Reading notes: You’ll Like This Film Because You’re in it
On the recommendation of my buddy Kathryn, I’ve been reading Michel Gondry’s odd little book, You’ll Like This Film Because You’re In It: The Be Kind, Rewind Protocol. Gondry is a filmmaker, the director of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Be Kind Rewind and others. I say it’s an odd book because he writes things like this:
And my utopia was once again tickling my brain. Utopian Tourette’s: That is my precise condition – utopias burst out of my imagination without warning. (14)
The book is, among other things, a guide to a particular approach to community engagement and collaboration. Gondry organized a gallery space into a set of film sets, and brought individuals and groups in to create films using the protocol laid out in the book. These guidelines are intended to maximize collaborative creativity:
I believe in systems. Well, not the big and vague entity that seems to run the world against everyone. The system to which I am referring is more like an ensemble of imagined rules that allow a participant to achieve a certain outcome. The rules let people focus on a single moment, while simultaneously ensuring that all the efforts produced add up to the desired result. (15)
and
When people are given a chance to achieve something fun, they don’t need the hassle of authority to stay focused. They always rise to the occasion, which is the easiest way to get the best of people: no management required. (59)
Gondry is particularly interested in how people create together, and ensuring participation and equality between contributors. He describes with great detail some of the specific groups he observes going through the process. His distress when teachers interfere with their students’ collaborations, or when professional filmmakers attempt to circumvent the protocol are tender and authentic. He also acknowledges the ambiguous value of the products of the — these films are not great art, and may be limited to the enjoyment of the persons who worked on them. He alludes to individuals who have since gone on to other projects, but the goal is not . The goal is to make and watch a movie with a group that then becomes a community.
This sort of meaningful collaboration can develop through all kinds of activities, not just film. The creative problem solving that Gondry describes reminds me of my own dorkalicious time on Odyssey of the Mind teams as a teenager. In this creative problem-solving competition, a team works together to write and perform a skit that incorporates certain requirements. Though I doubt I’ll ever have to make another apron out of paper bags, OM taught me team work and brainstorming skills that I use on a daily basis. These kinds of skills are at least a bonus effect of projects like the films Gondry is proposing.
