I've been writing, to some degree, since I was 5 years old. Back then I was writing songs under the stage name Johnny Gutts. I don't remember all the songs I wrote but I do know one of the songs I made was called "Football" and the song started with me shouting "I have boobs!" I don't know what I was going for, but then again... I was 5. Also, why was I saying 'boobs' at 5 years old? Who taught me how to say that?
Through my adolescence, I was still writing songs. Sometimes I'd just write song lyrics. Pages and pages of song lyrics. I'd invent bands, invent their discography, come up with a track list full of made-up song titles, and then I'd write lyrics for each of the songs. I remember one of the band names I came up with was called Braindead. Another was called Soup. All the bands were either signed to Geffen Records or Interscope. I'd draw a CD case, put the track list on the back of the "case" and add a little Geffen or Interscope logo at the bottom, since a lot of my favorite bands at the time were signed to those record labels.
I spent hours writing as a kid. I say this as an old man lamenting on how my son seemingly only ever plays video games in his spare time. I could cut down on the amount of time he spends playing games, but the thing is, I also played video games back in the '90s. Tons of 'em! But I still spent a lot of time listening to music, making up bands, and writing song lyrics. I don't want to force my kids to try to do the things I did. They're doing the things they do. I could probably do more to inspire my son to want to do other things. Maybe that's something I need to get better at. I'm coming to that realization in real time, as I write this. Wow! What a breakthrough.
Something happened in high school. I think the catalyst was actually trying to start bands at that time. My attempts were mostly unsuccessful. The one band I did manage to form broke up within a month. In that month, I wrote like 80 songs for the band, but I only shared, like, 2 with my friend and we broke up before we explored anything. Thing is, I was really frickin' prolific at the time. I'm not trying to brag, it was just reality. In general, I had several notebooks full of lyrics and a multitude of song ideas. I still have song ideas buried in my head and now that I'm in my mid-30s, I wonder if there will ever be an outlet for me to get them out. I don't know. I'm not too old to form a band, am I?
I think the unsuccessful attempts at forming a band kinda shifted me away from writing song lyrics. Also, my growing interest in movies. By the age of 16, I had transitioned from an avid music head to a budding cinephile. Summer of 2004 - I wrote my first ever screenplay. A 135-page script titled "Dick Travis", which was about the trials and tribulations about a fictional actor. I really don't know where the story came from, but the script was definitely inspired by the likes of Quentin Tarantino. It was broken up into multiple chapters and I shifted the film's POV at various points.
Concurrently, I had started my first blog. It was actually in March 2004 where I started up a livejournal. I was 16, a junior in HS, and I was a very angry teen. I'm not going to link the livejournal here (it still exists) because I'm not proud of certain things I wrote on there, but if someone found it, so be it. Yeah, I said some dumb shit when I was a teenager. I used the word "gay" to describe things that were lame. Embarrassing stuff like that. I guess in some ways it's interesting to see how I evolved over time, but overall, if you wanna find my livejournal, you're gonna have to search for it. I'm just a bit too ashamed to share it.
My point though, is that the blog and the interest in movies carried over for the rest of the decade. But I never considered myself a "writer". When I got into Penn State, the goal was to make movies. Unfortunately, two years into being a student, my application to become a film major was rejected and I ended up getting a degree in Media Studies. A degree which really didn't help me all that much. I wish I put more thought into a back-up plan. Or, better yet, maybe they could've just accepted my application. Part of my application package included a ten-page script that got an A+ in my one film class, and yet, I guess that wasn't enough. I probably should've submitted a short film or something, but the one I made for that film class was... uh, not very good.
The fact that my script got an A+ should've told me something. When I took a creative writing class the fall of 2006 (my sophomore year) and I ended up getting an A and my professor gave me high marks on the short stories I wrote, that should've been a signal to me as well! It wasn't. I was still, in the back of my head, thinking I was going to make movies. Not that being a writer and being a filmmaker were diametrically opposed. It's just funny because I was still writing. At that time, I was writing blogs and screenplays all through college. But I never considered myself a writer, nor did I think writing was something I could do professionally.
After I graduated college, I stuck around in the State College, PA area for a few years while I waited for my now-wife to graduate. Those two years I stayed in State College, I started up this blog, KenonCinema, and I continued writing screenplays. I eventually wrote a movie called "Roommates", which I turned into a no-budget feature film with the help of strangers I met through Craigslist. The movie took a long time to make and I was using really lousy equipment. It ended up not coming out all too great. I remember a conversation I had with someone who was interested in being the cinematographer for my movie. He had a Canon 7D camera, which would've definitely made my movie look better, but he wasn't interested in making a feature film. "Why don't you make short films?" he asked. Yeah, why didn't I? ...I don't fucking know. I was so gung ho about making a shitty feature-length film, I probably could've made much better short films and I would've gotten somewhere. Instead, my feature-length film came out shitty and I couldn't use it to help my career. Fuck!
Still, I was keeping up with this blog the entire time. This blog was rather active circa 2010-2012. By summer of 2011, I moved to Brooklyn, NY with my significant other and we got married. I mentioned it in a blog a year ago, but I eventually was able to use my work on this blog as a way to write about movies for different websites. I wrote for The Playlist, whatculture, and very briefly wrote for another website but I can't remember its name.
Let me fast forward a bit. I had my first child in September of 2013 and we moved to Southern California in the summer of 2014. I got accepted to Chapman University as a screenwriting grad in the Fall of 2015 and that's when I stopped blogging. Before I stopped blogging, I was finally getting paid gigs to write for The Playlist. They'd have me go to Q&As for film screenings that were happening in Los Angeles. I'd write an introduction to the Q&A, then I'd transcribe the Q&A. The highlight was when writer/director Rian Johnson re-tweeted a Q&A he was involved in that I transcribed. Oh my god, Rian Johnson read something I wrote!
But yeah, I did stop blogging gradually. And I did stop writing for The Playlist. Oh, the website I forgot was called wegotthiscovered.com. Very briefly, like a month, I wrote for that site, but I was just way too busy being a dad to write for 3 different websites so eventually I quietly quit. Going to Chapman University, I fully immersed myself back into the world of screenwriting. I finally came to terms with the fact that... maybe I wasn't a filmmaker, but a writer. A screenwriter. The written word always seemed to be my strongpoint. I wrote several screenplays, I even made a pilot for a web series (which I think turned out well and is definitely my best work as a "filmmaker"). But ever since I graduated Chapman and got a full-time job working as an audio describer, my writing/screenwriting career had gradually come to a halt. And remember, I had already stopped blogging at this point. I had poured all my energy as a writer into my 9-5 job, where I was writing 40 hours a week, mind you. By the time I was done at 5, I didn't have the mental energy to spend on writing anything else. I still tried. I've written a few pilots and one or two screenplays, but I graduated Chapman in 2017. It's 2023. I'm almost 36 years old. What the hell am I doing?
But there's another factor in this whole thing. The pandemic, black lives matter, the Me Too movement----all these things contributed to this mindset I had where, even if I wanted to write, what did I want to say? What did I have to say about the movies I watched? What about the stories I had in my head? Did I just want to write about white guys and their problems? I mean, that wasn't exactly that kind of stories I was writing, not always. Ok, sometimes. But my point is, by the summer of 2020, I really started to think about these things. What was it that I wanted to say, at this point? Did I have any value as a writer, beyond the job that I had? Do I have an interesting voice? My blog never got any readers. My screenplays weren't being read. I don't have a big social media following. Where was this going?
Sometimes I'd get a dash of inspiration and all-of-a-sudden the prolific writer inside me would come up and - voila! - I wrote 30 pages in a day. But between those moments were just months of inaction. Not just laziness, although maybe that had something to do with it. There was something more profound - I didn't think I had anything interesting to say. So, I decided what I should do instead was listen.
For the last three years, I just tried to take everything in. All the problems, the outrage, the anger --- all of that which has been simmering in our society these last few years, especially since my second child had been born during this time, I felt it was better to just take it all in and listen. Really listen and understand what was being said around me before I felt the need to spout my own opinion.
Now, I don't know. I feel like maybe I'm ready to just write again. Write for myself, or hopefully, write with an audience reading me. I always felt a strength of this blog, Kenoncinema, was I tried to keep knee-jerk reactions to a minimum. I try to be honest in my approach to writing film reviews, but I also try to consider the thoughts and opinions of everyone around me. What can I add to the discourse? I hope, I can add levelheaded-ness. Film discourse can be really toxic. Every big release has to have a degree of outrage surrounding it. I don't want to be a part of that. I want to listen and I want to understand where outraged people are coming from. Hey, maybe they have a point. But, I hope I can approach topics with a measured perspective. Would that be interesting to read? I guess we'll find out.
That brings me to Barbie. Holy shit this blog post isn't over.
Greta Gerwig kicked off her directorial career with Ladybird in 2017. It's a shame I wasn't blogging at the time because, not only was that movie my favorite of 2017, it'd probably still be in my top 10 of the 2010s. What I loved about that movie was how brisk the pace was. The writing was sharp and witty. I'm basing this off memory, it's been awhile since I watched it, but I remember it having a formal structure as well. There was a balance between having a formal structure mixed with an off-beat sense of humor and the movie just moved at a breakneck pace. It was character-driven. Lots of details. It was also very personal. Personal, but accessible. Having been familiar with Gerwig up to that point, I was surprised with just how not-mumblecore the movie was. Technically her directorial debut was Nights and Weekends, which she co-directed with Joe Swanberg, who was one of the heads of the mumblecore movement. To go from that to Ladybird ten years later - the growth and the leap she took as an artist was just staggering.
And then there's Little Women. Look, I consider myself a pretty open-minded, progressive guy (uh oh...), but I never thought I'd ever be excited about a Little Women adaptation. I vaguely remember the 1994 version being on TV back in the day and it never drew me in. I was also a boy who liked sports and fart jokes. So, I was never going to embrace the 1994 film. But, circa 2018/2019, when I found out Greta Gerwig was making a Little Women adaptation, I was definitely curious what she could bring to the material. All this to say, I was absolutely floored with the 2019 adaptation. Blown away. The way she goes back and forth in time and the overall energy that movie contains drew me in from the beginning. The performances are fantastic. But more than that, the whole thing felt effortless. It didn't feel like a stretch of Gerwig's artistic abilities. Coming out of that movie, I couldn't help but think, "Is there anything she can't do?"
Nearly a week after seeing Barbie, I still don't know the answer to that question because... she fucking nailed it. What struck me was just how different Barbie is visually and stylistically to her previous two films. And also just how goofy, funny, and irreverent it was. Lady Bird has funny moments. Barbie is downright goofy and I loved every minute of it. I can't believe people (angry men, the GOP) came away angry after seeing the movie. Yeah, it has a lot on its mind. Yes, it's very open and upfront about its feelings about how women are treated in the real world, but it's also funny and it doesn't take itself too seriously. So if the movie doesn't take itself too seriously and it rags on the patriarchy for a small chunk of the movie, why do certain men have to have a stick up their ass about it? Fucking relax.
It's funny and subversive. Margot Robbie is literally perfect as the "stereotypical Barbie" and Ryan Gosling just kills it as Ken. Absolutely slays. It's simply a good time at the movies, but also, it does have a lot of substance. It does have a message. And during those moments I just went back to what I'd been doing the last 3 years - I listened. I took it in. Look, it's a weird fucking time. I just don't feel the need to inst-react to every fucking thing that happens in the world, including a movie. But you know what, the movie very eloquently makes its point and I totally get where it's coming from. I get that it can be difficult and nearly impossible to be a woman in the modern world. And as evidenced by how men, at least on the internet, have reacted to the movie, it's clear we have a long way to go in this society, no matter how much it feels like we've moved forward.
I write all that about Barbie and that long autobiographical preface to say this: I think why I want to try writing again is because I think my sane, white male cisgender voice could actually be worthy voicing? I don't know if I'll come away from every movie with the most progressive viewpoint. But honestly, when I watch a movie, I don't really think about its politics unless the politics are as upfront as they are in Barbie. I don't feel the need to shoehorn my political beliefs into every topic. If the time comes, however, where a political discussion must be had, I hope I can at least approach it in a levelheaded away and we can just... fucking talk. Like people. I don't know, is there any value in that? If not, maybe I should stop writing after all. But for now, I'm thinking I'm back
No comments:
Post a Comment