Into Great Silence

The thick of summer is undoubtedly the province of the blockbuster. Fast-paced editing, amped-up music, explosive pyrotechnics, death-defying stunts, excessive CGI and throwaway plots beckon the masses. I, myself, am not immune to its siren call. Last weekend, my weakness for comic book heroes and desire for escapist entertainment lured me to the theater where I watched “The Incredible Hulk” and “Wanted” back to back. Both were entertaining, fun, and action-packed—but, let’s face it, the pleasures of the summer blockbuster are like eating a Big Mac and fries. Flavor is high, obviously enhanced, but as food usually lacks nutrition and the subtle complexities in taste. Wanting to balance my filmic diet, I decided to seek out the very antithesis of the summer blockbuster: something slow-moving, lengthy, with no music, minimal dialogue, and a subject matter completely devoid of drama. What I found was a documentary about the preternaturally silent lives of Carthusian monks…

My Dinner with Andre Royo, Part III: From Nothing to Something

What does it mean to start at the very beginning? For that matter, what does the concept of “beginning” mean? And how exactly does a beginner “begin”? These are the questions I now began to contemplate as my understanding of things was shattered by the concept of “beginner’s mind”…

“I love editing…”

“I love editing. I think I like it more than any other phase of filmmaking. If I wanted to be frivolous, I might say that everything that precedes editing is merely a way of producing film to edit.”

–Stanley Kubrick