ShareThisThe late director Stanley Kubrick once passed on to young filmmakers this advice (from his own experience): Get a camera, go out and make a movie, any movie.
Such bravado was easily achieved in early-1950s New York City, especially for a talented lad who, by the time he had made his first movie, was already a staff photographer for a national magazine, Look (RIP).
But for new filmmakers today, getting off the ground may be a bit more daunting. That's why the "short film" (which can run anywhere from one to 20 minutes long) is so beneficial to cinematic neophytes looking to get exposure while pinching every penny. Festivals of short films generate publicity for new projects, and -- just as importantly -- attract distributors.
The recently completed Rhode Island International Short-Film Festival is one of the more prestigious of the lot. This year, I was proud to have been chosen by organizers to be one of a number of judges whose task it was to screen and critique a handful of movies.
As I watched my assigned films, I realized how many notable directors had begun their careers by (to paraphrase Kubrick) getting a camera and making a movie. At the same time, I'm keenly aware that labels such as "great director" and "renowned film maker" are retro-fitted encomiums. No festival judge can predict what kind of future work a new first-time director will turn out. (The more perceptive among film critics can, on occasion, detect innovation in a new project.)
And so, after my judging duties were completed, I made note of some of my favorite directors whose careers began on the short-film route, and scoured my video library for some of these efforts.
My first was "Peel," a color short by a New Zealand film student named Jane Campion ("An Angel At My Table," "The Piano," "Portrait of a Lady"). The film was a 10-minute trifle. And yet, working with the clarity of hindsight, I could easily detect evidence of Campion's idiosyncratic visual and storytelling style.
Next, I watched an early short by Todd Haynes, the Brown University-educated director of "Safe," "Far From Heaven" and the recent "I'm Not There." The film, "Dottie Gets Spanked," is a loopy account of a pre-teen who fanaticizes about a TV soap-opera actress. I caught Haynes's cool sense of confidence that was so evident in "Safe."
David Lynch's "The Grandmother" is a 15-minute oddity that clearly presages this director's future otherworldliness. I even revisited feature-length debuts by some directors who are now recognized masters: Kubrick's "Fear and Desire," Martin Scorsese's "Who's That Knocking at My Door" and Terrence Malick's "Badlands." All these movies were virtually unknown to the public at the time of their release.
Then I asked myself: If I were a festival judge watching any of these movies, but without 20/20 hindsight, how would I rate them? Citing the impossibility of answering such a question accurately, I'll take the safe way out and plead ignorance.
Festival side note: I was glad to see that organizers screened "Another Harvest Moon," starring the great Ernest Borgnine. Now 92, Borgnine is remembered not only for his Oscar-winning performance in Delbert Mann's "Marty" (1955), but Fred Zinnemann's iconic "From Here to Eternity," Nicholas Ray's "Johnny Guitar" and his performances in two films by director Robert Aldrich: "The Flight of the Phoenix" and "Emperor of the North." (In the latter, Borgnine played one of his most memorable villains.)
Borgnine was equally memorable in an episode of "9/11," a 2002 compendium of 11 short films dealing with the catastrophe. As directed by actor Sean Penn, Borgnine was heartbreaking as a widower living in an apartment in the shadow of one of the World Trade Center towers. The segment was only 11 minutes long, but Borgnine gave one of his best-ever performances, testimony to the power of the short film.
(Bob Leddy is a film historian.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Must credit The Providence Journal
