As director of photography, Montreal's André Turpin has worked on a lot of movies, including Oscar-nominated Incendies and Xavier Dolan's Mommy.

Turpin also shot Hello, the Adele video directed by Xavier Dolan that's been seen by millions.

Now Turpin, the director, is talking up his second feature film, Endorphine, starring 15-year old Sophie Nélisse as Simone, a girl who sees her mother's murder.

"It's not a character piece per se, because it's all about how Simone is transformed," Turpin told CBC.

"When she's 13...she's a very lively, bright, witty character that's sort of [a] good, kind-hearted person, but then she's witness to her mother's brutal murder, and it changes everything."

"Her post-traumatic shock makes her not able to feel emotions anymore. She's completely a sociopath."

15-year-old Montreal actress Sophie Nélisse plays Simone as a girl.

The Quebec actress first got attention for her role in the Oscar-nominated Quebec film, Monsieur Lazhar. She was just 11 when she became the youngest Genie winner in the history of the awards for that role.

Nélisse has also starred in several English-language movies, including The Book Thief, as well as the soon-to-be-released The Great Gilly Hopkins, with Glenn Close and Kathy Bates.

CBC Arts reporter Jeanette Kelly talked to Sophie Nélisse about Endorphine.

Here is an edited version of their conversation.

Sophie Nélisse: I wouldn't say sociopath, personally, but she's quite strange and interesting because we don't all see those kind reactions.

The reaction we expect of someone noticing her mother's death is to cry or to feel really bad or to fall into a depression or something. But her reaction is completely out of the ordinary. I've never seen that before in someone, which is what was so interesting.

The main goal – the main challenge – was that.

I usually use a lot of my lines to show my emotion... to show that I'm mad or happy, whatever.

[This] was to show that same emotion without talking: showing that emotion through my eyes, my body language – that was the hardest part – and also doing that without getting the audience to look at you and be bored and fall asleep.

I'm not even sure if that's what I actually achieved!

I don't like watching myself. and I always think I'm bad when I look at myself so I couldn't say if I'm satisfied, but I hope.

When I was looking in the audience yesterday, no one was falling asleep – so that's a good sign.

That helps me because I'm not a shy person, and when I talk with André or whichever director, I'm able to get everything out on the table.

I know what I want, and I say what I'm looking for, and I want people to tell me the truth.

When I'm not satisfied or I'm stressed for a scene, I think that really helps, because I can tell them straight what I'm afraid of, and then we can talk.

I'm able to learn my lines really fast. I talk really fast, and that's a thing that people tell me the most: 'Try to talk not as fast.'

When I have speaking roles that's the main challenge.

I have to admit I was looking at that yesterday while watching the movie. I was, like, 'She does faint a lot more than my memory.'

My perspective – and I don't even know if it's the same as [Turpin's] – ...it's like a time loop, like a gateway to switch into different times, different periods in her mind of what happened in the past.

It's like coming back to all these places, and I think it's also – when she can't deal with it, when she can't do it anymore, she just passes out. Instead of just facing it, she blacks out.

That's what you see at the end. You understand the last time she sees the murder, she decides that this time she's not going to faint, she's going to get through it, and I think that's how she ends up getting better: by getting through that fainting past.

The main thing is that the sets are, most of the time, much smaller because the budgets are much lower. But because we have a smaller budget, we're very organized...We always have a Plan B for everything. That's awesome.

I like shooting in Quebec. It's kind of, more like my family. I feel it's not as intimidating. I come back home, and ...even if you don't know the set, even if it's your first time on set, you know someone who knows someone that you've worked with before, or there [are] a lot of people that you've worked with before: Like, I did Monsieur Lazhar that was on this, and I'm like, 'Oh my God.' And after two days, you know everyone on the set, and you're best friends.

But obviously, I love shooting in the States because it's huge: It's so intimidating and overwhelming, and I'm most of the time shooting with actors that I've been looking up to since I was super young. Then I go to all these huge premieres and these huge red carpets, and Meryl Streep is, like, walking right beside me, and I'm, like, 'This is not happening right now.'

I would say crop tops.

The standard girls that wear super small crop tops that cut off right under their boobs is really annoying, and they always wear them with leggings, and I think they look very…without using any swear words…I don't think they look proper.

It's too much, to go to school. I'll wear leggings, but I'll wear a shirt that covers my butt or something.

I really don't think about that right now.

It's funny to see all these girls [who] I've been competing with when I was doing gymnastics, a lot of the girls I was competing with – and were really good – are now not making the team. It's so surprising.

It's just completely another world now, and it's funny to see I could have been there, and now I'm just watching like a normal teenager. But I'm really happy for them and I wish them all the best."

Right now, none of my new releases are out.

I know in a couple of weeks, everybody is going to be like, 'Oh, we saw you in that movie,' and a lot of people will just be making stupid jokes about it in class.

Still I get a lot of stupid jokes from The Book Thief.

I'll be sitting in class, and, 'Oh I lost my pen,' and everybody turns and [says] 'Maybe it's the Book Thief,' and I'm, like, 'Hilarious.' That joke has been done to me so many times it's not funny anymore.'

But I'd rather that than to be home-schooled.