Interview notes 14 (January 2023)

Inventing movies

"You are a man who spends his time inventing movies , so I must take some time to ask you about them. Firstly, how up to date are you with popular culture? Do you make an effort to keep on top of the latest releases for the account, or do you simply watch what you want to and build on that."

I don't rate myself as being up to date on popular culture, not for the present day, nor for any era of the past. It's true that I know a lot of things about a lot of things: but this is a fishing line in the ocean. I catch fish most every time. Yet I can see from my boat that the ocean is unimaginably vast, and populated by creatures equally unimaginable.

Put another way: I'm not a cineaste. I don't know films like film buffs know films. In the course of making Chronicles, I have watched hundreds of trailers for films I've never seen.

Movie mashups have been very successful for me. They find a ready audience: people respond to them. And I enjoy making movie mashups. But perhaps I have drained some of the vitality from my awareness of movies. Often they are like tools, something I pick up and use then I need them, then put down without further thought.