Your Only Weapon is Your Work

Following on from yesterday's blog post, I came across these wise words of advice from a letter written by John Steinbeck to fellow writer and friend Dennis Murphy.

Your Only Weapon Is Your Work

"You have a harder fight now than you’ve ever had. It is tough to battle opposition and disapproval but that’s easy compared to the subtle attack of approval and flattery. There’s nothing so nice as a compliment and if it can be true it’s even nicer but also there is nothing more weakening. You’ve done well against failure. Now let’s see how you defend yourself against success. Your only weapon is your work. Take everything you can but keep your work pure and innocent and fierce.

After you have finished let them have it, but while you are doing it for God’s sake, keep your holy loneliness."

A Personal Journey for Sharing

I sometimes wonder if the content of this blog is an acting substitute for a personal diary...all this gunk of ideas continuously spews and needs to be released somehow, it just so happens that it's released in a public space.

But in this line of work, there is an ever-present feeling of vulnerability. If I am making a film it involves the collaboration of others to share my ideas and in turn help to make a vision real. If I am writing a script (as I am currently doing for my Screenwriting class) it involves sharing with the rest of the class what I have written and sometimes the reason for my motives.

Writing and making films isn't something I do just to keep myself amused, it is an outlet for a large volume of ideas that need to be expressed and interpreted lest they fester in frustration. It is therefore natural that my projects come from a very personal place, and it can be daunting to make that leap and put it out there in public, open to scrutiny and inevitably criticism.

It can go both ways though, if you make a conscious leap of faith to share your work, you think to yourself "I don't know what peoples' reaction will be" -the butterflies in the stomach begin to stir. Most people begin by sharing their projects with close family, friends or tutors. In my experience, I have received nothing but supportive comments from great friends that realise how hard it can be to 'show yourself' in this way, and know that a positive comment, no matter how humble, can be like a rocket lifting your self esteem and incentivising you to go further.

A lot of the above says more about the kind nature of my friends than the quality of my work. In actual fact, I believe that criticism when given constructively can be more motivational than anything else. It is possible to get stuck in your vision sometimes -'writer's block' can apply to anyone who is moulding a concrete, physical piece from an abstract idea. It is then that you realise that you need other people, you need their buzz, their ideas and their energy to reinvigorate you and your projects - this includes criticism, praise, whatever it may be that helps you achieve your vision.

So in reflection, I come back to the opening statement of the post - about this blog serving sometimes as a personal diary, and in pondering this I am asking myself if it is appropriate to share these thoughts somewhere like this. I feel very much that it is, because often I write down these thoughts without having spoken to anyone else about them. Not only is it a way to unburden myself, but to reach out to others who are working in similar fields, and ask if this is the experience they have, and whether they have anything to add. After all, you can't do it completely by yourself...can you?

Day One

Most children will have been taught by their parents when growing up that they should never play on stairs, indeed most children should then grow up to possess at least a shred of common sense. Not me. I spent a good part of this Saturday afternoon balanced precariously on the landing of my Victorian staircase all in the good name of film making. Result? about 30 seconds of me staring blankly at a camera lens. This is exactly what I wanted to achieve, but it was only after having disassembled most of the living room furniture and broken the clothes horse that I realised hanging off a staircase was the best way to achieve my 'blank stare'. Perhaps I should explain...

I wanted to create a stark black and white picture - severe frame - severe haircut - severe expression. I intended to look a cross between a nazi camp guard and a loony science geek. I think I achieved the effect quite well...the character is a boy who suffers from Obsessive Compulsive behaviour, he is repressed and not doing what he wants to do. Living an inauthentic existence means that he is bound for failure and the more he fails, the more he must tighten his grip and regain control - hence the OCD. So I had to make sure I was firmly in the middle of the frame for preliminary photography, and because I had the misfortune of being alone whilst doing this, I had to rely on resourcefulness to achieve the effect - to the stairwell I went!

I'll upload some stills when I get home...

ICA: TCP and Table Salt

I went to the ICA to see some free artistic events last night, there was an eclectic mix on offer. Try laser gunning an artist until a red strapless dress appears on his body…or taking part in a Sewing Machine race (a sort of snakes and ladders meets high-speed stitching) there was also a good folk band playing in a cavernous space romantically lit by candles – that was nice.

We went to see a play called ‘Growing Old With You’ which, in their own words: “attempts to document lived experience in real time”. I was none the wiser upon entering and…not much the wiser upon leaving. It seemed the performance revolved around a couple’s experience together in a relationship, and certainly didn’t leave you with a warm feeling of ‘togetherness’. One of the many silent role plays included the female artist rubbing her man down with TCP, much in the vigorous manner you would imagine employed by a matron during the war. She then covered him with three industrial sized tubs of salt whilst he finally gave in to sing her the theme to Home and Away (a song she had requested he sing on their first encounter apparently)

I applaud their highly physical role play which was compelling…however there was no grace to the choreography but rather a series of aggressive treatments (remember the TCP?) which gave a feeling that this relationship was a clunky and cold affair, that there was no tender, loving bind keeping this couple together. I even think they intended to irritate the audience with their long pauses and their emotional detachment from one another – I almost wanted to scream “lighten up!”

If it was their intention to irritate and estrange the audience then bravo, job done. But there was precious little information on what the piece was intended to portray, so it left you guessing. To be honest it wasn’t good enough to engage the audience and stimulate them to make their own interpretations.

At least it was free…

It all happened at once

Why is it that in life nothing seems to happen for a very long time and then suddenly it all happens at once? It would appear it does pay off to be patient (eventually) - for in the last week everything has happened - and all very positively but nonetheless it has left me in a bit of a delirious daze.

Let me start from the beginning. It has been my intention for a long while to study a One Year Practical Filmmaking Diploma in order to accumulate a lot of technical experience as well as a good and diverse portfolio of work. Well, that's what the logical side of my brain has long believed and thankfully has been in the driving seat, though the irrational neurotic side of the brain has still made itself heard and has ensured that my thoughts of the last few months about 'what to do' with my life have been frustrating, occasionally erring on the unbearable. I mean, what does an embryonic filmmaker have to go on we he doesn't have the experience that others have, as well as a nagging awareness that there is so much to learn about an industry that is so multi-faceted and competetive? I have relied mainly on gut instinct -going on the fact that it 'feels' right, and it really feels oh so right, more right than anything else in my life so far.

So in between these little mental workouts, I have been carrying on with my Screenwriting course as usual and scribbling illegible notes on the bus (not grafittying may I add, though it can occasionally be so bumpy that accidental graffitti of the seat or a woman's handbag may occur).

It just so happened that a week ago I called the MET Film School to inquire about their admissions deadline for the one year course, having read that they take applicants on a first-come-first-served basis. He said that I should be doing the application now and could I get it to him by the end of the week? I had expected him to say in the next month...

If there is any excuse for taking a few days off work this was one of them, and I got down to writing a long personal statement on what motivated me to do Filmmaking. It was very hard, especially because so many things inspire me. How can you pin down disparate, unarticulated thoughts into a structured, coherent essay? It took some time, but I appreciated the effectiveness of the exercise. It forced me to think seriously for the first time about what it is that drives me to want to do this, and in so doing, I started to take myself seriously for the first time. The cynical part of my brain was relegated to white noise - I no longer feared of myself that I might just be doing this all on a whim because it 'looked like fun'.

Anyway, once the application was finally submitted I was called on the spot by the admissions department asking if I would be free for an interview in 3 days. Another day's holiday happily booked, I braced myself for an hour of interrogation on the films I loved and what it was I wanted to achieve.
In reality it wasn't too daunting, the questions were quite probing, obviously they want to know that people are committed to the intense nature of this study before they accept you, but he was all the same very friendly and quickly put my nervous twiddling thumbs at ease.
The best part was being offered a place at the end of the interview, and whilst quietly maintaining a cool, composed outward manner, I was screaming for joy internally - ringing the church bells with gay abandon - HA!

That is when I knew. I knew that all the thought put into the application as well as the extraordinary emotional energy I had invested was all worth it. It was all I needed to be sure that I was doing the right thing. It is the first time in my life I have genuinely been proud of myself because I am following what I want to do and have done it myself. It's a good feeling.

The hard work starts now, but I am SO looking forward to it. I feel like life is beginning, and hopefully as it does I will be able to share my experiences on this blog because if experience is anything to go by, expect the unexpected when working in film!

People's Picturehouse: Saturday 22nd January: Werner Herzog double bill.....

People's Picturehouse: Saturday 22nd January: Werner Herzog double bill.....: "The People's Picturehouse is proud to present: a Werner Herzog double bill. This Saturday we will be showing Lessons of Darkness (52m) ..."

Clio Barnard - Before the Arbor, BAFTA.

Back in October I went to see The Arbor, Clio Barnard's film about the troubled lives of deceased playwrite Andrea Dunbar's children. It used the voices of her real children lipsynched by actors and interspersed with scenes from Dunbar's plays about the Brafferton Arbor estate in Bradford.

It was a powerful piece of work -a mix of fictional story and documentary aesthetic -that's her style. She will be talking about her earlier short-film work at BAFTA this Saturday evening. If you can get down there, do because it looks set to be a really interesting event.

More info below:

http://www.bafta.org/public-event.html?Pevent=com.othermedia.bafta.model.BaftaEvent-L-6198966