Hoarders

I love the show Hoarders and am really interested in making a film about a person and their things. I would pick someone who has really interesting and/or beautiful things, rather than just the people who have disgusting junk garbage piles. Make beautiful shots of their objects and make an intimate portrait with the person and more into their past and why they treasure the things they do. Hoarders goes into those things a bit, but obviously it's just a reality tv show and are just out to make it a dramatic situation and show the objects all piled up whereas I would like to look at things more individually and make it seem more delicate and loving. That image is of all of the cheap knick knacks we gathered of my Grandpa's when we were moving him out of his old house. He was not a hoarder, but this image sort of gives you the idea of what I'm thinking.

Portraits of Homes

I would really like to make a slow, portrait documentary of houses and apartments I grew up in (nothing post high school). I have lived in several houses and apartments that have a lot of character and are in many ways very "American." Like existing in a cul-de-sac, and out in the suburbs. The house I lived in in the suburbs, however, is not a newly built home, but a rather run down home in the midst of many nice, newer homes. I have also lived in a few apartments in bad neighbors which I think adds a lot of story and character. My family does not and has never had money, but we have been able to live in nicer and better homes and neighborhoods and I think that's also a story. I like knowing a lot about where I came from and always remembering and reflecting on my history.

Mysterium Cosmographicum

On November 16th at the Union Theatre I saw Brent Coughenour's live video performance. They were found footage films along with live voice/music/sound from Brent. I wasn't really sure what to expect when I was going to the performance, and I certainly didn't expect it to be as fun as it was. What made it most exciting and engaging was that Brent would provide the sound track and voices live. At one point he was even using a Guitar Hero guitar. The funniest though was hearing him talk like the Devil, using a voice distorter.

MAM After Dark

On November 18th I went to MAM After Dark to help assist Kelly Bronikowski with her dance/video performance. The performance was great. Her story was very personal and moving the way it involved her sick father and her relationship to him and how it has been effecting her. I love how she fit the projected images onto her body and face, particularly when she would hold her father's face in her hands. The crowd was really drawn to and moved by her performance, which made me especially glad I had helped out.

Annie Sprinkle

On Tuesday November 1st I went to see porn star/activist/artist Annie Sprinkle at the UWM Ballroom. I hadn't heard of her before so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. She was one of the first feminist porn stars that promoted female aggressors in porn and focused on female pleasure. Last year I saw a new feminist porn activist named Madison Young who is trying to do the same things, as well as Sasha Grey who I hung out with in New York last year. Even though I don't watch porn myself, it's still really powerful and motivating for me to be encouraged by these strong women who are working in an industry that is mostly owned by men and made for men, and their changing that. The image in the upper left are stills from her "Boobie Ballet", which she performed for us. It was just a fun, goofy performance she has been doing at shows for the last thirty years.

I'm Glad That My Mother Is Alive

I saw I'm Glad That My Mother Is Alive at the Union Theatre on Friday. I wasn't planning on watching it, because from the descriptions I had read, it seemed like a predictable story about an adopted boy who goes to find his birth mother and is disappointed. However, after watching the opening scene and seeing how beautifully the film was shot, I kept watching. The film was unexpected and had a lot more intense emotions involved that I thought it would. Not only is this boy feeling detached from his adoptive family and is longing for his birth mother, but once he finds her, he has some rather strange feelings towards her. It's almost as if he is trying to date his mother. His Mom has a younger son about 5 years old that lives with her, and at one point the innocent boy calls the two "lovebirds". In one scene, he sees his Mom kiss her ex boyfriend, and he gets very jealous and interrogates her on her. He builds up anger and jeaously about her abandoning him, not taking care of him once he finds her, and going to other men, and then finally gets so angry when she starts to come onto him that he stabs her, intending to murder her. While part of him had some bizarre fantasy with wanting her, he saw her coming onto him as being a bad mother, as she always had been. The film ends with a court scene where his mother, who had survived the stabbing, asks the court not to punish him, but since he had attempted murder, he gets sentenced to 3 years in prison. When I was a kid, one of my parents went through a series of partners, and I had a lot of resentment and jealously attached to it, because it took focus away from me, so I understood how the young man felt.

Meaning of Colors & Colors Creating Meanings

I am interested in color and art direction, in particular, clothing. I really love the way color is used in Godard's films and Volver. Very bright ad bold, but still a pretty simple clothing style. I don't have any ideas in regards to narrative with this, but I would like to make a film, or at least do art direction where the colors of the character's clothing correspond with the character's progress and emotions. I realize this isn't a new idea or concept, but I would like it to be more bold and more obvious. I would like the clothing colors to be more of a focus of the film than just an assistant. I'm really interested by how strong of meanings we put to colors-some colors have become gendered and some now radiate emotions to us. For exmaple: red-lust, passion, anger, power, blood; Pink-feminine, dainty, pretty; Purple is now mostly a feminine color, but used to be associated with power and royalty, and I think it's interesting how these meanings can change. Pink was not associated with femininity until the early 1900's when people became more concerned with separating the genders from birth. I think it would also be interesting to go against all of these meanings and see how people understand the film.