Today we walked around on the Agnes Varda tour. Honestly, I’ve never heard of her, but I’m always down for some feminist cinema. It was also rather fitting that we were touring Varda’s Paris at a time when there were so many feminist messages scrawed across the walls and monuments of the city. I thought it was interesting to hear the story of how she made a film in her neighborhood and she had a vision of turning it into a beach and having people drop ping pong balls from the apartment buildings. After all that effort she decided it didn’t look good, and was left to collect the ping pong balls. It was gratifying to hear about an established and respected director going back on her idea like that. Made me feel better about the prospect of being a director and being in charge.
Another cool thing was meeting Bob Swaim because he was a writer. I love talking to other writers, especially those with a passion for film history. It was pretty awesome to have an award winning director ask me my opinion on the Irishman, and genuinely wanting to hear the answer. I’m glad I got his email. I felt he was the best at talking to us, possibly because he’s also a teacher as well as an industry professional.
London and Paris 2020 Culzean 