Alice Waddington’s first short 2015’s “Disco Inferno,” was invited to 65 international film festivals, including Fantastic Fest, where it won Best Director and Best Feature Project. “Paradise Hills” marks her feature directorial debut.

“Paradise Hills” will premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival on January 26.

W&H: Describe the film for us in your own words.

AW: Paradise Hills is an institution located on an isolated Mediterranean island in the middle of the ocean where well-off families from all over the world send their daughters to be molded into “perfect” versions of themselves. These girls are marginalized because they have refused to adapt to expected social rules. Some don’t want to enter into arranged marriages, others want the freedom to love their own gender, or have non-normative minds and bodies.

Through individually calibrated treatment regimens, all physical and emotional shortcomings are resolved within two months. Transformation is guaranteed. But it is soon realized that there is a sinister secret lurking behind all this beauty.

W&H: What drew you to this story?

AW: When we wrote the original treatment, our main goal was telling a diverse, all-female science fiction tale that did not rely on women’s objectification or suffering, but on stories of personal independence and self-love.

I wanted to give girls and women an entertaining fairytale that acted like a poison apple, filled with all of the visual and narrative treats that fascinated me as a teenager: high fantasy, ’90s shōjo manga, ’60s genre films, and costume dramas. These are stories that dared to inhabit eccentric fantasy worlds—whether real or imagined—with narratives that motivated young girls to wield their power.

W&H:What do you want people to think about when they are leaving the theater?

AW: I want women to feel empowered to try and become as brave as our female protagonists. I want young adults to know that there’s more than one way to be a woman, and that they can choose to become whatever makes their heart sing.

W&H:What was the biggest challenge in making the film?

AW: The biggest challenge was the unique worldbuilding our team needed to develop from scratch. Using real interior or exterior locations is always a challenge, but utilizing them to tell a brand-new science fiction story proved to be a puzzle. We’d scout every location ranging from Modernist Barcelona buildings, Edwardian mansions, and cutting-edge supercomputing centers to Gran Canaria rainforests and botanical gardens. We knew Brutalist architecture was the right choice for our modern Gothic castle, which acted as another character in the story. And they all had to fit together!

W&H: How did you get your film funded? Share some insights into how you got the film made.

AW: The film was funded through public subsidies, tax credits, pre-sales, and television. It’s a highly independent production with many different streams of financing that our wonderful producers—Núria Valls and Adrián Guerra from Nostromo Pictures—put together on their own, and quite bravely so.

Also, this was almost three years ago. Investing in a female-led, female-directed film was seen as a true gamble, which is puzzling given that women are sometimes more than 50 percent of moviegoers.

W&H: What inspired you to become a filmmaker?

AW: My teenage love for Japanese genre and adventure comic books and animation — “Princess Knight,” “Chobits,” “Time Stranger Kyoko,” to name a few — led me to Western storytelling, including European arthouse and small studio films such as”The Abominable Dr. Phibes” and the British TV series “The Prisoner.” All of these joyful, free, odd works were a strong visual and narrative influence on “Paradise Hills.”

I originally wanted to become a photographer and started by assisting a director of photography. I then studied advertising in the Public Basque University and began taking promotional stills and directing fashion films for the Spanish editions of magazines like Harper’s Bazaar. I also worked as an advertising creative, a producer, and an editor at the agencies Leo Burnett Iberia and Social Noise, specializing as a storyboard artist.

In 2014, with the help of Mexican producer Yadira Ávalos, I took a year off agency work to make the short film “Disco Inferno,” which received award nominations from 67 international film festivals including Palm Springs, Fantasia, Sitges, and Fantastic Fest.

It was at Fantastic Fest that I met Guillermo del Toro, who introduced me to his agents, who in turn introduced me to the producers of “Paradise Hills.” I’m extremely grateful to see the fruits of our labor premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival!

W&H: What’s the best and worst advice you’ve received?

AW: The best advice I’ve heard would be to find the people you love working with the most and stick with them throughout your career.

The worst was perhaps a decade-old one: “Now you just need to find producers who’ll want to work with a pretty lady.”

W&H: What advice do you have for other female directors?

AW: Persist and fight for your ideas. If your gut tells you it’s right and your team agrees it’s sensible, go for it.

Or, to quote the ever-eloquent Björk, “I want to support young girls who are in their 20s and tell them: You’re not just imagining things. It’s tough. Everything that a guy says once, you have to say five times.”

W&H: Name your favorite woman-directed film and why.

AW: There’s no way I could ever choose just one, so I’ll mention two favorites off the top of my head. First is “Belle,” directed by Amma Asante. Dido Elizabeth Belle, who the film is about, was such a fascinating person that was treated so unfairly by historians. This film does her justice.

Another one would be “Orlando,” directed by Sally Potter. Its sense of humor is impeccably bizarre—there’s someone falling on their butt every three shots, yet it’s such an elegant experience. The costumes are out-of-this-world stunning. And Tilda Swinton playing that incredible character!

I guess I really fancy a costume drama directed by a kick-ass lady.

W&H: It’s been a little over a year since the reckoning in Hollywood and the global film industry began. What differences have you noticed since the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements launched?

AW: There’s definitely a higher level of recognition of the female creative force, which is awesome and long overdue. [Our interest in representation shouldn’t just be] symbolic [or a hollow gesture] —queer women, women of color, and physically and mentally diverse women all deserve the spotlight.