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Antonio Campos: The Media Diet

Brandon Harris
By Brandon Harris posted 1 year ago
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Of the 8,500 or so filmmakers who receive an automated rejection email from Sundance’s Geoff Gilmore every year, usually the Tuesday or Wednesday after Thanksgiving, nearly none receive the sweet revenge Antonio Campos has been privy to. Both his 2005 NYU undergrad short Buy It Now and his 2008 debut feature Afterschool were rejected by the Redford Cabal. Both were accepted into Cannes however, the short making Campos the youngest man ever to win a prize on the Croisette, the feature cementing his reputation as one of the most promising young American directors of his generation. Hot off the heels of its American debut at the New York Film Festival, Afterschool still awaits stateside commercial distribution. I recently had the privilege, along with my colleagues at Filmmaker Magazine, of bestowing the film with a Gotham Award nomination for “The Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You”. It will wind its way back to New York screens fairly soon when it screens at MOMA as part of a program supporting the nominees. In the meantime, we caught up with Campos to discuss The Godfather, Steve Reich and why he isn’t reading nearly enough fiction. For more with Campos, check out this interview over at Cinema Echo Chamber.What films or television shows have you seen recently?

I just watched The Godfather parts I and II restorations at the Film Forum, which was wonderful. Going to watch it again at the Ziegfeld this week. I enjoyed Serbis at NYFF. As for TV, I tend to watch only a few shows consistently, right now beside the news, I watch “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” pretty regularly.

Which ones stuck with you and why?

There really hasn’t been anything recently that has “stuck” with me, but The Godfather films are what’s in my head right now. They really are a couple of the greatest films ever made. There is such a beauty to every aspect of the two first films that I can’t get over. They’re obviously so different from the stuff I’ve done as a filmmaker, but what I make and what I watch don’t have to be the same thing. His use of music, montage, blocking shows such perfect amount of restraint and precision, and the story is so brilliantly structure d. I’d really rather watch that than anything else coming out from the majority of American filmmakers now.

Does your interest in them have anything to do with your own work as a filmmaker? How do the films that you think of as “influences” affect your own style and preoccupations as a filmmaker?

I prefer to just consume a lot and then see what happens. There are things that I am aware of borrowing or trying to build on from what I’ve seen, but a lot of it is just consuming as many films as possible and then allowing their influence to come out in my work without thinking about it too much. I like to digest it, and then see how I’ve processed it.

How often do you read fiction? Do you wish you read more?
Not often enough. I would like to read at least two books a month, but it turns out to be more like one book a month. There is just too much great art — film, literature, painting, photography, music, etc. — that I get overwhelmed thinking about what I would like to see, read, or hear. One day, I would like to just be able to spend days on end locked in a cozy room reading books and watching films, but I don’t have the luxury of time at the moment. I have to continue being active with my partners in the work we’re doing and trying to get in the commercial world, and also doing everything I need to do now for the film. Before I go into my next script, I hope to take a couple weeks just consuming a few books and a lot of films, but it’s hard.

What would be your ideal literary adaptation and why?
I haven’t found it yet.

How, if at all, has reading informed your filmmaking?
I think any good filmmaker needs to read. It keeps your imagination working, and exposes you to ideas and images (ones not yet realized) that simply watching a film won’t. I think Afterschool wouldn’t be the same film if I hadn’t read Camus’ The Stranger or if I hadn’t read the work of Sartre.

What are you listening to recently?

The main theme from “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” by Ryuichi Sakamoto and Katy Perry’s “I Kissed A Girl”

If you could collaborate with one musician on a film, who would it be and why?
Steve Reich. His music is hypnotic. It can be equally euphoric and maddening, and I think his music married to the right images would be powerful.

What would be the ideal pairing of filmmaker and musician for a concert film?

Sean Durkin and Arcade Fire.

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  • Lane said

    AFTERSCHOOL is also playing at AFI FEST in Los Angeles! Festival starts next week!

  • bob towne said

    i unknowingly sat next to him at the nyff premiere last month. nice guy. great film!