Why do we try to make it better?
Is the best revenge always making a great movie?
Before we begin today, can I ask you a question?
You know our monthly FilmStack Joint Post Challenge? Perhaps you’ve participated in “If I ran a film studio” or “How to improve the moviegoing experience”. I am hoping we can keep doing this every month for several years. I know it is possible. But like anything else, the question is what is the best way forward.
Taylor over at Luz has remarked that FilmStack is becoming the Cinema Think Tank floating ideas for innovation on all fronts. I like that idea very much.
And so I’ve been thinking. And I’ve floated this idea to you before, but I want you to weigh in. You see, I am an advocate for the utopian small group democracy where there are no leaders, but we all take responsibility. I like the idea of group owned enterprises. No bosses. We are all leaders. So I think what we should do is that every month, the last group post curator passes the baton to another substack writer to put it a question to the group regarding some aspect of cinema art or business and its ecosystem. We need to do it in a way that allos the resulting post to be written in 30 minutes or so. We want to keep it meaningful, to generate deep thought and fun ideas. You can curate more than once a year, but ideally it will go round and round. So what say you?
And check this out!
Also let me give a plug to a friend’s upcoming video chat later today:
"MrBeast is heading to a second season on Amazon, Netflix is getting into video podcasts, more people watch YouTube on their TVs than their phones.... Join tech and culture reporter Taylor Lorenz and film/tv producer Kathleen Lingo to chat live on Substack this Monday at 5pm PT about how we got here and what this means for filmmakers. Free for all Lingo on Doc subscribers"
Okay, and now on with the show!!!
This is a deep one…
Why do we reach high?
I was inspired by the books I read, the movies I saw, and the music I listened to. They made me want to do more with my life and labor, and eventually my attention. I felt heard. Seen. I felt the sense of the possible. I could dream utopian.
It went even far beyond that though – as I am sure it did with you too. I loved walking in the woods and up in the hills. Watching the waves on the beach. At sunset no less. And I love to eat. And drink. Hang out with friends, talking about life and all that inspired us. Falling in love, staying in love, returning to love. There’s so much that is so remarkable. And the songs, stories, images, flow… they all deepened that.
I’ve always wanted to contribute. I have always thought that was a bit how it worked: we all tried to contribute and do good work, lift each other higher and higher until sometimes we got close to the marvelous. It’s amazing what we can accomplish. Particularly together. At least sometimes. And sometimes is enough.
I also thought that was why we build systems: to help us do good work, better work. It made sense that if we improved the systems, we’d also improve the work. There is no gap in that logic, is there? You’d think then that those that wanted to do good work, to enjoy good work, would also want to build better systems, right?
When I started to reach that point in life where I thought I could really contribute one day to culture — that thing that lasts and lasts — and add to the good work that was already out there, I liked that there was so much that I didn’t like, that I thought was mediocre, that just wasn’t worthy of my time. Truly. I liked that there was so much to disappoint me.
That crap was getting made. If I made – or even just tried to make – something better than that crap, mine should get made and seen too and, maybe — just maybe — enjoyed. I thought it also followed that if I proved I could do it -- particularly if I could do it over and over again – it would grow easier and I’d have more resources and collaborators as time went on. I’d be generating opportunity.
But it doesn’t work that way.
I have to learn to accept that the world doesn’t really care for what matters most to me. I’ve been fighting against it my entire life. I learned to love that fight. Crave it. I will show them. Tell me “no” and it will increase my drive. I’ve managed to make a ton of movies by loving the stories others don’t want to tell. I like the scripts others don’t believe in. I like the ones the directors reject, that the actors don’t say yes to. The ones that are impossible to finance, get rejected by festivals, and turned down by distributors. But over a hundred of my dear fishes have escaped through the net and flourished in the open sees. I showed them. The best revenge is making a great movie, and mine that no one wanted, well, they won awards, made money, and got good reviews. That’s worth something… but it changes nothing.
I am really pleased with what I have accomplished. And I did what I wanted. Yet it is never enough, never truly satisfying. And it has never gotten easier either, and, truth is, I don’t think it ever will.
These things that I love still go unwanted. Some of the apparatus is there for the sort of stuff I aspire to, but not much. So much more is possible. We can lift it higher. We will lift it higher. There are those working diligently to make it a bit better, but even they will tell you it is not currently a sustainable life. They too might have learned to love the fight, because there really isn’t much more to keep one going that that. Other than loving what you do of course. And knowing that we are all in it together. It helps to know we are not alone.
Perhaps we can find solace in being the resistance, the counterforce. The right side of history. Or the thought that somewhere sometime someone will lift up what we throw down and it will inspire them as if we are all one, and in this great endeavor together. Our work will speak to them: “You are not alone; you are part of something larger than yourself. We are connected through time and space, and love, hope, and dreams”.
Come with me.
I will take you there. The better place is not only possible, but it is around the corner.
Or at least that is what I feel on my better days. I still don’t know how we put up with so much crap. We shit where we eat. A swarm of monkeys masturbating wildly in spite of each other and all over the furniture.
I have to remind myself that there is so much beauty because if I don’t, I will see that I am living in a hell. It is not an either/or – which I think would actually be preferable because then at least one option is to leave the crap behind. It is more of both/and -- which means we will always have to put up with the other; it’s not ever going to go away. I have a bookshelf of inspiration waiting to be read, but no matter all the good songs and the transcendent paintings, no matter what I eat, I am still here, in a land where so few really care.
They will never like what I like so much. So what, right?
When I read those books and heard those songs, looked at the photos and pondered the paintings, I wanted to make films that speak to the many and live over the years. I wanted that to be the system that I was in, where that connection was actually possible. It never will be and I don’t think I will ever get used to that. It doesn’t feel right.
Something feels wrong.
I love the little details. The nuance. The multiple interpretations. The hidden meaning. The unintended consequence. The note that lingers and the unfinished sentence.
But that’s me. Just me.
I will always be alone, even when surrounded by loving friends and family. Even when I achieved the miracle that is finding a partner to share a life with. No matter that connection, no matter how lasting and deep. We are far off lands, touching, but still always just ourselves.
And that goes for you too.
But that is why we try so hard.
We want to fall in love with that thing no one else wants, the thing that everyone else overlooks. It is there for us. Just us.
It is the thing with feathers, the last thing in the box. It will fly out and dance around, and do it just because it is what it likes and the best revenge is just not giving a fuck what they think or that they ever will. We have ourselves. We have each other. And we will always love it even if others never will.
We make things better because we want it that way, because we know if we each rub the dog’s nose, it will stay shiny. It won’t be forgotten. It will find the others that need it so.
Do you like posts like this? Do they help? Inspire? Let me know. I always want to know how I can help, what I should share (or not). Leave a comment or “heart” it. Let’s build on the conversation. Thanks.
We often think we do what we do because we want to be happy. In reality, we do what we do because we need to be fulfilled--a very different thing. We don't really know what will do that, if anything even can, and for every single person it is individual and private. But it drives us. More than a goal or even a dream. Maybe it is the essence of life-force itself?
I always reflect on the realization that if we make things easier, it'll be easier to make schlock too. It's common to think that because filmmaking was hard to do back in the day, that's why we had so much "golden age" good stuff. But the reality is, at the times that bread such genius as Jacques Tati, the rest of the world was laughing at The Three Stooges. I've realized that both sides of the coin must exist at the same time. The cream rises only above the milk below it. And there is always a lot more milk than cream.
So as we change the system so that it is easier to create and get our creations seen, we'll have to put up with a lot of less than stellar stuff filling the void as well. But if we want the stars to shine, there's got to be a lot of dark sky around them for contrast. But we need a night sky with stars, don't we? So we keep looking in the dark for them, and smile when we find them and see them twinkle.