I think there’s something in collaboration – the fact that you can sit there and bounce ideas off of someone. It definitely matters who the person is, because certain people… T
I’ve always wanted to introduce hip-hop filmmaking to film. There’s hip-hop art, dance, music, but there really isn’t hip-hop film. So I was trying to do that.
If you think of that, as a parent, you know that if you have too much justice and you’re too strict, you destroy a child. If you have too much mercy, as a parent, you destroy a child as well. A big part of this movie is Noah finding mercy for man.
These wrestlers aren’t organized. They have no union, no pension and no insurance. You meet wrestler after wrestler who sold out Madison Square Garden ten years ago, basically running on fumes today. There’s a lot of drama there.
I wasn’t a big fan of social anthropology. And, luckily, that created room for me to work in visual arts because I sort of ignored my requirements. I think I was attracted to social anthropology because I liked to travel and was always interested in far-off places.
That’s the time to play around, the moment of theater. And then you can shape things. But a lot of it is just managing stuff. It’s upsetting because you get away from the core.
Also expressionistic filmmaking – making the audience feel like they were inside the characters’ heads. And so we create all these different types of techniques to put the audience there.
I think it’s my nature to try and make original content, and that’s what I’ve done, is just try and approach things in an original way, and do things differently.
I think religion is often very different from spirituality. Religion is often about rules and people trying to control our lives who are actually very unspiritual…
It’s not that much of a difference. Basically, your job is the same as a film director. It’s a triangle between creativity, money, and time. But they don’t really change. You’re ultimately trying to get the most creativity and time with the money that you have.
I spent about a year and a half doing technical post work on ‘The Fountain’. Although I do like the process, I think my favorite part of filmmaking is the actors.
I’ve been joking that if Madonna taught us anything, you’ve got to reinvent yourself. I think it’s important as a filmmaker, as any person working in the arts, that you’ve got to try new stuff and challenge yourself and take chances.
