For a little over two years I’ve been struggling with how it feels to be liked and hated with such intensity, and usually by strangers. I tried to say I didn’t care, but I obviously did. Looking over blogs of the past few years, since I’ve been blogging a journal for 6 years or so, you can clearly see someone who cared a lot what other people thought of himself. Things have changed though.
I can say in all honesty I don’t care anymore. I’m going to do what I do. I’m not interested in how other people will think about me. I do have an interest in how they feel about the work, as in my film work, but I won’t spend any of my time thinking about how people feel about me. It’s not my job to try to convince anyone to like or not like me or to change their minds about who or what I am.
If someone wants to buy into the mythology and rumors of days long gone or even the wild interpretations of my motives for doing things, I cannot be held responsible, nor do I have any need to change their mind or work to convince them of anything.
I have found a peace that I have not known in my life. I am uninvolved in most of the dramas in my film community. I tend to leave my laptop at work even on weekends just to get away from filmmaking as an all consuming thing. I want to live something more of a life, so I’ve taken up bowling for fun. I love it, even though it is minimalist physical activity; that is still an increase for me. I take little interest in what other people do or don’t do, as it has no affect on me.
All I want to do now is more work. How other people want to perceive me is none of my business quite frankly. I’m not going to go to many MOFA (Mid Ohio Filmmakers Association) meetings anymore. I’m getting plenty of social outlets and I don’t feel my physical presence will do much, as in I see the people I want to see whenever I want to anyways.
I’ve entered what I am calling my “Kubrickian Phase”, which is not to do with comparing myself to the master himself, as it is that I don’t want to be in the public much and I’ve clearly changed my output of work to be more about quality than quantity. No, I do not think everything I’ve made is golden. Some of my movies are quite bad actually, but I’m okay with that. Those are what I made at a certain point in time and with whatever skills I had at that moment. I won’t abandon these pieces as if they didn’t exist, but I intend to improve and make better films. I drew a line in the sand and I want my work to be better than what I made in the past.
In the near future, some of my new projects will start to go public. There are three separate TV series in the works, all with broadcast outlets. The first one, a short film compilation show that I am calling LOOK AT MY SHORTS TV will probably hit first. Already, I have enough material for 6 of my first 13 episodes of one hour shows. Within the first 24 hours of making a call for entries, I got several options of expanding the show from 4 cable markets in Ohio to several more states and several more prestigious copyright holders of short films contacted me about submitting their catalogs.
The other two shows need more gestation before I announce anything, but along with TV, I have come up with another idea that I’m going to move on sooner. I wanted to do something with actors where I can help promote some of the better acting talent we have in Columbus and an anthology idea occurred that came together in no time. I’m still selecting the other directors and working with writers on the scripts, but this seems like another project that will be popular one it gets finished later this summer.
So, in the end, I am busy. I have my nose to the ground and I’m doing work. A lot of my vices are dwindling away and all that is left is a desire to do better work and to live a little outside of movies.
‘S’allright.
- Ross
