Producing - Week Four

A rather lonely week. Everyone from my class has been either preparing to leave for the U.S. or on the shoot for Breathing Room. I am now the only one in the class who hasn’t been on set for one of our end-of-year films... boohoo. Never mind, I have my turn next week. As it happens it was rather pleasant to have a quiet and peaceful few days in which to hack away at the production tasks still to be done. For this was indeed the last full week of prep for Broken Bubbles. This coming Wednesday, we shoot!

A rather stunted week also. Only four days, since this Friday and Saturday we will be savouring the delights of the Edinburgh International Film Festival. I’m sure I’ll have plenty to say about that later. Something I have rediscovered over these past few days has been the pure joy of filmmaking. It is something far too easily forgotten or trivialised in the competitive chaos of the student filmmaker’s slog to success. I, personally, put so much pressure on myself to learn, improve, develop, succeed, that I can almost forget why I do it. Then a day comes along like this Thursday, where I’m tearing about like a ball in a pinball machine; chairing a full crew meeting, supervising a green screen test, watching a make-up test, passing a costume fitting, or spotting Murdo in an in-depth ‘character’ discussion with an actor; while of course trying to get back to the production office to organise the countless other things that have yet to be done. This is what producing is all about. And I love it. Imagine I was doing all this and I didn’t enjoy it. If I wasn’t excited by the bustle and chaos, if I didn’t get a warm glow inside when I see a beautifully painted prop, if I didn’t just love it when everything is going wrong and everyone is turning to me for answers. Imagine I didn’t enjoy it. It would be just like any other job then, where I just can’t wait until the weekend or the next holiday.

François Truffaut, the great director of the French New Wave, said:

“I demand that a film express either the joy of making cinema or the agony of making cinema. I am not at all interested in anything in between.”

I take his point. All good art comes from passion. I want to be a good filmmaker. I’m passionate about filmmaking. But am I a passionate filmmaker? It’s a challenge. Something to strive for.