Editing a "making of" featurette for your own film, however, is both mentally taxing ("Who's actually going to watch this anyway?") as well as tedious and time-consuming, especially when you're a nit-picker. Thankfully, producer Lee wrote the script for the "making of" doc, titled Do What You Can With What You Have. The hard part of the process is looking back at a project that I'm still working on, albeit in its closing stages. It doesn't feel worthy of nostalgia just yet, but with this whole day-and-date experiment, I'll just have to push that out of my psyche. The most esteem-damaging part of the process is seeing myself in the throes of production - out of shape, tired, unkempt, and stressed. It reminds me a lot of looking in the mirror this morning... Showering isn't, like, a mandatory thing, right? It's more like flossing, right? Right? Say what? Oh, no.
As I write this, my final cut of Do What You Can... is compressing for producer review.
Looking beyond this tiny world of my keyboard, my mac, and me, I see that today, my favorite movie of all time turns 30. On this day in 1981, Raiders of the Lost Ark was released for the world to consume. I watch Raiders several times a year, and it never loses its luster.
Raiders is a big reason I'm doing what I'm doing this very second, in so much as I get an idea for a new movie every time I watch it. It just gives me the itch. I'll be honest and say that Jurassic Park and Back to the Future were bigger catalysts for my childhood desire to make movies, but Raiders is somehow more perfect, more watchable.
Note that when I say perfect, it is a completely subjective term. There exist many more expertly put-together films than Raiders, with smoother shots, better effects, and cleaner sound. That said, Raiders is more perfect than these movies for reasons I cannot perfectly articulate. Maybe it has something to do with the organic texture of the movie; it feels real and worn down. Perhaps it's the script, which refracts its source material so well that it spawns something new entirely. Whatever the elusive reason, it must be a strong one, as it doesn't overcome the movie's rough edges, but rather redeems them and makes them part of the greater whole.
Some would respect the movie as fine "trash", but I would disagree, and put Raiders of the Lost Ark above any socially conscious melodrama. Raiders defines cinema, an art form that thrives on behavior. To go on a limb while stealing an entry from the Werner Herzog glossary, there is more "ecstatic truth" in Raiders of the Lost Ark than in any weepy, any art-house indie, and any high gloss Oscar bait.
Happy birthday, Raiders of the Lost Ark - a movie greater than its franchise, greater than its inspirations, greater than its makers. That said: thank you Lucas, Spielberg, Marshall, Allen, Ford, Kaufman, Kasdan, and Williams for making something truly special.
