Recent banter about the independent film scene, particularly with regards to young filmmakers, charges that the works are essentially apolitical. Interested in insular worlds dominated by personal mishaps and mayhems, signed by a lo-fi, digital aesthetic or with lo-lit 16mm print, these indies, now so common in the scene, eschew world issues at large, exploring in their creative spaces instead, the “I” of collective existence. Somehow, oddly these individual explorations, many beautifully drawn, fall prey to ridicule for their narrow scope, and while this extreme reaction is often unjustified, there is a bite of excitement when a young filmmaker delves into the absurdities of society and politics with keen focus and a clear vision.

With both his short films Darling, Darling and By Modern Measure, filmmaker Matthew Lessner does just that with great ease. Under his guidance, political and social commentary surfaces to extenuate humor; it’s never didactic and always sharp-witted. While Darling, Darling, a film Lessner made while studying in the film program at Chapman University, sets out with a clear absurdist air, telling the story of a high school boy meeting his date’s parents just before a school dance, the later short By Modern Measure riffs off the French New Wave, following two wandering twenty-somethings in an exploration of modern society at a peak of socially-conscious befuddlement.

And, so it happens that Lessner is a young filmmaker who’s doing just those things that sources report other young indie directors are straying from. When he’s told all this about the nature of his work, Lessner says, quite humbly, “I appreciate that.”

SM: So, I know that when you made (By Modern Measure), you went out and shot all of the footage first. Then the narration came after the shooting. I was hoping that you could tell me about the process of going through to make the short.

ML: I don’t really see a purpose to making anything unless it’s got something specific to say. I feel that it’s the obligation of the artist to at the very least comment on the climate that we’re living in, and I think it’s kind of frightening times. This idea that you’re speaking of, whether it’s filmmakers of our generation or people of our generation, there’s a lot of apathy and a lot of disconnect from what’s going on in the world. There are a lot of people just having a good time and not really taking any notice of the atrocities across the globe. That was the main idea, being really immersed in that disconnect.

[On By Modern Measure], I was just working with what I had. I had made Darling, Darling, and I had spent a bit money for me, paying for it myself. I had saved up for a couple of years to make that film. So, I’d been traveling around and around with Darling, Darling, and I didn’t have any money, but I had this idea.

I had some old black-and-white film, and I had this old Russian camera that my grandfather gave me…Drawing from the fact that the film stock I had and the kind of camera I had both seemed reminiscent of something a bit older and maybe kind of New Wave-y, that got me thinking of the generation of filmmakers and the generation of youth that were alive during the time of the New Wave. Maybe this is naïve of me because I wasn’t actually around then, but now looking back, I feel they were a bit more politically charged, a bit more agitated, a bit more maybe willing to say something or do something about things that were going on then, like the war. I see some similarities in the political-global climate, maybe from the 60s, as now, but I think there’s a complete divergence in how these cultures react to that. So, it just seemed funny to me to play with some of the visuals, the aesthetics of the New Wave, of this generation of people that were doing a bit more, and then replace that with modern day banalities.

Having that aesthetic in mind and having a few films that I wanted to reference and a general look that I wanted to reference, I went out with a really small group of friends who I continually make films with…The shooting process was kind of a reaction to going to film school and having a lot of procedural things beaten into my head and losing some of the fun of making films: that everything has to be so thought out, so planned, so carefully guided. Over time that led to filmmaking not being as fun as it used to be. When filmmaking was most fun for me was, when I was younger, going out with some friends and making things, doing that in spontaneity, just kind of creating something.

We piled into this crappy little car of mine and drove around the Southern California desert and just looked for a location that we thought would suit our needs and we could shoot at without permits. We just stomped around and did this for a couple of days, just pieced things together, pieced, I think, an hour of footage together. Then I went back, looked at it, and we talked about what everything was about; it was really just trying to incorporate a lot of very immediate things that were going on in the news at the moment.

I find it very interesting to set things in a specific time. I think when I first started out, maybe a couple of years back, there was something very appealing to me about—there’s a tendency with a lot of modern films, well not a lot of modern films but a certain number do—films like Wes Anderson’s are not set in a certain time period. They could be anytime and anyplace, and it’s very whimsical and fairy tale book-ish in that way. That was appealing for a while, but for some reason now to me, like I was saying, with all that’s going on, it’s interesting to me to ground something in a very specific date, to make something that speaks to the immediacy of right now, to cull things from the headlines.

Most of the narration doesn’t directly tie into what you’re seeing visually…We edited together based on the narration to craft humorous juxtaposition between some of what (the narrator’s) saying and some of the visuals. That was probably the toughest part, was having this hour of footage, which has no through-line or narrative structure while you’re filming it, and trying to figure out some way to piece that together and tell some kind of story.

SM: A point of disagreement: I don’t necessarily feel a direct apathy in the youth generation and culture. Rather, I feel the apathy isn’t developed out a lack of activism so much as a lack of support for that continued activism…Mass media is not supportive of these ventures anymore, and the enthusiasm and freedom of press that existed and supported college revolutions that we used to see historically, no longer exists because the media is often in the hands of a corporate conglomerate. So, even if there is an attempt on the part of the youth culture to change something, it has to be packaged in a pop culture setting because it’s got to make money for somebody. I don’t feel like that was as obviously the case in the 1960s.

ML: Another point that you have to think of when referencing the 60s and that whole movement is that: Vietnam stopped, but basically look where we are now. It’s not like the world has necessarily changed, or that kind of activism or those actions actually succeeded. Also, I’m not trying to glorify the 60s.

That’s the other thing about (By Modern Measure), I’m not trying to point a finger with the film because I very much associate with the characters in the film. I’m not trying to say, ‘I am this great activist who’s making all this change, and look at all of you.’ I’m, like most of us are, a product of this society, and a lot of that disconnect is inherent. I do think a lot of people want to do things. They just don’t know how and don’t really know how to get their point across.

Another thing that’s interesting to me, and which ties into the film in some ways indirectly, is that we have such a difficult time communicating or getting together. You’re saying that there needs to be this banner of something that can sell, this corporatism to communicate, to get these ideas across. I wonder; it is true to a certain extent. But, what comes to mind to me, are things like MySpace or YouTube, which I see on the one hand as being very shallow and being used for banal, pointless reasons—uploading a video of your cat falling down stairs. But, it seems like more than ever in history, there’s a way to communicate with large groups of people to perhaps find like-minded people. In theory at least, you can find groups of people or sub-sects of people. You can get those groups of people together; you can communicate with them in a way that you never could anytime in history. We have these amazing tools, even MySpace to a certain degree, but they are controlled and used in mind-numbing ways. At the same time, talking about corporatism, both of those sites are owned by huge media conglomerates. It seems like it wouldn’t be too much a stretch, even under the nose of those corporations, to start a communication that’s more—And, the truth is I don’t know…Perhaps there are people who are doing that.

I agree with what you’re saying, so maybe I have to go back on what I said earlier. I don’t know that it’s so much apathy and the fact that people don’t care, but they don’t know how to do anything or what to do. At the same time, it seems that we have to do something. Unfortunately, I don’t have the proper answer. Maybe in another film I’ll know about that; maybe that’s what’s wrong with this film. It’s just kind of observing the problem without offering any potential solutions. That doesn’t do a whole lot of good I guess.

SM: That’s the same answer I’d come to, that, “I don’t know.” I can see the extremism of the late 60s, and even late (Jean-Luc) Godard is so bitter, so extremist, that I kind of write it off. I always attach myself to his early work, which seems to come from a much more personal place and mines the personal within the political. I just feel that his later work gets so didactic that I get very turned off. So, it’s a very thin line.

ML: That’s what I’m still trying to figure out in my work and for my future work. I have this real drive to study politics, even if I’m not offering a solution, at the very least to comment and observe. I understand that escapism has its place, and people want to get out of what’s going on. But, I think it’s really interesting to engage these things if not offer some solution, which would be great at some point to address.

There’s something really interesting about political or social subversion in films, talking about things that are political in nature or about things that are going on but not in such a direct manner. I think that’s where humor comes in, and I would like to continue to play with that. People can be turned off if you are too direct or too preachy. There has to be that element of humanity, that human element that people can connect with.

Jumping to Darling, Darling for a second, I was trying at the time to say some things that were not directly political but social, that in my mind, led into some political ideas. But, they’re so shrouded in absurdity that some of those things are lost. I’m still trying to figure out what that line is between trying to engage issues but do things that are hopefully entertaining at the same time.

SM: Can you extrapolate a bit on those social-political commentaries in Darling, Darling for me?

ML: I feel I’ve failed to some degree when I have to lay it out...To me Darling, Darling is basically a commentary on the absurdity of the banality, common every day of mainly suburban American life with all its formalities: just this process of going to this high school dance, the formality of meeting people’s parents and the niceties of everything—in light of everything else that’s going on in the world…It’s Americana, modern day Americana, those little things we do, how silly they seem to me with everything else going on, but as I hear myself saying that, that’s life. You need those little things that people do to stay alive, and there’s nothing criminal about a high school dance.

SM: I do want to get back to this idea of Americana, but you said that you feel as if you’ve failed if you have to explain your work. I completely disagree with that statement altogether…I don’t feel like all art is just going to make sense. There’s something good sometimes for me when an artist has to explain what he or she is doing. (laughing) I don’t think it’s a bad thing.

ML: I just have a feeling as an artist, I suppose, that I hope people can get what I’m trying to say. I’m not a fine artist, but I know a painter will have a statement of intent in a show. It seems weird to me to have to explain part of your painting; explain, “This color represents this, and this represents that.” I feel like people are going to watch your film or look at your painting, and they’re going to get what they’re going to get. My hope would be to stimulate people to discuss what they saw afterwards and maybe try to think more about what they just saw;…beyond you get up, walk away, know what you just saw and that’s that. That would be the ultimate success.

SM: When I look at Darling, Darling, I see it as an absurdist piece…

ML: …Absurdity that works I think is very masterfully crafted, and I don’t know if I could necessarily say that I had achieved that level in my attempt at that. I’d like to work more in that arena in the future. It’s more challenging for the viewer. For a lot of people it’s really easy to write it off, but I think about subversion to a certain extent.

It’s also interesting to have a piece of work that can function on multiple levels: that certain people maybe can enjoy and think, “That was funny,” and walk away not taking much from it but are still able to enjoy it. Other people may also enjoy it but might want to take the time and the effort, or for some reason they’re getting it on a different level, and can read into it to see the other things that may be political in nature, or have something to say socially or otherwise. At least right now, I could never envision myself making a film directly about a war or about some very specific political issue. Somehow, it’s more interesting to me to intertwine that in other things and not necessarily make it gray or hide that away. I’d still like it to be there, but maybe just with different levels of what’s going on.

Some things that I respond to the most in art, whether it be music, painting or anything, are things that I didn’t get at first, and maybe it takes me a little bit of work. I like to be challenged as a viewer of the arts, and to a certain extent, I would like to assume that other people do too…I appreciate the sensation I get from a film when I come to it on my own, when I don’t feel the filmmaker has spoon-fed it to me. I feel like I can take these elements that the filmmaker has presented and think for myself to realize something.

I also like the idea of multiple interpretations. For my favorite films, my interpretation and what I get from those films may be entirely different from what the filmmaker’s intent was, but I don’t think that makes it less valid. I think that gets back to the issue of explaining (the art). Will it lessen my experience or appreciation of a particular film if I was getting something from that film that I really enjoyed, and then I went to see the director talk, or read something, and he’s suddenly saying something quite to the contrary? Maybe that doesn’t change it. Maybe I can still get what I got, and he can still say what his intent was.

I like that idea of different ways of working to understand something, thinking about something, walking away from a piece of art and talking to your friend about it. What does that mean to you? What did you think that part was all about? Maybe it goes no farther than that conversation, but maybe it can stay with you a little bit.

For more information visit www.montelomax.com, www.myspace.com/darlingdarlingfilm, and www.myspace.com/bymodernmeasure