Reaction to the Portrait

Considering I was dreading being interviewed from the moment the syllabus was handed out on the first day of class, I had a surprisingly good experience being interviewed by Quinn! It's not something I'd like to repeat, but it wound up not being as bad as I had feared. I think it was invaluable that Quinn and I are friends. Not only had we already established trust and a rapport, but she knew to ask things that most people wouldn't have (my green smoothies don't often come up in casual conversation...). It also allowed her to jump around a lot and ask me to do quite a few different things. She didn't often have me answer a question multiple times, or ask me to re-state since I knew to rephrase her questions in my answers. Generally, I don't think this approach is very good, but it worked in this situation. Most people need a little time to get used to having a camera in their face. I also think it's very important to allow someone to answer certain questions more than once - it's difficult to answer questions on-the-fly, and, in my experience interviewing people, you often get more thoughtful, better articulated answers the second or third time around. In addition to having better phrased answers, you are given more options in the editing room, so you have the opportunity to make the end result all the more coherent. But Quinn was almost as nervous as I was (which put me at ease, oddly enough), and she was operating the camera in addition to asking questions, so it's very understandable that things happened the way they did. As I already stated, Quinn's approach was perfectly fine for this situation - you just have to gauge your participants and quickly figure out how you need to interact with them. As others have stated, it was interesting to see which clips Quinn chose to use in her film. I was convinced certain things would be included - they weren't - and other things that didn't seem too important at the time made it into her project.

I encourage everyone to watch The Up Series! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_series - don't read all the details on each participant...it will ruin the viewing experience!!) It's absorbing and fun to watch, but it also makes you think about life and the passage of time in a way that I think is very valuable. They are great interview films - lots of lessons in rapport building, what to do, and what not to do. Anyway, I wanted to point out that most of the original "children" participate every seven years, while others drop out for one or two installments, only to return in a later episode. Only one of the participants, Charles, drops out after 21 Up and then refuses to participate in every subsequent installment. Some think it's ironic - I think it's quite significant - but Charles works in documentaries! (For some context, he was an executive producer on Touching the Void.) Anyway, with a few exceptions, I think most of us were pretty uncomfortable to be on the other side of the camera, and many of us hope to never repeat the experience. I don't know why Charles turned his back on The Up experiment, but maybe his career choice of filmmaker represents a deliberate decision about his relationship to the camera. All of us in this program have similarly chosen to be behind the lens. Perhaps this makes us more aware of and less comfortable in front of the camera, compared to those who have not seriously considered their relationship to the camera. Michael Apted, the director, has even offered Charles far more editorial control than he has any of the other participants, but Charles still refuses to return to the project. And as much as I'd love to know his thoughts on the matter, I think his refusal to participate is very understandable.