March 08, 2006
AJ Schnack links to an interview he did concerning his just wrapped documentary about Kurt Cobain.
"Sometimes we shot in places that were specific to Kurt - places he lived or worked - and sometimes we shot in places that didn't exist until a year or so ago. We didn't want to create something that was completely stuck in the early 90s, not just a nostalgia piece...At various places in our film, we're mirroring events or moments in Kurt's life by finding real people who are doing the same thing in 2005. For me, the audio and the video are in some ways very separate ideas, conveying different thoughts and emotions, but hopefully together they will make something great."
I'm really quite excited about this documentary, especially because its focus is on Cobain himself, rather than his band. It looks to be a more of a personal portrait than anything else, and that's something I've always wanted to see. Cobain, both the icon and the man, remains an enduring point of fascination for me (I wrote about this a bit in my review of Last Days). He's symbolic of many things I've dealt with in my own work, and thus I feel some vague connection to him, some desire to deconstruct that symbolism (which, incidentally, I did my part to perpetuate in my first attempt at a feature film).
It was because my interest in this personal, non-mythic element that I loved Van Sant's film, as imperfect as it was, and that I'm looking forward to AJ's documentary. I've always entertained the idea of dealing with the same subject again myself, in some indirect way, but until I have a project worthy of the topic, I'll be happy to see it handled by these filmmakers.
Speaking of my first film: it always surfaces in my mind around this time of year, since it was around this time that we shot it, and that it had its one public screening. I don't remember exactly what it's like anymore. I feel like watching it again, but I'm pretty sure I'm better off living with the memory, rather than the real thing.
Hmmm. I was hoping to have this paper I'm working on (linking Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex all the way back to Plato's Republic) at least halfway done by now, and instead I'm two sentences in. What other quality distractions might I come upon tonight? I've a feeling the whole student-by-day, filmmaker-by-day-and-night thing is going to reach a sustained boiling point in about three weeks. I'll enjoy this procrastination while I still can.
Posted by David Lowery at March 8, 2006 10:01 PM
Comments
That's a fun coincidence... I'm working on a text about Simone de Beauvoir's book as well. Though not linking it to Plato's "Republic". I'm discussing her thesis on the relation between the sexes, and her view on possible change of this relation. (I'm still in the reading-part of the work... so 'two sentences in' sounds familiar..) Good luck with it!
Posted by: Karsten at March 9, 2006 03:38 PM
I'm in the 'reading-and-simultaneously-writing' part of the process. Which will I finish first, the book or the paper about the book? I'm a terrible academic - at least when it comes to deadlines!
Posted by: Ghostboy at March 9, 2006 05:04 PM
David...thanks for the encouragement. This has been an amazing project to do. Hard to believe that the completion is closer than the beginning. AJ
Posted by: AJ at March 9, 2006 11:03 PM