I learned a couple weeks ago that in the sixties and early seventies there was a pharmacist here in Grand Rapids by the name of Middleton who collected 16mm films. In the basement of his drugstore he kept a library of everything from school instructional films to local films to major features, and would rent them out with a 16mm projector to his friends and customers. When Middleton died, he left all the films to our local library with the stipulation that they never be sold. Shortly after his death, VHS hit the market. Suddenly, 16mm films were about as attractive as driving around an AMC Gremlin. Other libraries and TV stations trucked their cans of 16mm to the Middleton Film Library for free to make shelf-space for video cassettes. The collection grew.
Over the past several decades, the Middleton library has moved from basement to basement. Some of the films have succumbed to poor storage conditions, but a lot have survived. I was around for the most recent move, to a climate-controlled facility here in town. When I arrived to meet the man who has inherited the library, Ghirb Eevsting, the scene looked like the reunion of a high school audio/video club from 1976. Middle-aged men were telling stories of their lives in production and sharing old techie knowledge while shelving cans from shopping carts. A can with the words “Nazi War Propaganda” written in marker was elected to be screened first. Then we ate pizza and talked about the future of the library.
In short, there is no plan for the future. Right now it’s a bunch of guys with a bug for treasure hunting who will eventually transfer the films to digital video. Our lunch conversation moved to less romantic talk about possible grants and in-fighting between non-profit media organizations. But even amidst the bureaucracy of non-profit fund raising, there’s something about this collection that invigorates film geeks. In fact, a collector from San Francisco and one from New York each offered to pay for a semi-truck and movers to pick up the entire library if Ghirb would sign ownership over to them (Ghirb still doesn’t know how these collectors found him).
As I ate pizza with them, I thought of my grandfather combing the beach with a metal detector. I would walk next to him as he hovered the donut shaped end of the wand over the sand and listened intently to sonar ping sounds in the headphones. I’d jabber about finding a hidden pirates’ treasure and he’d eventually tell me to leave. I wanted a treasure and he wanted to hunt.
The middle-aged A/V club hopes there’s a treasure in the basement. But I get the sense they’re in this for the hunt more than the treasure. They believe they’ve got something precious. They believe there’s tremendous value is saving these relics, even if nobody is willing to step up and fund their expedition. As for me, I don’t know. Maybe they should scrap them. How much time will be spent sifting through half-rotted junk looking for something great? Who decides what’s great? My grandpa hunted for gold on his vacations. These guys will be pouring more than vacation time into this collection.
I want them to follow their hearts, but I’m skeptical at the same time. Is it a fool’s errand to archive this collection? I’m ashamed to admit it, but it’s a nagging question for me. How many people actually find a Van Gogh in their attic?
“This seems kind of obvious, but filmmaking is about storytelling, and stories are all around you, no matter where you live. You need to tell those stories.”
Spout’s founder, Rick DeVos, said it, making what I thought was the most inspirational point of all at the Waterfront Film Festival panel “3,000 Miles Away.” (OK, maybe I’m a bit biased, since I’m a Spout employee, but what he had to say truly resonated with me.)
A similar sentiment apparently resonated with filmmaker Colin Gray about five years ago. Colin is half of the team known as “The Sibs” (the other half being his sister, Megan Raney). After clipping an article from the newspaper, he was struck by the realization that he had a story to tell. It was important. No one else was going to tell it. Even if it seemed like a bizarre concept, he had to do it. He had to tell the story about
Going to festivals and making a point of seeing first-time filmmakers is a hit or miss game. Finding a real gem from somebody who came out of nowhere is like no other feeling in movie watching. But most of the time I find myself stirring in my seat, listening to line after line of dialogue heavy on information and low on drama. Most of these films fall into a freshman sand trap of simply delivering bulky information to the audience, while relying on tricks to excite people. And when it’s time for the audience to have a revelation, it winds up being a soliloquy that ends with a deep breath and a phrase like, “I guess you’ve got to forget somebody before you can really remember them.” With the accessibility of equipment out there and the diversity of life experience, I’m surprised to see how homogenized the stories that show up at festivals can be.
Ten years ago, Ed Burns was one of these young filmmakers showing She’s the One on the festival circuit. I felt with She’s the One, Burns was way too polished. Now with The Groomsmen, he’s revisited familiar territory and smoothed out the rough edges. In both films he’s simply telling stories from what he knows
We’re here at one of our favorite festivals, The Waterfront Film Festival. It’s a weekend for Industry people to let their hair down (while Midwesterners put their hair up) and watch the “best ofs” from the festival circuit. The atmosphere is pleasantly uncharged compared to Park City in January, and casual conversations flow. There are also some panel discussions, most designed to be eye openers for young Midwestern filmmakers.
On Friday, Spout’s own Rick was on the panel discussion “3,000 Miles Away from LA.” Sitting up front with him was a melange of directors, writers and creative developers, all who live or lived in Michigan at one time (four of the six panelists live in LA now). The topic: Can a filmmaker make a living between the coasts? The basic answer: yes, but not if you’re an actor. The caveat for anybody working in film is this: Even if you make films outside of LA, to become viable (i.e. get paid), you have to tie the knot with people in LA. Essentially, for a filmmaker, this means the check that allows you to quit your day job will be signed in LA. It’s inevitable.
What was blatantly absent from the conversation was any real questioning of this assumed paradigm. Does somebody in LA really have to sign my check for me to be viable? What if a filmmaker quit their day job because, say, they have hundreds of smaller checks coming to them from a loyal audience? It reminds me of Jimmy Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life going to old man Potter for a fat wad of cash, getting denied, then jumping off a bridge. He simply couldn’t see what was really going to save him
My favorite season is here and my favorite festival is right around the corner
OK, I must admit: I’m super excited. I just spent time perusing the Waterfront Film Festival program, and so much of it sounds so good that I’ve developed this underlying frantic excitement in my belly. It makes me realize how bereft I am when it comes to having access to truly intriguing, unexpected films–the kind that leave you feeling different about everything you think and hear and see.
What I’m most excited about in terms of Waterfront is the line-up of short films. My experience with the genre is limited, but I already have an affection for them, spilling over from my love for short stories. What I love about short stories is how compact they are–how quickly they get to the heart of the matter and make you feel something, make you connect with someone.
Take some of the shorts that will be at Waterfront: Unhitched, a documentary about the residents of Faerie Ring Campground and RV Park, tucked away in the Redwoods, which serves as one of the only options for low income housing in its Northern California region. Twelve minutes long. Or Lighten Up, in which a man confesses to his best friend what he is doing to handle his life’s challenges. Told in eight minutes. Or Losing Lusk, the story of the least populated county in the country’s least populated state, Wyoming. Told in five minutes. And Twitch, which introduces us to a young girl torn between two worlds: her domestic life where she cares for her wheelchair-bound mother, and her escape into the world of sexuality with her eager boyfriend. Ten minutes.
Is anyone else amazed by this? That we can be told anything, become connected to a character, or be transported in any sense in such short bursts of time? I’m amazed. Kudos to the makers of short films. Let’s put our heads together to figure out how to see more of this genre outside of film festivals. Any ideas?
