One thing I've noticed about all of my films is that they tend to engender a tremendous amount of hostility in some people. For instance, this recent blog comment from "Anonymous":
"Where is your reaction to the LA Times review? The one that TOTALLY NAILS YOU? Thank god your children are celluloid and not flesh and blood."
What's odd to me about comments like this one is the amount of personal preoccupation that they display. If I don't like a film, I simply avoid it. I don't troll the blog of the person who made it, waiting impatiently for their response to the latest review.
It's almost as if these people feel they are on a mission. Their fervor is quasi-religious. One senses, palpably, that they feel that they are the upholders of morality, and that it is their duty (as well as their pleasure) to denounce me and my work.
The L.A. Times review in question took a similar stance, and focused on my "bad behavior," with no ability to discern the film's dramatic irony or self-consciousness. Such readings are surprisingly simplistic, yet not wholly unexpected. What is more interesting is the degree of venom that the film seems to elicit.
I remember when Gummo came out, and how the mostly withering (and utterly uncomprehending) reviews accused Harmony Korine of cruelty to cats. The inability of critics to distinguish between the views and actions of his characters and those of Harmony Korine himself was maddeningly jejune. That critics would have an even harder time distinguishing between the views and actions of Caveh the real-life character in the movie and Caveh the real-life director making a film about those events years later is, I suppose, to be expected. And yet, it reveals such an utter lack of sophistication, not only about the history of cinema but even about the classics of literature of the twentieth century, that one wonders how these film critics get their jobs.
My friends tell me I should be glad to get hate mail. It means the film is pressing buttons. So be it:
"Dear Anonymous,
Thank you so much for your kind posting on my blog. It means a lot to me that you feel so passionately about my work. Please keep 'em coming.
Best,
Caveh"
posted by Caveh Zahedi at
9:38 PM
