Creating Cinema Culture – A Context For My Films

 

I wrote this piece in 2015, to explain the culture I wanted to create around my then upcoming feature film, Distracted. However, it’s now 2021, as I put together my next production, Composure, the same cinema culture holds true. This idea of ‘creating cinema culture’ is an idea central to the driving force behind my work.

 

If you can’t find the culture you want, then you  must create it yourself. The Twitter feed for “Distracted“, my new feature film, has grown to become a gallery featuring images of films, actors and filmmakers from cinema’s history. It’s updated several times a day, and also includes links to film-lists and video-essays, as well as artistic insights from great artists. It is a natural expression of my love for the cinema which resonates with me, but it is also my attempt to inspire, to entertain, to inform, and to create a context for Distracted. All of which, I hope, in the end, will add up to the sort of cinema culture I want Distracted to be a part of.

The actors include; Catherine Deneuve, Jack Nicholson, Romy Schneider, Cary Grant, Marcello Mastroianni and Richard Burton. The filmmakers; Jim Jarmusch, Jean-Pierre Melville, Mike Leigh, Michelangelo Antonioni, Jean-Luc Godard, Luis Bunuel and Roman Polanksi. Films such as; Le Cercle Rouge, L’Eclisse, I Hired A Contract Killer, Belle De Jour, Tokyo Drifter, Le Mepris, Repulsion, Divorce Italian Style, to list but a few.

These names and titles, sit, for me, at the very pinnacle of the art form. They are models not only of artistry, but of generosity and of beauty too. Their poetry creates powerful connection, and, in consequence, powerful emotion. They inspire because they demonstrate what can be achieved. Though we may fail in our efforts to emulate them, striving to do so is something worth doing.

Follow @distractedfilm

 

RELATED
Composure – Director’s Statement
About Distracted