“The trajectory is right,” my friend H. said to me years ago about my filmmaking career.
At a recent dinner with my friend S. we discussed what we wanted for our artistic lives in 2011: “I just want the trajectory to keep going up,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be steep, a little incline is okay.”
Seems obvious. That’s what we all want, isn’t it? But what does it mean for a filmmaker and/or writer to be on a desirable trajectory?
There is the obvious: 8½ x 11’s budget was x, its running time 9 minutes, it was shot on 16mm film, and it screened at 10 film festivals. Tango Octogenario came in at x+y, ran 7 minutes (ooops), was filmed on glorious 35mm film, and screened at 33 film festivals around the world and on a number of PBS stations. That’s a desirable trajectory.
But I am misleading you, because really, after 8½ x 11, I wasn’t thinking bigger, longer, more viewers; what I really wanted to do was make a better film. And I think I did with Tango Octogenario. This is why when the film was first completed and it wasn’t getting shown ANYWHERE, I was totally flummoxed. Festivals wanted to show 8½ x 11, so did TV stations. Why wasn’t anyone interested in Tango Octo when it was so obviously (to me) better?
It took a few months and many rejections before a festival took a chance on Tango Octogenario. Fortunately, the festival that took a chance was New Directors/New Films, a film showcase put on by The Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Museum of Modern Art. After that, the film took off and suddenly many festivals wanted to show it. Some even waived their application fee. Imagine that.
And A Life’s Work? Budget x + y + z. Feature-length running time. The SD DV format is not as glamorous as 35mm film, but it’s a documentary; what it lacks in the format department it makes up for in the amount of footage department. Total footage of both of my previous films: under two hours. Total footage of A Life’s Work: over one hundred hours. Will it find a larger audience than Tango? I hope so.
The big question: will it be better?
Better is subjective, of course, and sometimes a work’s author is not its best judge, but from my subjective point of view, yes, it will be better.
So I’m happy to say A Life’s Work is on the right trajectory.