Angry
On breaking things
There is a lot to be angry about in the world at the moment. I mean, I could list examples, but I don’t need to tell you. There is a lot. Clearly, the past couple of generations have done a terrible job at stewarding the world to a better place. (I intend to directly blame my parents and their peers for this, probably when we play Trivial Pursuit kids versus grown-ups next time). But not only are there millions of things to be legitimately heartbreakingly angry about, I also have a really good list of things I’m angry about today that are mainly petty bits of competitiveness.
First of all, I’m only now getting over the fact that I wasn’t nominated for an Oscar this year. I might not have made a film that qualified, but still, a small part of me gets a little bit frustrated and angry that I haven’t been nominated for an Oscar.
I’m in an interminable fight to get some royalties from the release of one of my films in a couple of foreign territories. The distributor is slow-playing it to the point where I think they’re hoping for the collapse of the global financial system so that they might get out of paying me. Unfortunately, I think they’re going to win - the global financial system might collapse before they give me any money.
I’m angry that I got fouled playing football the other day, and that my ankle is currently four different shades of blue and yellow, with four neat stud marks. I won the ball, the guy clattered me. Every time I step on it funny, a little bit of rage bubbles up.
And I’m still occasionally angry that Dustin Hoffman asked for a copy of one of my films but never told me what he thought (or asked me if he could be in something I would make).
On top of all this, I now seem to get phishing attempts that are incredibly well targeted. This week there was one for a company offering me a screenwriting job to write a historical drama - a factual-based bit of fiction. That’s what I’ve been asking to write for ages! I would love to do that, but this isn’t at all legit. It’s just playing on my weakness and trying to get my information.
Okay, Tomas, you might be saying, enough of your entitled crap, where’s this going? Well...
This kind of angsty, fidgety rage, and this feeling of being itchy with frustration, is exactly the time that I decide to break things. And I really think that breaking things can be quite helpful sometimes. Not only the cathartic release of clearing some shit, but also the impulsive shaking up of things that aren’t really working.
I’m usually a very patient filmmaker. Much of my work is built around observation, character, about spending time building relationships and adding subtle details together. But sometimes I want to take a literal and metaphorical hammer to all of that.
For example, during the pandemic I was editing a film. And me and the main exec had differing opinions about whether to include one subject in the film or not. It had been drifting with ‘maybe we should’, or ‘I really think it would be good to’, or ‘I don’t think we need’, and all this kind of trying to divert ourselves away from confrontation language. But at a certain point, cooped up in home, editing with my daughter alongside me, dealing with lots of remote elements, I decided enough was enough and started drafting a really, really angry email. Here’s some of it…
His notes are patronising, factually inaccurate and filmically terrible.
He’s clearly confused by the most basic things.
My producer and the execs we were working with closely thought this email was both terrifying and hilarious and under no circumstances should have been sent to the main guy. But writing it was effective enough to let me break through and change my opinion about what I thought. That process is a little of what I need now.
What can I shake up, smash up and kick in my career that might lead to fresh ways of thinking, fresh ways of doing things, fresh opportunities?
I think I’m going to start by getting rid of one or two of my commercial agents that aren’t really doing it. Spring cleaning is always good. I think I’ll give away some books. I’ll probably sign up for a football game tomorrow morning and listen to Idles on the way.
I also want to write an angry/passionate script. Too often everything gets muted at the moment. I want a kind of expressive anger at the world film that lets me live out what I’m feeling today.
There’s even a way of writing that feels reflective of this kind of energy. I’m tired of all this explanatory, rational ‘logic’ that proliferates through scripts. I quite like a bit of violent, expressive, not necessarily sensical, action. I love how Joachim Trier just jumps from one scene to another if he needs to - I love the connections and rhythms that come out of that.
It’s like how Cassavetes made his films with that momentum and emotional pace. He talked about wanting scenes to feel unresolved, like you’d walked into the middle of something.
So maybe I’ll translate this restless, angry energy into the writing style. I’m tired of joining all the dots up. Maybe just writing something expressively that leaps around will make for a more dynamic film.
Or maybe I’ll just write in giant red felt tip on a huge sheet of paper, send some angry voice notes and visualize the 30 yard screamer I’m going to score tomorrow morning.
