a clip from the luddite club doc
This is just a short note to say: the Luddite Club documentary is nearing the last week of its Kickstarter. Here’s a clip from the film of yours truly being interviewed, cut with my absolute favorite part of Modern Times (the corn cob!!!):
And here also is a great interview in the Creative Independent with Amanda Hanna-McLeer, the director: https://thecreativeindependent.com/people/filmmaker-amanda-hanna-mcleer-on-embracing-mistakes/
She talks about what it’s like to work with students (a few of whom you see in that clip — I truly loved meeting them), but also, there’s some very real stuff about the reality of trying to make it as an artist:
“It’s been incredibly hard as a new filmmaker because nobody wants to take a chance on me. I’ve made all this promotional material by myself and when I talk to producers, I have the pitch deck, the trailer, the New York Times article to back it, and it’s not enough. I thought this would be the first time that I didn’t have to do a Kickstarter. Nope, not at all! It’s funny because what they’ll say to artists, especially young women of color, is, ‘We want to give you a voice.’ I had a pitch meeting with a producer who said, ‘This is a good moment for Latina filmmakers.’ Is it? Okay, now it’s marketable to be a Latina filmmaker, I guess. Not that they even gave me money after that! It can make you feel so invalidated. On top of that, being a waitress can be so demeaning. I was serving two older couples and when I went and asked how their food was, one of the guys said, ‘I didn’t enjoy that.’ I said, ‘I’m so sorry about that. Can you tell me why?’ And he said, ‘Why should I? You’re just a cog in the machine.’ The irony of being told I’m a cog in the machine while working on a documentary about luddites was really funny to me. I was pissed off… Someone else at the table said, ‘What are your aspirations outside of this?’ Should I say, ‘My aspirations are serving you’ or do I tell them what I’m doing and feed into that image of a struggling artist? Why do I have to justify myself to be seen as a human being? My ego got the better of me and I told them about the doc.”
From everything I’ve seen so far from this film, it’s both very fun and very important — so if you can, please consider throwing some support their way!!
All best,
Jenny