Roddy Bogawa

12/99

Roddy Bogawa lives in New York and teaches filmmaking at New Jersey City University. JUNK (SFIAAFF 2000) is his second feature length film.

Roddy Bogawa 12/99 These are the worst of times...In a short blip of wiggles, fits and starts, "independent" filmmaking is over. That dirty little word "indie" has taken on a whole new meaning not only for what fragments existed of a film community committed to making work outside of an industry but also to those controlling its distribution (and reception). Technology has brought neither pluralism nor education but tidal wave upon tidal wave of mediocrity. I'm fatigued. Critics are fatigued. Audiences are fatigued. It's strange to be nostalgic for a moment fueled by isolation, embattled with culture, silent not having yet found a voice. But now I am. There once existed "political" filmmaking, "experimental" filmmaking, "personal" filmmaking. But now the markers have shifted, the margins have been swallowed whole. Once upon a time, Jean-Luc Godard said that the problem was not to make political films but to make films politically. Perhaps these words are words we as filmmakers should re-learn. Perhaps this is the precise moment to re-trench. I'm hopeful and excited. Perhaps we're in the best of times. Roddy Bogawa lives in New York and teaches filmmaking at New Jersey City University. JUNK (SFIAAFF 2000) is his second feature length film.