Being Geek Chic is a blog about one woman navigating the male-dominated industries of production and tech. It's written by Elizabeth Giorgi, Founder, CEO and Director of Mighteor - one of the world's first internet video production companies. Learn more about Mighteor here.
When I was 16, I saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (1) for the first time. To my creative mind: there is my life before I saw that movie. And there is what my life became BECAUSE I saw that movie. It was like a glaring sun that set fire to an iron and burnt an image on my brain: the bed on the beach. I watched it over and over and over again. I showed it to all my friends. I waited patiently, slogging through the pains of rural dial up internet to get online and find out two things: one, where is Montauk? And two, who wrote this impossibly sensical and relatable, yet completely nonsensically beautiful movie?
Charlie Kaufman.
One could say that after that, I became a disciple of the filmmaking school of Kaufman. I read all his scripts. I saw all his movies. I read every newspaper article I could find that ever mentioned his name. I devoured every interview. I even looked at pictures of him and tried to figure out what about his face made him… him.
It wasn’t a crush. It wasn’t love. It was complete and total professional admiration.
Today, I truly believe I have the bed on the beach to thank for my entire career. I knew how screenplays were written because of the bed on the beach. I knew I wanted to make beautiful imagery because of the bed on the beach. I fell in love with movies because of the bed on the beach.
In the summer of 2013, I even convinced my friends to steal a mattress with me from a local furniture retailer and we hauled it to a field in northern Minnesota in the dark of night. Humid and cold at the same time, we laid on the mattress and stared at the stars. My friends thought it was just a fun adventure. It was my reenactment of the bed on the beach. (2)
In my career, I’ve been to many a film festival, but never one of the premiere elites where all the big name stars and makers go to connect and watch and revel. So when my trip to Italia coincided with the Venice Film Festival, I knew I had to do everything in my power to acquire a pass. La Biennale de Venezia, as they call it, is the oldest film festival in the world dating back to the birth of cinema. It happens on the tiny island of Lido just off of Venice and it’s less glamorous and more real and honest in ways you wouldn’t even expect. Sure there are red carpets. But there are mostly just people who love cinema from all parts of the world trying to create an ounce of excitement about the work that they do. Truth was so resonant for me that it quickly overshadowed any sense of fame-grabbing. Just two weeks before I left for my trip, I finished production on my first narrative film. Suddenly, the reality of the WHY I put myself through that process was so obvious. This is where I’ve always wanted to be.
I have always wanted my own bed on the beach.
And because everything needs to come full circle when you’re telling a story like this, you must know that at this particular moment in time, Charlie Kaufman’s new film, Anomalisa, was having its world premiere at the Venice Festival. This was profound because Kaufman hasn’t put out a new film in 7 years. It felt as if I was meant to be there, even though it had been public knowledge for months. A girl can believe what she needs to believe to be happy. My entire mission at the Fest became finding a way to see the premiere. And indeed, I got my ass in.
Anomalisa is not my favorite Charlie Kaufman movie. But it is most certainly a Charlie Kaufman movie in every way a story could be owned by one mind. It’s about a motivational speaker sort who longs for some kind of connection in a world full of people who aim for very little other than the status quo. It’s done with a strange and jarring stop motion technique that is smooth and yet breathing, ugly and yet has all kinds of dark charm to it. You can almost smell it. Truly. In my mind, the film smells like burning felt. I may forget the details of that movie, but here is what I’ll never forget:
I’ll never forget sitting at the Venice Film Festival in the Grande Theater, watching the world premiere of a Charlie Kaufman film with him sitting only 8 rows behind me.
I’ll never forget how every single person in that theater sat there until the very last credit rolled, because they wanted to pay respects to the people that made the experience they just took in. I will never forget it because it’s what I do every time I see a movie. And I’ll never forget it because I loved being around people who I could just tell are doing that every time they see a film, even if that usually means they are doing it all by themselves as the theater staff sweeps up popcorn around their feet.
I’ll never forget giving Charlie Kaufman a standing ovation. Not just for Anomalisa. But for giving me the bed on the beach.
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*1* Fun fact about that movie, Ellen Kuras was the cinematographer. She did a beautiful job and is one of very few female cinematographers in Hollywood.
*2* I really hope the statute of limitations is up on that behavior. Either way, it was worth it.
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