I'm so happy to return to the roots of the podcast by talking REQUIEM FOR A SOLDIER with filmmaker Jeremy Musher, currently crowdfunding on Seed & Spark. It is the story of a "Vietnam veteran who in his last weeks of service, found a Vietnamese soldier's diary, and 56 years later returned it to the soldier's family." We talk war films, fatherhood and filmmaking, and his sweeping vision for a topic that doesn't get as much love as it should: Vietnam veterans. And this film has the added pleasure of showing the Vietnamese perspective.
Let's get REQUIEM over the line. Happy holidays.
Jeremy's Indie Film Highlights: THE ZONE OF INTEREST (2023) dir. by Jonathan Glazer; LITTLE DEATH (2024) dir. by Jack Begert
Memorable Quotes:
"The interview we did with him to shoot this kind of teaser was a seven hour interview, and Peter just has story after story."
"It is the story of a Vietnam veteran who in his last weeks of service, found a Vietnamese soldier's diary, and 56 years later returned it to the soldier's family."
"I feel like financing a film is harder than actually making the film."
About one of the subjects of the documentary: "He struggled with a lot. He struggled with PTSD. He was an alcoholic, he was homeless, divorced arrested, and never lost the diary."
"I've never done a crowdfunding campaign before and I've always pushed it off until I found a project that I really cared about."
"[Animation] works so well for war...because I think that war is probably one of those things that you can't really understand unless you've lived through it and as somebody who hasn't lived through it, it's hard to ever fully understand it. I think love is honestly on that same spectrum."
"It is a really hard industry...to have kids in, be a filmmaker and to have kids in our industry. You get locked in to staying local. And I think there's a reason, Terrence Malick took 20 years off of being a filmmaker so he could watch his, so he could actually raise his children."
Links:
Donate To REQUIEM FOR A SOLDIER
