With Haskell Wexler
Haskell Wexler is here with a particular sense of purpose. His film Who Needs Sleep? is in the Spectrum program after seven years in the making.
First screening is Sunday 8:30pm at the library. Wexler got the idea for the film on a very bad day when assistant cameraman Brent Hershman feel asleep at the wheel, crashed his car and died after a 19-hour workday. Hershman was just one of a legion of crew members who Wexler says are pushed into the danger zone by the film industry sweatshop. In addition to the film he‘s started a non-profit organization www.12on12off.org and joined with some 5000 film professionals to set sane and sustainable labor practices.
Wexler‘s passion for this particular cause extends to his conviction that cameras are tools of political participation. He‘s equally articulate about the give and take he experiences when he shoots film or video (he shot Who Needs Sleep? on a Sony PD150).
“I‘ve got the hots for the new Sony camera,” he says (the A1U). “It‘s really constructed for the camera operator,” he continues citing, for example, the controls of the viewfinder. He gestures with his hands, imaging himself gripping the small, nimble camera (“small and unthreatening,” he stresses) and also praises the removable sound component. “Joan Churchill always talks about this, she want to have equipment that she doesn‘t have to think about and weighs in her mind how her equipment choices will affect how she makes her films.
“Many of my friends–especially the younger ones–are so consumed with the technology that it sometimes overrides their filmmaking sensibility. You do have to know your tools, understand the colors, the palette. But things are so easy now with the marvelous advances that we have in these consumer size cameras that it can make some of your filmmaking sensibilities atrophy.” Example?
“The shotgun technique of never turning the camera off can work, but a good camera person cannot depend on what I call the 1000 monkeys approach.” He means of course the idea that all ills can be solved if you just have enough footage. He suggests that the preparation and decisionmaking process that‘s required with film cameras has an aesthetic impact on the film.
“Having said that, I‘ve shot enough 16mm documentaries to know that the moment you roll out the 400 feet, the thing you‘ve been waiting for happens. So it‘s not just the expense of film, but the being ready.
“If you really want to sharpen your shooting ability–spend some time with a good editor. It doesn‘t even have to be your own footage. The specific skills to deliver cuttable material–these disciplines, besides being aesthetically valid also allow you to work more civilized hours and to be more respectful to the artists in front and behind the camera. So much of sloppy, irresponsible filmmaking falls under the idea of shooting unlimted footage and the idea of “fixing it in post.”
I ask him how it feels for him personally to shoot video. “It feels like you‘re on a more personal edge of creativity when you‘re not the foreman of the crew, when you‘re not the team member you have to be on a more complex film. [With video] there‘s a personal visceral thrill–though that thrill goes with fear because you have the responsibility that‘s it‘s all up to you.
On to DI: For the guys who grew up in film, what hurts them in the transition is to see something on the screen they didn‘t do. DPs are asking to be present when the DI is done and to have some say in what‘s on the screen under their name.”
Wexler says he expects to be concentrating on documentaries, continuing to work more on documentaries with his producer and editor Tamara Maloney. He‘s hoping–and expecting–that he‘ll have a lot of company.
“Command of a camera is power,” he says plainly. “In this time of deceit in our country, telling the truth can be a challenging act. We are getting bombarded with deceit,” he says, much of it designed to intimidate and minimize debate. “I‘m supposed to be so afraid that I‘m not going to take the lens cap off my camera and explore what the truth is?” he says a touch of incredulity in his voice. Empowering filmmakers to step back and be able to comment on what‘s being done and said is one benefit he cites of more accessible tools for both filmmaking and distribution. “If these young filmmakers want to explore, what they make will have an audience and that means money and that mean things will happen.”
