State of Action

Kartikey Sehgal

If you are a man and want to tell a girl that she has nice hair, then you go to her and tell her that she has nice hair. If you are a girl who wants to tell a man that you have nice hair, then you hint and hint and travel the world over and over and blame him for the expenses. That’s also the difference in films.

Certain films are direct. They have a message, or a story and they tell it to you straight. Using people who act straight - the actors.
Other films use lots of emotions and to drive home their point.

This is no criticism. It’s about how simple cinema can be. Or how indirect.
You take a camera and shoot people who say something, and then you move on. Or you spend time in their tears and say the same things.

'Straight-cinema' appears simple but takes immense courage, fortitude and other such text-book qualities. Simple things are difficult. So we hope that people are lost in weepy emotions. Coz when they cry, or spend their time in fear, joy and other emotions, then they will not see through the deficiencies. Such films, however, may turn out to be good. Hence, no criticism.

I will not take examples. You do that for your self. Or instead of films, look at people around you, especially in their interactions with women. There are men who only ‘beat around the bush’, flatter excessively and waste time with the other gender. And there are men who are either quiet, or talkative, but they speak straight.
And there are those who act to be straight or quiet or broody but waste their time in trying. Nothing like originality.

Anything that’s original and promising doesn’t waste time in pandering too much to others’ tastes. Now you will tell me men who are brilliant and have spent time, and lots of it, in convincing and pitching their worth to the money bags - the financiers.

Here’s the difference. It doesn’t matter to them. I have projects that I am pitching to people, some are long-pending, and a few very long-pending, but I loathe complaining to people about them, except when they are friends and I need to inform them about aspects of my life or of art.

Do you struggle in art, in making it, or do you struggle to convince people.
Both, you say. I agree with you - today.
On another day, I reply - neither.
You just do your work. Leave the rest.

You hone the art of straight talk - tell the girl she has nice hair. And then move on no matter what her reply. Action can transcend talk.

You make a film, or you don’t make it. That’s all. You do, or you don’t.
Nice state to be in.

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When i am in the boat, I can think of storms to come, but do nothing about them, except wait.
Or I can think of the fear I had about the water, when I sat on the boat.
I still can’t do anything. I am in the water, on the boat. I look at the sky, look around, and think of other things.
I am already here.

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Letting go, a popular usage, means doing it without fear of regret.
When I let go, I think that I won’t care what people think about me.
Letting go is a temporary feeling/affair.
So after I let go something, do I immediately let go in another event?
And keep going this way?

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Is action the problem or is choice the problem?

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"I have frequently experienced myself the mood in which I have felt that all is vanity; I have emerged from it not by means of any philosophy, but owing to some imperative necessity of action . . . .”
- Bertrand Russell