HFF's The Five: 01.09.25 Edition
What are all the reasons for why why why
HFF’s The Five is a regular and reoccurring feature of this newsletter. It is my twice a week (sometimes thrice) collection of the links, ponders, and wonders I find relevant to those of us committed to a non-dependent cinema ecosystem that prioritizes the artist — what I now call NonDē cinema. It aims to be a gentle analysis of the collision between the real, symbolic, and imaginary within our world, industry, and community, and how we can not only find the passion to keep on keeping on, but also the drive to truly make it all better than we found it.
The HFF FIVE: 01.09.25
5 What happens after it breaks your heart?
4 What does it say that we have abandoned the mainstream outlier films?
3 One way satisfying way to try to lead life
2 The purpose of 15 years of an abundance of photography
1 Another newsletter you should subscribe to.
5
Nothing short of shocking
I wasn’t in NYC during 9/11, but I was the next day. I had to drive down from Toronto as I had been at the film festival. I wasn’t in NYC during Hurricane Sandy but my wife was, and she was downtown without power in a darkened city. But I was in LA during these devastating fires. I wish I wasn’t.
I was supposed to be away. I was supposed to be on location and to start filming a new movie but the financing was delayed (more on all that much later). The fires were all around us, but we were spared. So many people we know evacuated and a substantial number lost their homes and all their possessions. History and memories were in all those homes. Dreams. The past and the future too. And security. How they were planning to live their life from this moment forward. And now it is gone. It is heartbreaking, and really confusing.
When I was a teenager I liked to imagine cities being destroyed. Like so many, I dug a dystopian vision. And I was angry towards what was around me. They were childish thoughts. And the worst sort of ignorance. The kind that comes with blinders to the pain everyone would suffer if those visions were not just fantasy. But being in NYC on on 9/12, I never wanted to imagine such things again.
I’ve heard many spit out their wish to burn Hollywood to the ground, but I don’t think anyone meant it literally. When it does come, we like to attribute such destruction to nature, or even to what we like to think of as the worse side of human nature — evil, but to me all of it can be attributed to a sort of willful ignorance — the things that actually define humanity in our present era.
We didn’t want to address what was the inevitable until it was actually happening — or rather too late. That is our real evil and it is more of an infection, be it ignorance, neglect, laziness, or lack of responsibility. We are all the same when it comes to this. We hope it never happens. We wish that it never did. But we also knew that it would, and that it will again. We didn’t plan for the worse when we could of and should of. That is the only way to diminish the impact of the inevitable. It is the sort of an investment that pays off most when it can be determined that it is wasn’t needed in full.
Instead we subtly encourage all to gamble. With everything we hold dear.
Where do we go from here? Can we learn how to make sure our broken hearts and lost dreams make us stronger? I have to say that in all such tragedies and disasters the outpouring of unity and compassion is always inspiring, and yet it always leaves me wondering, how can we do that next time BEFORE it is too late?
So many people have reached out, and it means a great deal. People do love to help. That opportunity is always there; we don’t have to wait until disaster and heartbreak arrive.
Imagine.
4
The $5-35M feature — particularly the comedy — are disappearing fast!
Their mistake is your opportunity. Best get to it. My former boss, Roy Price, nailed it recently. We are only making 30 or so features in that budget range a year that break through to audiences. And half of them are horror flicks now. Personally I suspect that you can’t attribute all of that to executives’ dumb ass selection process. I believe some of that it is due to the unfair competitive practices of the GSPs and other corporate powers. Add on Indies’ neglect of maintaining the ecosystem for authored work, and the creator class’ self-sabotaging self-centeredness and then, boom, doomsday for a significant swarth of films: the cultural course correctors. Give Roy a read:
3
It was a note to a friend, but it was really a note to myself, and thus really a note to you too.
I think there very likely is only one way to live one’s life and be satisfied and that is by active choice. I think it also only makes sense to have that active choice be pointed towards personal satisfaction. For a great part of my life that satisfaction was driven by accomplishment. I have had a profound need to be appreciated (by those that I appreciated), and I slowly came to realize that got in the way of my personal satisfaction. My dreams are for me — and although it is disappointing that others do not share in them with the same level of passion I do — they still satisfy me, as dreams. And not as things I need to complete or accomplish. I can work towards them, and I can pass them on to others if they are so inclined, but I don’t even need to execute them. The point is to recognize that dreams are not only worthy just as dreams, but they are also delights. I deliberately don’t want to hit the delight part harder, because I wanted to focus on how it is okay for the dream not to be achieved.
2
Now I understand why they mated cameras with cell phones
I’ve always enjoyed taking photos, but I must confess that back when phones were in fact just phones (and maybe also address books), I thought it was absurd to add a camera to the device. I guess I got that wrong.
That said, in the 15 years since phones & cameras mated, I have felt a wee bit foolish about the amount the number of photos I took. I found no way to keep them organized — and I certainly didn’t want to spend time doing so. I experimented to see if social media was the home for mine, but nope, it didn’t satisfy me. But now I think I found The Why.
Why have I taken so many photos of so many types for the last decade and a half? To illustrate all of the substacks that I will write over my remaining days. Whew! I knew they’d be an answer somewhere.
Do we eventually find the purpose of everything?
1
I found this the perfect way to enjoy my coffee
Like the author, I am not particular pro-diner, or anti-diner for that matter, but it is an example of why Substack has become part of my morning ritual. I loved stumbling into this essay. It is so many things at once. And it is excellent writing. It made me jealous that I can’t do that!
And as a SPECIAL BONUS and ICYMI when I shared it before:
Mmmm…
Mist,