Voices on the Art Form
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Is that what you meant when you said that it's a bad cycle?
Movies are terrible from Hollywood. Good movies continue to get made; they tend not to come out of the studio system, which is an archaic, dying system. They're coming out of independent sources, even if the money can be traced back finally to the studios. The studios themselves aren't making interesting movies, but they sometimes fund interesting movies from other people. . . . In the '70s it was a great time for Hollywood films. I can tell you 50 great Hollywood films that came out in a two-year period. Now, if you have three or four good Hollywood films a year you're lucky.
Now that we're talking about the possible direction films are going in general, as a filmmaker do you see any challenges ahead? What would you say to an up-and-coming filmmaker?
The challenge is to continue to do your own work as opposed to the work that you will be offered and will be tempted by. The industry constantly needs new people to make bad things that they think need to be made. But those things don't really need to be made, and people who have a passion for film and have real stories to tell have to resist the temptations, the sirens, of money and fame and so on and try to continue to do their own work. It's never been easier to make a film than it is today. You can do it with an 8mm video camera. . . . The technology has gotten simpler and simpler. It's just the will to do it and the story that is worth telling.
In many of your films you use friends, family and crew members in cameo roles, and generally involve people in ways that help them grow beyond the limits of the usual.
I think that filmmaking is the ultimate joint activity, it's like a team. I love that feeling of working with a team of people that I know and respect and like. So for me the nucleus doesn't change much. New people come into the orbit and you hope that they're absorbed in the best possible way. But I believe that to get to make movies is a great gift. . . . I wanted to do it for many years before I was allowed to. And I've been able to do it with enormous freedom and satisfaction since I've started doing it. So every day to me is a kind of blessing.
Do you have any thoughts in general on filming in New Mexico, or about either Wyatt Earp or Silverado?
You know, I lived in Santa Fe for a year over the course of those two pictures. . . . It's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been in, I truly love New Mexico. . . . There are volumes that I think about! The things that have happened to me there, the experiences that I've had, are just a huge chapter in my life - two chapters - and very hard to summarize in a few sentences. Most of it's very personal. But I found it an astounding place to work, where every day, over the course of the day the sky was putting on a show! And sometimes it wasn't the show you needed for your movie, but it was always a great show. To me it was like a kaleidoscope, New Mexico, working out in the weather and that terrain, so every day was a surprise and a delight.
There were many evenings over the course of those two pictures where we would wrap, and the sun was going down and everyone would leave to go back to Santa Fe. I would be practically alone on location by the trailers. We used to keep the trailers over the hill from the town at the Cook Ranch so you couldn't see them in the shot. There's a high point on the hill and you had an incredible 360-degree view of that area, with the sun going down, and they're some of the happiest moments of my life.
Mikelle Cosandaey
