T-Port Blog

In William Sehested Høeg’s workplace tragi-comedy THE COMPLAINT, his protagonist Mona learns of a complaint made about her to HR while attending a management training course. 

We chatted with the Danish filmmaker about his process as well as finding the balance between comedy and pain. THE COMPLAINT was picked as part of the 2025 T-Port Lighthouse Selections by our special guest curator Kasia Karwan. The short is also part of the European Film Promotion’s Future Frames series, as well as having screened at Karlovy-Vary Film Festival. 

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Hi William, could you introduce yourself? 

My name is William Sehested Høeg, I’m a 32 year old filmmaker, living with my family in Copenhagen. I grew up a little outside Copenhagen, but I don’t know if that has really influenced my passion for film. But I come from a middle-class family and grew up in a very wealthy area – so I remember feeling different early on because I was the only one running around making films during my breaks in primary school.

If you could watch one film forever on a loop – what would it be?

“Jurassic Park” or “Apocalypse Now.” 

How many films have you made before this one, and what did each new film teach you?

I have made seven short films before THE COMPLAINT – and THE COMPLAINT was my graduation film from the Danish Film School in Copenhagen. The graduation film was largely a result of first and foremost figuring out what tone I would like my films to have: A combination of suspense and comedy that I don’t think I come across very often. 

My producer calls the film a “suspense-comedy” – which I really like. And it’s a tone I want to pursue with my next films.

How did you first start working on this film? What was the process like and what first sparked the idea to make it?

I’ve been in love with movies ever since I saw ‘Jurassic Park’ for the first time. I actually wanted to be a paleontologist, but my parents told me the movie was fictional. And then I became incredibly interested in the work behind a movie. I watched all sorts of different movies that I shouldn’t have seen so early on – and I became obsessed with buying DVDs to watch the behind the scenes documentaries – almost more than watching the movie. 

That interest in movies never went away – so two weeks after I got my driver’s license I was a runner on a commercial. And ever since then I’ve worked my way up through the industry in Denmark – always with the ultimate goal of writing and directing movies one day. 

I’ve tried to wear many different hats before I started directing – which makes me feel incredibly comfortable in most production and creative processes of making a movie – because I’ve experienced the processes from multiple sides.

Once you had the idea – how did you go about the production process?

I use my team a lot, and I use them early in the process. I like to expose the script to the team as we develop – so that the development of the film affects the script, and the script can affect the development. That way the process becomes very organic.

What were the biggest challenges you encountered during making your film?

Writing the script haha… Because we were working with a character that we wanted to both make you think she was awful and have sympathy for, and that’s difficult to write. The nuances come from the actors – a little look, or a pause – we had to trust that that sympathy came through. And then it was a big challenge to create the course itself, which is the framework for the film, because we wanted it to be as authentic as possible. For example, my screenwriter and I took courses ourselves to become inspired.

How was it to collaborate with your cast and crew? Have you formed any particular meaningful connection from someone from the crew you would like to share?

At film school, I learned how important it is for me to start a process with a production designer and composer early in the process. Almost as early as the script.

What did you find (or still find) as especially lacking in the process of distributing and promoting your film? What was especially challenging?

It has been a challenge that we have made a “long” short film, in 45 minutes. But it was a very conscious choice, as my entire team had only tried to make smaller stories in 20-25 minutes. So festivals have been almost impossible.

What do feel young film talents lack the most today, after graduating from film school? Where are the gaps in the film industry?

I generally feel that there should be more opportunities to debut as a young talent. In Denmark, there is almost only one scheme you can apply for financing for your first feature film. And most TV stations want you to have made a feature film before you direct for them. So that makes the options very limited.

What’s next for you?

Right now I’m writing my debut feature film which I’m going to make with the same team as THE COMPLAINT. I can’t say much about it yet – other than that we’re aiming for the same mood and tone in terms of genre – but that it’s a completely new story set in perhaps the most toxic group dynamic imaginable.

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