ADA: Tell us about the New York Documentary Film Festival you attended.
LD: I went to the film festival because John Rushe was there -- you might call him the grandfather of cinema verite -- he made a film called Chronicle of the Summer, and coined that term. That preceeded Breathless by Jon Luc Goddard. Rushe was the spark that set off the whole French New Wave.
LT: Which influenced a whole generation of Americans.
LD: He took that to be known as direct cinema in the U.S.; Albert Masels, Richard Leetock, whatever -- Wiseman.
ADA: Were Richard and yourself influenced by documentary filmaking with Slacker?
LD: With Slacker it had to do with what limitations we had technically. I just had a portable 16 mm which I owned. We had six lights. We couldn't really do anything really elaborate in a fictional context. So yeah, we were trying to make it look like real life, and that goes back to Rick and I's intrest in the French New Wave -- guys like Goddard, Bunuel. We wanted it to be kind of cyclical -- sort of non-linear. A baton passing from one character to the next -- little slices of life.
ADA: What documentaries in the film festival did you see that influenced you?
LD: Nothing that really influenced me. Maybe a bit down the road. There was a film called The Cruise that I think people will see. It's about a guy that does double decker bus tours -- the "Apple Tours" of New York. He's a free wheelin, rappin' kind of free associative poet guy that gives more or less a people's history of New York -- a very unorthodox way of giving a tour.
ADA: I was thinking about documentaries like Roger and Me that got out to the mainstream. It seems like documentary filmaking is this sort of elite genre of moviemaking that doesn't reach a wide audience.
LD: There was a panel discussion that included John Rushe, Albert Massels, and D.H. Pennebaker; and every chance he got he brought up Michael Moore because he despises the guy. He sees him not as a documentary filmaker at all but a petty entertainer. So here you've got guys that build their careers, and they are not very lucrative careers by the way, but they are well known in these circles. Documentary, or cinema verite if you will. I feel like Albert Masels -- he's old -- I feel like he's threatened by people like Michael Moore.
LT: Maybe because he's pushing boundaries, making it a little different. You always find people who are old school...like this is the definition of documentary -- how the genre should be.
LD: That was the point of that particular panel discussion; about defining it. I think their point is well taken because that's the whole point of direct cinema or cinema verite. Define truth; and he felt Michael Moore was a conniving entertainer rather than someone who is speaking the truth.
LT: I think that's weird, because what is truth? There is no absolute truth! No matter how you slice it, one always is coming from a certain perspective. I would have argued truth in cinema needs to be defined by the viewer.
LD: It ends up in the existential realm. You have someone like Jon Luc Goddard to define truth -- a film is true at 24 times a second. But here we have a serious panel of filmakers -- it was an experiment about truth and the idea was to keep objectivity out of it until -- and this is the key -- until you start editing. There is no way you can really be an objective editor; but the idea was to be as much as you could an objective viewer on the world through the camera.
ADA: So in terms of the Austin film scene, where is independent film headed? How does it compare to 10 years ago?
LD: Well, Slacker was like 10 years ago. I could count every filmaker in town on one hand. There are very few people -- even professional crew people I can count on both hands. So yeah, we are undergoing a renaissance, nothing less in this town, as well as other towns around. Independent film is breaking out everywhere. I think interest in documentaries here is greater that any town I've been in the whole country.
LT: We have the "Texas Documentary Tour."
LD: I think the "Texas Documentary Tour" sold out every night in Austin. You know you can't sell films out like that in New York.
LT: Does New York have a good film society?
LD: Yes, The Public Film Forum, the Anthology Film Archives, Collective for Living Cinema. These places have been around forever but there is so much going on there that you're not going to find lines around the block to see something that would show at the Texas Documentary Tour. See in Austin it used to be just music, no film. We had the Varsity Theater, Cinema Texas -- you know, that Louis Black started. We lost the Varsity Theater, Cinema Texas, now subsequently the Texas Union....
LT: And more currently, Cinema West!!
LD: Oohhh, Cinema West!
ADA: So, Lee -- besides pornos; what are some of your goals for the future as cinematographer?
LD: I guess my goal at the moment is to find a challenge. Either visually or just a good story. So if you know anyone out there that has a good script and has money...I talk to a lot of people that have great ideas and scripts but they can't get it together. I think the indie film scene is burning out slowly because it is fusing its way into commercial Hollywood. I believe they use the term independent as a euphemism for exploitation: crew working cheap. At the end of the day, what's going on? What kind of movies are these so-called independents? They're not that much different than Hollywood movies.
LT: How does that relate to unions? How is it possible to get unions to work cheap?
LD: They can't get unions to work cheap, but they are working on that. Now unions are working with producers to have "special deals" for independent films. You don't see it much around this part of the country because there is not much union presence. See, it comes from the top down. It's the demographers that have a negative impact. The evil science of finding out what people where will do. The psychological method of marketing. The studio execs rely on this and they do extensive testing and marketing research without regard to making a meaningful and worthwhile product.
LT: As director of photography, where do you come in? Do you work with the director on the screenplay or is it different with every relationship?
LD: It's different with every relationship. It is preferable as DP from my perspective to work with a director that knows cinematography. Some people easily slap the term auteur on there. Hollywood producers and studio execs overuse the term. It was originally used to describe some of the European filmakers like Francois Trauffot; a sole visionary. But in filmaking, a director that knows cinematography makes it more of his/her vision. Too many movies rely on the DP; especially a first time director and a DP that has done 30 or 40 movies. Studio exects like fresh young ideas because that's the audience they are going for. These directors often don't understand cinematography, so they get an old time DP to hold their hand through the picture.
ADA: So when you say "understanding cinematography," what do you mean?
LD: Basically blocking, which means setting up the camera, choosing what angles and lenses. Master shot, close up, over the shoulder, reaction shot. There are four or five shots standard to every movie. Directors rely on the DP to block and set the camera so many times. Every shot is different, but I think it is the job of the DP to interpret the director's vision or mood.
LT: So how was the director/cinematographer relationship between you and Linklater?
LD: Rick is not a really visual director, not real cinematic. But I understand the type of stories he is telling are not inherently cinematic. I like to stick with that, if that's what he wants. I don't go out of my way to make it look so-called beautiful when it is not called for. Rick understands lenses and camera movement and what motivates camera movement.
LT: What would be your ideal cinematic situation? What do you feel passionate about?
LD: I sometimes dream of doing an episodic road movie. Directing or shooting it. One a year for 10 years...more or less an expanded type of Slacker, but traveling the world. An episodic road movie...
LT: 'Screams PBS!
LD: 35 Up is something Mike Apted did. He goes back to the same group of kids he interviewed when they were seven, every seven years. It's a sociological, ethilogical perspective, but it 's very cinematic, too. That's the kind of thing that interests me.
