LADY VENGEANCE: INTERVIEW WITH SUNDANCE FILMMAKER EVE SUSSMAN

By Farihah Zaman

Although Sundance is predominantly known for indie dramas and social issue documentaries, the New Frontiers section provides a loving home for particularly odd ducks. Unlike many projects in New Frontiers, which are presented as installations or other new media formats, Eve Sussman’s whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir was screened in a conventional theater. However, the film’s text, 300 bits of voiceover, 150 pieces of music, and 3,000 images are live-edited by an algorithmic computer dubbed the Serendipity Machine that creates a randomized sequence, meaning each screening is entirely unique. Not only does Sussman’s piece turn the idea of the mystery genre on its ear, it plays with the very idea of genre itself, as well as chronology, and convention, and every other building block of narrative as we know it.

Fresh from a successful three-show run at Sundance 2012, Sussman spoke with Lady Vengeance about storytelling and the nature of human perception.

LADY VENGEANCE: How did you conceive of whiteonwhite?

SUSSMAN: Well the title is named after a Malevich painting; White on White and Black Square are the two seminal pieces of Suprematist work, which is about transcendence through art, and pure feeling in art—getting away from representation. But as I was becoming interested in trying to make a piece about that painting, the actor I worked with, Jeff Wood, who was also at Sundance with us, became really interested in space travel. So his literal interest in space converged with the sort of conceptual, theoretical ideas of White on White. Malevich used these sort of megalomaniac theoretical concepts where he would call himself the chairman of space, and he would talk often about the idea of space, whether it was the space of the picture plane, or literal space as in the cosmos; you could sort of read it as a double entendre. And so we started conflating those two ideas, the idea of space and the idea of Suprematism and White on White and pure transcendence.

LV: How did this idea lead you to shoot in Central Asia?

SUSSMAN: Because Jeff kept talking about space I said, … Read the rest

“PRICE CHECK” | director, Michael Walker

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Wednesday, January 25 6:30 pm –Eccles Theatre, Park City]

When you are in the film business, someone, let’s say your dentist, will inevitably tell you a story that they think is a great idea for a movie. But they don’t know how to write a script, they just know how to clean teeth, so they want you to write it for them. If I had an idea that I thought would make a good novel, I would tell it to the poor guy who made the mistake of telling me that he was a novelist, because I don’t know how to write a novel.  I work in film, so I write screenplays, and, when I can, I direct them. I don’t really have ideas and then wonder which medium would best suit the story. When the idea for Price Check came, I wrote the script, and, eventually, directed it.

When I was young, I wanted to be an actor. I can’t remember when I first heard the word “director”, but at some point I became aware that there was a process of making a film, and from then on, I was hooked.  Like most people who work in film, I got caught up in the magic of it all. It’s an amazing thing to walk into a dark room for two hours and be transported into another world, and go on an emotional journey with characters that you get to know and love.

One of the things I love about film is that it can be so many different things: funny, serious, arty, scary, low brow. There is an idea that pure cinema is silent, that the images alone need to tell the story, but this kind of thinking always bothered me.  There are films, like the Marx Brothers films, that aren’t visual films, but are as pure as cinema gets.  Price Check is a talky film, but it’s a visual film as well.  Every shot was planned and storyboarded, some of the sets are abstract, the acting is heightened – all of this is part of the … Read the rest

“GYPSY DAVY” | director, Rachel Leah Jones

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, January 24, 3:00 pm –Yarrow Hotel Theatre, Park City]

I’m not an independent filmmaker; so-called independent filmmakers—all the more so documentarians—are some of the most dependent people around. We depend on funders and characters, on permission-givers and gatekeepers, on our own (free) will, determination and hubris—not to mention on the weather. A film teacher I once had gave me the one really truly valuable lesson in all my MFA: “You want to make a movie?” she asked us. Yes, we nodded. “Then go out and tell everyone you know that you’re going to make a movie.” Otherwise, she explained, you’ll never make it to the finish line. In other words, let your ego (read: the fear and potential shame of not realizing what you set out to do) lead the way. And it’s so true. There you are, a single mother (regardless of how many co-producers you arm yourself with)—the filmmaker-progenitor, male or female, will always be a single mother; the kind who nobody knocked up; the kind who voluntarily walked into the sperm bank of creative ideas and impregnated themselves with a film. “You’ll fall in and out of love with your movie so many times, you won’t know how to begin, let alone end,” the professor of production continued… To which I would add, just like with children: you also won’t know where you end and your film begins…

Nevertheless, I make documentaries because I LOVE them—a good doc inspires like nothing else—but also because it seems I just wasn’t daring enough to choose an easier, cheaper, less risky medium to “do my thing.” I don’t make documentaries because I believe in “reality” as such, but because I’m a sucker for it’s narrative impact—especially when it is “subjectively” rather than “objectively” told. I’m a political animal and the documentary, one of the “discourses of sobriety,” as Bill Nichols so aptly put it, is my “drug of choice.” I’m a girl who feels compelled to name things, to “speak truth to power,” knowing full well that truth and power are relative. And once I start making a … Read the rest

“SLAVERY BY ANOTHER NAME” | director, Sam Pollard

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23 Noon –Temple Theatre, Park City]

I am a filmmaker because as a young man much of my time was spent watching a television show titled The Million Dollar Movie. It was broadcast on the local station WOR Channel 9. They happen to own the RKO Pictures film catalogue and they would show a film all week. The one film that I saw many times that had a tremendous impression on me was Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane. So watching that show every week and seeing that film and others such as Gunga Din, Fort Apache, His Kind of Woman shaped much of my filmic sensibility. From that point in my life to now I love watching movies all types of moves. My palette has expanded to include not only American films but also foreign films, not only narrative films but also documentaries and experimental films. I love films, great ones, mediocre ones and even bad ones. I always learn something from any of them and can watch a movie anytime and any place.

Why is film, as opposed to all of today’s other forms, the medium for your story? We live and breathe in a visual age and what amazes me as I live now have entered my sixth decade is how people are so visually astute to everything from commercials to feature films. I teach filmmaking at NYU and the students we now have did not grow up on books but film and so much of how they see the world is based on their filmic experiences. There is good and bad to this because as much as I love film I want people to be able to see the world not only through films but books, art, and music. All of these things are vital to making well-rounded human beings and great filmmakers… Read the rest

“JOHN DIES AT THE END” | director, Don Coscarell

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23 Midnight –Egyptian Theatre, Park City]

Us guys from the “horror ghetto” don’t usually get the “A” word attached to our work, but thank you. I’m flattered. When I was younger, I was dazzled by the work of the greats such as Fritz Lang, James Whale and Alfred Hitchcock. Their work taught me that film could be used to travel to the dark reaches of the subconscious. These were places that other mediums such as novels and paintings were just not as effective in my opinion. They have a hard time competing with a huge moving image that includes tools such as cinematography, sound effects, music and great actors. My new film, John Dies At The End exemplifies all of the above. It is a journey into very strange places. Besides, what better way to tell a story which includes talking dogs, a monster made of meat and an illicit hallucinogenic drug that “chooses you?”… Read the rest

“PUTIN’S KISS” | director, Lise Birk Pedersen

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23 2:30 pm –Prospector Square Theatre, Park City]

I decided that I wanted to be a documentary filmmaker on a travel I had to China in 1995. I was there on my own for three month and I had a fantastic time being an observer in a country who was in the beginning of such a life changing development. There was obviously many great stories, interesting contrasts and characters and I had my sketchbook with me and was drawing the people and situations that I met. But the silent portrays didn´t really seem enough to me at that time and that´s how I made up my mind for filming.

I never went back to China to make a film though.… Read the rest

“GRABBERS” | director, Joe Wright

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23, 11:45 pm –Library Center Theatre, Park City]

Grabbers is a monster movie, first and foremost, and so much of the experience is visceral, for your eyes and ears… Whether it’s a monster roar vibrating your innards or the orchestra rising to mark a poignant look from our leading lady. You simply couldn’t have that experience reading a book, or watching a play. It isn’t possible.

There’s something about the combination of pictures, and sound, plus time, that is utterly absorbing and compelling – when it’s done well. I enjoy a story told in a great film more than I enjoy a great book, or a play. Particularly when I see it in the cinema.

For me it’s the leading art form, for stories, and it encompasses so many other disciplines, whether it’s painting or photography, music or literature…

One day I imagine there will be a moment where video games and virtual reality mesh to create a new storytelling art form that supersedes cinema. But it feels to me like it’s a decade or two away, at least, so let’s enjoy this cinematic heyday while it lasts!

We talked a lot about shooting Grabbers in 3D and opted for 2D in the end, for a variety of technical and financial reasons… I wonder whether we’re at the end of the 2D era for cinema, and if 3D will become the norm. My generation grew up dismissing black and white movies as “old fashioned” – we see in colour, after all – and I wonder if there’s a new generation who will dismiss 2D movies as “flat” and “unrealistic” – we see in depth, with two eyes, don’t we?… Read the rest

“KID-THING” | writer-director, David Zellner

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23 2:30 pm –Prospector Square Theatre, Park City]

Nathan and I have always wanted to study and work in film. To me it’s the ultimate art form, in that it has infinite possibilities and the unique ability to encompass and incorporate all other art forms. Even if all art is derivative, it’s that challenge: attempt to make something new in film that’s exciting to us.

This was made clear to us as teenagers in the late ’80s when we were the personal videographers for Chuck Berry. Although known first and foremost as a rock-and-roll legend, he was also a pioneer of independent cinema and digital photography. Seminal experiences like that taught us about being resourceful, working in the moment and on your own terms.… Read the rest

“L” | co-writer-director Babis Makridis

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, January 23, 6:30 pm –Egyptian Theatre, Park City]

Because of audiovisual. 

A bicycle

… Read the rest

“MOSTQUITA Y MARI” | writer-director, Aurora Guerrero

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Sunday, January 22 9:00 pm -- Egyptian Theatre]

Being a filmmaker just feels right to me. It flows without forcing it. It feels like the tool I was born to use to express myself. I once explained it as feeling like that first pair of Puma shoes, you know, like they were meant especially for you to sport around town. There’s so much about film that I respect. It’s a medium that demands the talents of others and I love collaborating. Film requires patience, persistence, and passion. These are all qualities I have developed through my experiences as a filmmaker and I am so grateful for that. This medium has the power to bring a filmmaker to their knees in tears – either out of disappointment, pure joy, or both. Film can make people feel. It is one of the most powerful mediums around. That’s why I’m a filmmaker and that’s why I made Mosquita y Mari.… Read the rest