Filmmaker By Night

PREPRODUCTION > CONCEPTION

It's tempting to claim to be a filmmaker but the truth is a bit different. Most of my time and efforts, due to nessecity and the pursuit of well roundedness go towards a job. A great job. But a job nonetheless. One that can not allow me to claim to be anything other then, for the time being, a filmmaker by night.

Filmmaker by night. A romantic notion. One that clouds the reality, which is a constant battle with my own desire for sleep and dinner and television watching when I get home at 8ish or 9ish depending on the day. It speaks nothing to the creeping sense of encroachment on my "free time" which to be clear at this stage in my life is at best an illusion.

My time isn't free. It costs me a great deal. Especially when I'm not spending every waking moment making this or any other film. But that is a lifestyle I've not had any experience with, nor any suitable flesh and blood role models.

***

And still, I know there's a problem with the mother character in Pretend. Something isn't ringing true. My favorite filmmaker of all time has a very famous quote, of which I can only remember four words exactly as he said them. "Sincere and with daring." Meaning that to him, those were the two most important qualties of a picture. That it say something true about the human condition and that it say so in a new daring voice.

So if a film is original looking - and is told in a fresh and interesting way but says nothing of what I know to be real life - then I got to pass. The best thing, and is what I'm trying to do with PRETEND, is say something truthful about the nature of our hearts desires and our human potential - and put it in a fresh context. But the film has two characters. A mother and son. If it doesn't feel like a flesh and blood mother and a son - whats the point?

And so. I must drag my used up mind at the end of my day to my desk. And keep hammering at these 7 pages. Until each and everyone rings true. Until I am a filmmaker by day as well as by night.