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| SxSW ’08 Interview – In a Dream director Jeremiah Zagar |
In a Dream - At SxSW '08! |
by Jason Whyte
“In A Dream is a documentary feature film that chronicles Philly artist Isaiah Zagar, his work and his tumultuous relationship with his wife, Julia. It follows the Zagars as their marriage implodes and a harrowing new chapter in their life unfolds. It’s an exploration of the fallout that ensues when the line between art and life is blurred beyond distinction.” Director Jeremiah Zagar on “In a Dream” which screens at this year’s South By Southwest.
Is this your first film in the at SxSW? Do you have any other festival experience?
No. I had a short film called Coney Island, 1945 at SXSW in 2006. It was a terrific experience and I am excited to premiere my first feature film there. I’ve had a number of short films at festivals all over the world. Some of my favorites have been Slamdance, the BFI London Film Festival and Tribeca.
Will you be coming to Austin to attend the festival? If this is your first time, what do you expect to discover? If you have been here before, what do you love most about the city?
I am coming, of course and am very excited to screen the film in an Alamo Drafthouse theater. Those theaters are among my favorite places in the world to see a movie. I also look forward to coming back to the Salt Lick BBQ.
While you were making the movie, were you thinking about the future release of the film, be it film festivals, paying customers, critical response, and so forth?
Films cost a lot of money so you do have to think about your audience, distribution, and critical response. But whenever possible, I would try to avoid it because ultimately, all that should matter is making the best film possible.
How did this project come to fruition? If you could, please provide me with a rundown, start to finish, from your involvement.
I’ve always been interested in filmmaking. After I completed my first short documentary—a little movie about a hospital and orphanage in Delhi, India, my mother suggested I film my father.
Later that year, my dad and I traveled to our summer home in West Virginia. There, away from the distractions of the city, I asked him to tell me all his secrets.
And he did. He told me about how he was molested as a child, how he tried to kill himself at the age of 29 and how he fell in love with my mother on the night he emerged from a Pennsylvania mental institution. As the interviews progressed, I began to realize there was a much larger movie to be made than I had originally envisioned. It was a strange feeling because although I had wanted it, I never expected see this man who I revered as the flawed and fragile person he actually is. When we returned home a week later, my father hugged me and cried in my arms.
Over the next four years, I traveled back and forth between Philadelphia and Boston where I was in college, filming my family whenever something significant was happening—a birthday, a funeral, a lawsuit, one of my father’s mural workshops, whatever. And in April of 2005, everything suddenly changed.
What was the biggest challenge in the production of the movie, be it principal photography or post-production?
I went home to film my parents as they picked up my brother from rehab. The stress from the situation boiled over and my father suddenly admitted to my mother and I that he had been having an affair for the last three years with his assistant. That same night, my parents separated for the first time in 43 years. I shot for 16 hours that day and hated myself for every minute of it.
Please tell me about the technical side of the film; your relation to the film’s cinematographer, what the film was shot on and why it was decided to be photographed this way.
I shot the movie on pretty much every format that exists. 35mm, 16mm, Super-8mm, Hi-Def, MiniDV, etc… It made sense to shoot the verité sequences on MiniDV because that is what I had at my disposal. For the more impressionistic sequences of my father creating his art and the re-creations, I wanted to shoot on film. DV or high-def wouldn’t do it justice.
I shot a lot of the MiniDV myself. The beautiful 35mm was shot by my cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt. We’ve been working together since film school and I’m sure we’ll continue to work together for years and years.
Talk a bit about the festival experiences, if any, that you have had with this particular film. Have you had any interesting audience stories or questions that have arisen at any screenings?
SXSW will be our world premiere. We’ll be taking the film next to the Philadelphia Int’l Film Festival and the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. We look forward to screening in many other festivals down the road, especially outside of the US.
I love when a festival has a fancy filmmaker lounge where you can get massages and free drinks.
Who would you say your biggest inspirations are in the film world (directors, actors, cinematographers, etc)? Did you have any direct inspirations from filmmakers for this film in particular?
Before making the film, I was very influenced by the work of Errol Morris, Jonathan Caouette, Ken Loach, & Lynne Ramsey.
As I was cutting it together, I began working with Ross Kauffman and Sam Pollard and was tremendously influenced by their wisdom and experience.
How far do you think you would want to go in this industry? Do you see yourself directing larger stories for a larger budget under the studio system, or do you feel that you would like to continue down the independent film path?
I want to direct both documentaries and narrative features.
If you weren’t in this profession, what other career do you think you would be interested in?
I am also a teacher and it’s very rewarding. Ideally, I’d like to continue to be a filmmaker and a teacher for the foreseeable future.
Please tell me some filmmakers or talent that you would love to work with, even if money was no object.
There are a million people who I’d love to work with. The list is too long.
If this film could play in any movie theatre in the world, which one would you choose?
There’s a little theater in France I’d love to show it in. It has big red velvet seats and they let you bring in wine. I saw Manhattan there, it was great. Mann’s Chinese or the Ziegfeld would be alright too. Also, BAM.
No doubt there are a lot of aspiring filmmakers at film festivals who are out there curious about making a film of their own. Do you have any advice that you could provide for those looking to get a start?
Watch a lot of movies.
And finally…what is your all time favourite motion picture, and why?
How can you possibly have an all-time favorite movie? I love way too many.
This film is one of the many features that will be screening at SxSW this year from March 7th to 15th. For more information on this film, its screening times and for more information on SxSW, point your browser to the official website. – Jason Whyte, efilmcritic.com
link directly to this feature at http://efilmcritic.com/feature.php?feature=2419
originally posted: 03/01/08 18:39:17
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