Letting It Rip with VEMOD
Q> What’s the place you feel like you belong in?
John> There’s a particular pleasure to be found in corner stores, gas stations, strip malls and bus terminals - the in-between places, where we go because we have to, where strangers’ paths intersect but we all try as hard as we can to ignore each other. There’s no game to be played or mask to be worn. And the greener the overhead fluorescents the better.
Jakub> I belong in a garden, surrounded by a sea of green gradients that change and evolve every time you step into it. I’ve fallen in love with my personal secret garden, which I have been cultivating and stewarding. Recently, this has been the space where I feel most connected. The garden is not just a backyard but a zone of safety, where nature heals the mind from the onslaught of modern problems.
Q> What’s your favourite food related memory?
John> My wife and I met when we were eighteen and in school. On our first date I took her to a supposedly-cool, supposedly-delicious barbecue place around the corner, where we both got food poisoning and wound up (hours later, around 4 A.M.) in the emergency room together. She was admitted and given fluids. I couldn’t afford the fluids, so I holed up in the waiting room bathroom. We were miserable and laughing about it. Wedding bells were already ringing.
Jakub> My wife and I live to eat. We’re always looking for new culinary experiences, love to travel, and explore new restaurants wherever we go, but nothing compares to a pot-luck style dinner with close friends. One specific memory is a wild garlic bisque, a play on ajo blanco, made by my friend Jaymin.
Q> Share with us your guilty pleasure. And a sport you’d like to be good at.
John> I watch way too much lefty political content on YouTube. And on the days when I’m being extra generous with myself, I can even manage to feel I’m participating in some sort of struggle. I get a vicarious glow. That’s the “pleasure” bit. The “guilty” bit comes later, when I remember I’m at my laptop in sweatpants, satisfying my own strange curiosity, which is about as self-serving an urge as I can imagine.
Even more embarrassing is my love for skate videos, since the last time I could get all four wheels off the ground and come back to earth again without my knees, elbows and wrists regretting it, I was probably ten years old.
Jakub> My guilty pleasure is also connected to a sport. I could watch soccer, listen to soccer, and talk about soccer in any format. I enjoy it all. I like to commit to things, so I’d rather keep expanding my footballing abilities rather than switch to another sport. I’ll put all my eggs in one basket with this one.
Q> If you’d need to pick where you draw your inspiration from - based on the last three questions - would it be places, foods or guilty pleasures?
John> Places, for sure, no contest. Cinema is a place you go in your mind, anyway. So places make for good inspiration, even more so the in-between places - strip malls, bus terminals, etc. If you can listen to a mother yelling at her kids in the self-check line and not get inspired to make art, you’re listening wrong.
Jakub> A lot of my inspiration comes from places that I visit. Whenever I'm driving, going somewhere new, or observing spaces and different elements of landscapes, it always seems to connect to the way I approach writing new ideas and concepts. There is something special about putting ideas in spaces and juxtaposing concepts with concrete places.
Q> What US state would you choose for an open-budget weekend?
John> There are 49 wrong answers to this question, and then there is Florida. They’ve got iguanas the size of cats wandering the sidewalks, and those are free. Given an unlimited budget, the great state of Florida will open unto you like a nasty-smelling passion flower. Everything’s for sale, even the moral underpinnings. I’m talking about Miami and Orlando, especially. Willy Wonka never dreamed of places so fantastical. You can even lick the sidewalks, although I’m told they taste more like Hep C than chocolate.
Jakub> I would spend the whole budget hiding somewhere in the mountains, preferably only accessible by helicopter and surrounded by a lush forest of trees, a cold river with sauna access, and no humans in sight. I think that would limit my options as far as states go, but it could also be a perfect opportunity to find something special in my beloved state of North Carolina.
Q> What’s a movie scene you’d like to recreate in a branded content?
John> Since we’re talking about Willy Wonka, has anybody recreated the “rowers keep on rowing” scene that scarred so many kids for life? Gotta be potential there.
Jakub> One of my favourite scenes in a movie is at the end of "Annihilation," a strange take on an alien invasion coming to Earth and becoming us, modifying our DNA and invading us from the inside. It showcases a concept we all understand and assume would happen in a specific sci-fi way, but this scene subverts those ideas and shows us a new take on a classic concept. I'm not sure how this would directly translate into branded content, but I believe we can take this sentiment and find ways of showing old ideas, ideas that people seem to know and understand very well, and present them in a new way. I think that’s part of our job too, to present old ideas in new ways.
Q> Can you name a project that changed the course of your career in an unexpected way?
John> I got lucky. I had a mentor. I met him in Oklahoma City when I was twenty-two. We were both directing short films for a 48-hour filmmaking contest, and we both attended the meet-and-greet event the day before.
“See that guy across the bar, black t-shirt, stick-and-poke tattoos? That’s Mickey Reece,” said the guy I was hanging with.
“Who’s Mickey Reece?” I said back.
“That’s Mickey Reece,” said the guy. “I hear he makes three features a year, every year, like clockwork. Arthouse stuff, way out there. They call him the Soderbergh of the sticks.”
Later we met. He taught me how to think about directing.
Jakub> During the pandemic, I set out to make a film about my father, exploring how he sees the world, his identity, and what it means to be an artist. This project made me realize and brought me back to the roots of why I want to make films. It reminded me that it’s not about the toys, the cameras, or the cool visuals but about honesty and vulnerability.
Filmmaking is a search for transcendence and the ability to find beauty in the mundane, listening to others, and being curious about the world around us. This film recalibrated my north star and reminded me to chase honest stories and not be entranced by trends and trying to be something I’m not.
Q> How do you collaborate with actors in order to get their best emotions out?
John> It sounds obvious, but I’ve learned never to underestimate the importance of reminding the actor what just happened to their character five minutes before the scene you’re about to shoot. If, as director, you’re gonna do em dirty by shooting all their scenes out of sequence (like usual), then you owe them. It’s on you to help carry the load of keeping performance continuity straight.
Jakub> In my experience, creating a space where people feel safe and comfortable to be vulnerable, being open to ideas, listening to someone, and kindly guiding them rather than telling them to do something does the trick. Emotions are precious, they hide, they are easily scared, so my goal is always to make the actor feel comfortable and safe. I’m there to protect them!
Q> What’s your favourite in camera trick?
John> Forced perspective, especially when it involves some sneaky foreground element like a matte painting or a fish tank.
Jakub> There is nothing like putting some Vaseline on a filter, sticking a half-filled water tank in front of the lens, or shooting through foliage. Finding ways to obstruct the clean perspective of a camera and creating chaos straight in-camera is my favourite.
Q> Transitions - love them or hate them?
John> I’m suspicious of transitions. They can be technically challenging, so they’re often done for their own sake, as a flex or to pump up production values. Which is fine, so long as there’s another layer happening, some kind of depth. “Challengers” (Guadagnino) does it right.
Jakub> I love transitions! My favourite is a classic crossfade ;) Jokes aside, I think transitions can be really effective, especially if they work for the concept and help the viewer understand something more effectively. However, they should be used sparingly and not as a crutch to hide a lack of vision.
Q> What’s your take on AI?
John> As far as I’m aware, no AI has ever puked its guts out in a hospital waiting room, or skinned its knees playing 1-on-1, or said goodbye to a friend, or stubbed a toe, or stayed home with a cold, or laughed, or cried, or grieved, or been afraid to die.
So I have absolutely no interest in hearing what an AI has to say about this life we’re all living. I’d rather look at a four-year-old’s finger painting of their dog crapping in the yard than a new Vermeer stochastically pixel-ed together by a server rack. That technology has no place in the arts.
“AI will probably most likely lead to the end of the world, but in the meantime, there’ll be great companies.” - Sam Altman. I agree with the first part.
Jakub> I want AI to do my dishes, make my bed, clean my house, and correct my spelling. I can appreciate it as a tool and enjoy using it as a helper for tedious tasks.
Q> Did you ever do a cameo role and if so, can you share a picture with us?
John> I haven’t. Face for radio. :.(
Jakub> Funny you ask, this is something I try to keep a secret, but it might be time to go public. My wife and I were on an episode of House Hunters International. You can check out the whole episode wherever that show streams.
Q> Dream client?
John> I’d like to make a documentary about a chip-maker. Silicon chips, not Lays. I’ve always wanted to shoot a project that involves using microscopes for cameras.
Jakub> My dream client is one who isn’t afraid to ruffle feathers, loves to push boundaries, and is willing to take risks. I love collaborating with people who push to create trends rather than follow them. I am always looking to shoot in real locations with real people doing real things. Finding ways of putting ourselves on top of a mountain or in a lush forest is always a plus.
Q> What is your advice to producers in order to keep our film sets more eco-friendly?
John> I think we could afford to be more suspicious of the cloud. And I say that as someone who uses it every day. But it’s easy to think of cloud storage as if it were saving space or reducing consumption, when all the space saved and consumption reduced is only concentrated into land-devouring, energy-chugging, coolant-spewing server farms that look more dystopian the bigger they get.
Jakub> Everybody brings their own water bottle! That's the least we could do.
