Chris Gore, Founder/Owner of FilmThreat/Author/Filmmaker: I think that
the American identity is so fractured because of current day politics that there's almost no such
thing as a movie that everybody can get behind. I think the most recent example of one was…
Film Courage: Why do you love movies so much?
Chris: I feel like I love movies because it's
like it's like a waking dream, right? It's a dream and an experience where you can
enter the mind of a character and experience the world through their eyes and it's actually
safe whether that character gets horribly injured, has terrible things happen to them or loses
loved ones, friends, family members, you're able to experience those things
the kinds of things that everybody experiences in life in a way that's safe and in a way that
imparts lessons whether you're aware of it at the time or not. There's something in our lizard brain
that responds to storytelling because I think it's a way for us to exorcise our own demons or to deal
with loss and pain from our past and that's why I think storytelling and in particular movies
and in particular movies and seeing a movie in a theater when it's dark and you're focused and
you're not on your phone you're not distracted although I will say there is an entire category
of movies that I would say this would be a good movie to watch while you're folding laundry
and I have watched those movies and I have folded laundry while I've watched them
but the a film I know I'm really going to care about I'm going to see in a theater in the dark
experience the world through that character's eyes and and come out the other end better for it
and it's so universal that feeling that feeling that's why wherever you go in the world
people love to have us have a story unfold on the big screen I think there's something
primal about that that goes back to telling stories around the campfire or just a fire
right there's there's something about it that's just embedded in our heads and that's why
the love and passion for film is so universal worldwide and when did you find that category of
the folding laundry film I think the folding laundry film came during the pandemic in
terms of watching stuff I probably would not have watched otherwise when it's just well
we're here there's no movies at the theater I'm gonna watch this thing and so I think there is an
entire category of movies and a lot of I would say series television where you can get a lot of the
story that is happening just from the it's just from hearing it so it's kind of an a radio play
and they say that the original star trek series if you're not watching it if you're
just listening to it and I can confirm this because when I was a kid I used to
record the audio of old episodes of star trek and listen to them and even though I wasn't
seeing everything when I would listen to those cassette tapes later I still got got the story
all of your narrative points your your character moments your drama from the music
there there's a whole world of just like just that that you can experience just from listening to it
and I would I would recommend just as an exercise for fun some of the content on streaming services
like Netflix you can get not just the captions on but there's a thing called audio description and
I strongly recommend that you do this try this out for fun take something you like if audio
description is an option that's available it's for people who are disabled may not be able to see
and not only do you hear the dialogue you hear a description of a narrator telling you what has is
happening action-wise on the screen it's in a way almost like having the screenplay read to you it's
I mean it obviously has a function a useful function for people who are are unable to see
but it also as as a way of learning you you can you can listen to these
heck you can listen to them while you're driving and you get the entire story the audio descriptive
version there's even you can look this up online there's there are people who list some of the best
audio descriptive versions of content so I find it really useful I think it's interesting
but the folding laundry yes I think we've all had that experience where you're like
this thing that I'm about to watch doesn't deserve all of my attention for me it's
generally romantic comedies I romantic comedies as much as I am sometimes forced to watch them
I feel like that's that's something I can multitask and still enjoy okay so suppose
tonight is laundry night so after this interview I'm gonna go down to the laundromat and then I'm
gonna come back and start folding and organizing can you recommend two movies for me oh sure I
Marry Me with Jennifer Lopez which I saw recently that's a totally a full laundry movie and I would
say Death on the Nile for recent films okay they may not be recent when you're watching this
I have no idea when you're watching this when are you watching this I don't know all right great I
want to do laundry right now check them out but we all know we have those right everyone where you're
just like this is like my full attention is going on this Christopher Nolan movie or whatever it is
we're seeing like I'm gonna turn off the lights and I have my little I have like this sort of LED
like blue light that goes around my television kind of makes a movie theater experience in 4k
whatever but then there's other things where you're like now I'm just going to have this on
in the background or for me it's even a movie I've seen so many times I can quote the entire film
or what's great is when you think you're going to watch a film like that and you're actually
surprised like I was watching old episodes do you remember VR5 no I don't remember oh okay
so it had Lori Singer and it was about her she had this gift of being able to go into virtual reality
and she was the only one that had this ability and so she was being like
wanted by big tech at that time which was in the mid 90’s and it the storytelling was
excellent it's got cool old graphics and modems but I thought oh this is the perfect thing to
put on and actually I couldn't do anything else right right like some of those you put
on thinking like ah whatever I’m going to organize my receipts right okay that's something here to do
you put something on and then you do get caught up I mean that's that's a pleasant surprise but
but I kind of plan my viewing that way because I tend to watch at least a movie a day if not
more it's just it's part of what I do what does an American film mean today I really think that
there is no American cinema today the last great era of American cinema was in the 70s and probably
the 80s as well but I think that the American identity is so fractured because of current day
politics that there's almost no such thing as a movie that everybody can get behind
I think the most recent example of one was the latest spider-man movie spider-man no way home
which was a an incredibly fun like spider-man not just a spider-man movie it's a spider-man movie
that was built up over 20 years of spider-man movie fandom starting with Toby Mcguire
Andrew Garfield and and building up to this where now that all the spider men
are are united that was like hey we can all get behind this
it's a completely fun superhero movie ride we can all get behind it is that an American film
I don't know I would argue that the superhero genre is something that's very American made but I
really feel we've lost our identity as a country because it's so fractured into
multiple different americas and I’ll give you an example this is a weird thing I did a panel
at a a convention called Politicon and I pitched a panel called Trump The Movie and I had a
friend of mine who was a screenwriter I had a friend of mine who worked in film development
and I asked like almost every president post their presidency has a movie made about them
right not a documentary a dramatic movie that sort of goes through the highlights the low lights and
and and I wondered if if a trump movie would ever be made how would you market that movie
and I got it was a very interesting discussion because we got into this whole thing of like okay
you make the movie whatever the movie is what kind of movie would it be would it be more comedic
would it be sort of farcical like maybe maybe like from the mind of Adam Mckay or something
like what would it be one but then here becomes the challenge of marketing that movie which comes
back to the question of American cinema okay you've made a movie about the trump presidency
who is it for and how do you market it do you do a marketing campaign that is for
the red states that makes trump look like a hero do you do another campaign another marketing
campaign from the same movie that talks about how he's a horrible human being and this one these are
the trailers you would run in the blue states I think it would be really interesting to see
which is why I think a movie like that will not be made I don't think that there'll be a dramatic
telling of his story of of the trump presidency it's just not going to happen and I think it has
to do with our fractured America that's why we have no really cohesive American
cinema I think that there are outside interests and the concerns of our corporate factory
filmmaking are that this movie needs to play globally so it it's again and I've talked about
this many times the check boxes that need to go in order for something to play to the world
means that you've you've kind of distilled it and and it's not really a holy American
American movie and the only way you would notice this is if you watched a lot of foreign foreign
films or or what they call now world cinema so I would say to you I say as an exercise for yourself
watch a Canadian movie watch a Canadian it's very Canadian and the a lot of countries actually
subsidize their filmmakers and and the arts and in particular is the Canadian film board
that you pitch a movie to the Canadian film board has to have a certain percentage of
Canadian talent in it large percentage it has to have Canadian themes and made for people in Canada
and there are a lot of things if you're watching this you're American you're not going to get the
jokes I grew up in Michigan just outside of Canada and and so I experience the CBC I watch Canadian
children's programming I watch Canadian movies I watch Canadian hockey I became a hockey fan from
watching the CBC but it's really interesting to see how distinct the American identity is to the
Canadian culture so do yourself a favor and watch see films from other countries and you'll notice
how important it is for those countries to to lay out their identity in their culture in particular
french cinema does that as well so i'd say broaden your horizons broaden your media diet and you'll
just notice that most of the movies that are made in America now are not for America they're
for the globe they just are and so I think what's happened is it's eroded our identity as Americans
or something we could get behind because like I said you're going to make a movie about trump
you're going to have two marketing campaigns for that movie no matter what that movie ends up being
well let's suppose we just take the name trump out of it we could use any president really in
the last let's say 20 years we could use any media figures in the last few years
if we were to have a trailer that was specific to their audience
wouldn't it be almost considered propaganda well I would say that at least when it comes to
to documentaries it's almost all propaganda now I mean I would say to documentary filmmakers
it's just like I see a lot of docs small indie docs that come to Film Threat for us to look at
and it's almost all solidly on one side of the equation or the other I've seen
pro-Trump documentaries I've seen anti-Trump documentaries I would say that the only one
that was truly unbiased was made by a British filmmaker [James Fletcher] called The Accidental
President oh yes I heard of that yeah and I strongly recommend the accidental president it's
just one because it's made by a brit is just like look got no skin in the game let's let's look at
trump as a person and and what he did and it was it's really fascinating because I think it's an
it's an unbiased look at that at his run for the presidency but really most political documentaries
I see now they're either I can already tell it's like oh team red team blue where where where what
happened to being unbiased what happened to being a journalist and seeking out truth no matter where
it leads that used to be the way things were not sure what happened to that and I've often said
Film Threat my media outlet Film Threat dot com where we review independent films we're
politically agnostic we have people on all sides on all different diversities of thought I think is
my more what takes priority with me and I do enjoy reading someone whose opinion doesn't completely
line up with mine it's an opportunity to to learn something but I but I really see a fracture in in
the world of doc filmmaking where most of what's being produced is purely propaganda there was a
and and to be clear my politics are very middle of the road sure I can sit here and talk to you
all day about star wars and star wars is actually a good place I'm sure we'll get to some star wars
talk star wars a good place because it's a thing that most people have seen 99.9
of people have seen it so it's a great entry point to talk about lots of issues
that particular movie or film series and all that it begat but but boy we we've really gotten to a
place now where I just have concerns about we've lost the ability to objectively look at facts
and I think that's lazy here's why it bothers me it's lazy because
just as someone who's politically been in the middle which means I generally despise both sides
I think that let's come up with solutions to problems and if you're focused on the solution
it really really shouldn't matter necessarily your the politics or what you may be compromised by
when it comes to your donors but I but now I feel that if you are on one side or the other I feel
that that in my opinion is kind of lazy because what what it says is the thinking is done for you
which is why I think there are many ways to look at an issue so
I would just like to see documentary filmmaker filmmaking become
less less biased I think I think that would be a great service to all of us.