Bologna festival
Over 10 days of movies, Jo and I watched 40+ films, for me an unprecedented experience . The number of times I got asked, “what’s your favourite so far?” pushed me to address that I didn’t have a favourite. There were many films I admired and loads I really enjoyed; but most of all I loved the whole experience. Seeing a lot of films this way, they become a body of work. They become a pervading experience. I started to find elements in common… across quite random films, there were a lot of stories that relied upon the mother sacrificing herself for the daughter, and in quite a few cases, there was no pervading irony. The sacrifice was the way to represent order returning out of chaos, or the redeeming struggle. I don’t know why this trope kept reappearing, but it did: Applause, Stella Dallas, Lady Windermere’s Fan.
Watching films which speak to previous era and generations gives me access to previous cultural assumptions, and made it easier to ‘see’ the mechanism of excitement and decision making by the film makers.
The tropes of my career and efforts rose up. What I had learned, absorbed, attempted and assumed or stolen, thrown into relief through watching the work of ground breaking film makers.
For me, as a film maker, this opening up of ‘process’ has been wonderful. Having the opportunity to inhale so much, with so little judgement required, is the gift of Ritrovato. I can sit inside it and wait, watching and listening, allowing what will arise to arise.
So I had no ‘favourite’, but encountered a way of watching that engrossed and delighted. For which I am extremely grateful.
As I watched I wondered how I would have viewed this experience when I was a baby director. What I would have taken away from it, what I would have stolen and shamelessly taken credit for - there would have been much. But I know I was in a hurry, sitting still and waiting and deliberately watching such a body, I doubt I would have had the patience to really see what was on offer.
As the 10 days progressed I was drawn to the films that were kicking against the pricks, where censorship and control, or just limitations of budget, provoked solutions and poetry: Macario, 4 In A Jeep, Yam Daabo and Bushman come to mind.
Making comparisons between previous restrictions and thinking of the constraints of present certainties, has reinforced how film always works best when pushing boundaries, and drawing attention to iniquity, using surprise and discomfort, even and particularly, in comedy.
As an industrial process production can often view new directors (in particular) as irresponsible children who though essential, have to be controlled and constrained by budget and schedule, very evident in Powell’s early quota quickies. Again, watching the body of work, I was able to see how art can arise despite (or because of ?) the controls and constraints, manifested in the work a magnificently broad spread of directors developing their craft.