“Shirkers,” is, by every measure, a documentary noir. When you conceived of the idea of making this story into a documentary, did you always anticipate it was going to be a mystery?
I knew in my gut it was a mystery because it was a mystery I was trying to solve as a filmmaker about this entire period in life. There’s so many black holes that had to be filled. All these details I didn’t know. But as I went along trying to recreate the cadences of my life from the kind of youthful, energetic, optimistic period, it went along organically because I was growing up in the film and trying to reflect what it feels like to grow up and, inevitably it became me actively, as a filmmaker and as a life detective, trying to solve this mystery. So, yeah, I discovered it along the way, but all along, I had been approaching it as a detective in my own life because I forgotten what it felt like even to be a 19-year-old full of ideas. So, going back through my archives and looking through all my materials, I actually felt like a detective, so it felt completely correct to approach this as a detective.
In the process of making “Shirkers,” did you become reinvigorated with your creative side?
Yeah. Completely. With the 21st century, all this stuff that’s available to you; the fact that I basically edited this film in my garage with a 27-year-old, untried editor who had no experience, he just knew Photoshop and After Effects. He was not a film editor. But I knew what story I wanted to tell and he was willing to play along and just experiment with me, so it was very freeing. That’s really liberating when you realize that you can do this and you don’t need the credentials. You don’t need the long 30 years of experience. If you know what story you want to tell and you have the equipment and you know how to use it, you can actually tell a story.
In “Shirkers,” there’s a theme of a man abusing his power and taking advantage of an impressionable young woman. That’s a theme that’s been prevalent in the film industry and beyond for a long time, but many feel that the climate is starting to shift for the better. Do you think in today’s sociopolitical landscape, Georges would have gotten away with what he did?
I think Georges, like so many versions of Georges, get away with this all the time, no matter the age. People are more empowered now; younger women are; there are more people who might believe them and not so ready to say, “It’s your fault,” or victim-blame them like what happened with us. We weren’t so much impressionable as we just thought of him like he wasn’t like this authoritarian character. So, that’s the interesting thing. He came at us as if he was an equal, as if he was one of us. So, he was like a friend. A compadre. He didn’t seem like a grown up, which is why the betrayal was even more hurtful. But obviously, there was a power imbalance, of course.
One of the things that happened back then was that we didn’t have any grown ups to back us up. We didn’t have people who are really gonna be on our side, because it’s almost like, “You asked for it. You hung out with this creepy guy. Like, we all said he’s slightly creepy, and yet you hang out with him.” Hopefully, with all the stories that are out there that people are sharing about their experience, I think people won’t instantly discount experiences or the testimonies of young women who had gone through these things.
Yeah. Hopefully.
And they won’t simply say, “It was your fault for believing and trusting such a man.” All of these stories are different, and all of them have different permutations. Often, the women are not dumb, they’re not impressionable, they’re not naive, innocent people being led astray. Often, it’s much more complicated than that. And I think that’s a really interesting thing.
To that end, the original “Shirkers” was so ahead of it’s time. Do you have any plans of actually releasing the original film now that you’ve finally recovered the film?
It actually hasn’t been cut together, so it’s just fragments. And it’s 700 minutes total, so it has to be edited together from the script, which didn’t quite make sense. So. it has to be really, creatively done. Most of the sound is lost, so it probably would be a silent movie, and then we probably need the help of very patient editors and people to piece this thing together. And it would require some money and some time, and I don’t really have either right now. Everybody is asking about it, so at some point, it might happen. But I’m not sure I have the bandwidth to deal with it right now.
Any new projects that you are at liberty to discuss?
I’m talking to a whole bunch of different companies about different projects, so I’m really excited about making the next step. Nothing’s been sold yet, so I can’t say anything, but I’m working on a bunch of things like long form and short, feature and series. So, I’m excited. Basically, the whole thing : I cannot wait to make it for lost time. It’s been a long time. Yeah.