Celebrity-ish Encounter

Today I had a lecture from Jan Harlan on various aspects of film production and had the good fortune of sitting down and talking with him in a small group after lunch. He was very kind and curteous and always excited to share his wisdom with us young folk. And furthermore, he genuinely seemed to be excited by the energy we had. He even accepted a manuscript for a children's book written by one of my classmates.

I would be surprised if anyone reading this had previously heard of Jan Harlan and knew who he was. He is not a big-shot Hollywood producer, he certainly seems to have no interest in the spotlight whatsoever. But, he is an extremely important person to be familiar with in the film industry. He was Stanley Kubrick's producer from 1975 until the man's death in '99.

The enthusiasm I got from Jan (he doesn't really seem like a Mr. Harlan) felt so incredible and earnest. I believe he was truly excited for our generation to start making new films and thinking of new creative ways to approach our productions (a big part of his lecture was on production expenses, especially in relation to music).

Even better, he will be around for supper, all 3 meals tomorrow, and has 2 lectures and an introduction to The Shining to give us. So there is much more to come. He has reinforced all my passions towards art & filmmaking, and I don't doubt he will continue to do so with his future lectures and, simply, his future presence at the school over the next 28 hours or so.

Jan said passion is the most important thing. Even if your story is not about yourself, you must have a passion for it, something that draws you into the story. Either you relate to it or it is about something that is very dear to you, that you feel very strongly about. You need to have Knowledge + Passion or Love, as he put it in his lecture. I think he's right.

And I plan to capture this passion in my own filmmaking. Even if it does run the big risk of "putting all my cards on the table" as Jan put it.