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Human-Powered Filmmaking: Ben Wolf on Craft, Community and Change
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What happens when a neighborhood asks for one dangerous street to be made safer—and discovers that the fight is really about power, money and who gets to shape the future of a city? Stay with us as filmmaker Ben Wolf reveals how he transformed that battle into his feature documentary directing debut, Changing Lanes.
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What happens when a neighborhood asks for one dangerous street to be made safer and discovers that the fight is really about power, money, and who gets to shape the future of a city? Stay with us, as filmmaker Ben Wolfe reveals how he transformed that battle into his featured documentary, Directing Debut Changing Lanes.
SPEAKER_01As mentioned before, Carol is the author of the best-selling book, The Art of Film Funding, Alternative Financing Concepts, and the founder and president of From the Heart Productions. For more than 30 years, From the Heart has supported independent filmmakers through the Roy W. Dean grant, physical sponsorship, education, mentorship, and a community dedicated to helping important films reach the world. Today's guest understands documentary filmmaking from nearly every side of the camera. Ben Wolfe is a producer, director, and director of photography whose cinematography and producing credits include the feature documentaries Note by Note, Ride, Rise, Roar, Loving Lamp Post, Oh Bit, The Happy Film, and Keeper of Time. Splitting his time between Brooklyn and Sicily, Ben is also an avid cyclist. His relationship with cycling, documentary storytelling, and the streets of New York came together in his feature documentary directing debut, Changing Lanes. The film begins after the tragic hit and run death of a beloved teacher in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. His death helped ignite a grassroots movement to transform the notoriously dangerous McGuinness Boulevard from a four-lane roadway into a safer street with a protected bicycle lane. Today we will discuss how Ben moved from cinematographer to director, how he found and financed the story, how he filmed a politically charged community conflict, and what independent filmmakers can learn from creating an urgent documentary close to home. Ben, welcome to the Art of Film Funding. And now I'm delighted to turn the conversation over to Carol Dean.
SPEAKER_02Thank you, Claire. And Ben, welcome. We're delighted to have you with us. You really have photographed and helped produce an extraordinary range of documentaries, but changing lanes marks a significant new chapter for you as a feature director for documentaries. So I'm especially interested in how you recognize the larger story inside of this local conflict and how your background as a cinematographer helped you capture the people, the politics, and the changing emotions surrounding it.
SPEAKER_00Well, thanks for having me. Those are some really uh big questions you just you just came up with there. Um yeah, so just to give you a little background about my history, I um went to film school at Columbia University, the graduate program in the late 90s, and studied directing, and that was more focused on on narrative filmmaking that that program. And upon graduation, I uh wasn't really getting hired to direct narrative films or any films really, as it's always a wake-up call when you leave film school, and then you have to transition into a career. And um for a variety of reasons, I fell into cinematography. That was a thing that I enjoyed doing and and found I was reasonably good at and and could actually make a living doing it. And subsequently, for the last 25 or so years, that's mostly what I've done is worked as a cinematographer on all sorts of projects, narrative films, documentary films, commercials. But over time, documentary became sort of more meaningful to me and and the kind of work I was most excited to be doing, where the kind of work that I felt was actually making some kind of positive difference in the in the world. And uh so for some time I've wanted to, I still had this dream of directing, but uh it's difficult, especially when you're busy working on other people's projects. Um so really ironically, maybe it was only the when the pandemic hit and suddenly my uh the work I was doing for a living pretty much dried up. I finally had time. And uh, and and so I tried to figure out what is a what is a documentary that I uh that would be meaningful to me and also achievable, um, you know, which for me as a person of relatively modest means meant you know a local story, but hopefully a local story that had sort of larger implications and uh sort of a story that would be a microcosm for bigger um issues. Um and I guess what's been really wonderful is that that it seems to have uh worked. I seem to have maybe by instinct or luck found a very specific local story of a particular street in Brooklyn that is a compelling story on its own, but I think very clearly is a way into talking about sort of larger political problems that that we're sort of facing in in our city and and our country.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Uh well done. I think Changing Lines is a great film. And you studied at Columbia. That's a really difficult school to get into, Ben, right?
SPEAKER_00I uh I don't know. It may be, it may be, I don't know how difficult it is, and it may be more difficult now than it was at that time. It's clear that there are many, many people that are interested in studying film. Um, in fact, some sometimes I worry that there's more people. I'm not sure that the jobs exist or the roles exist that people are are studying for, and that's a that's sort of a frustration. Um but that's another that's another conversation.
SPEAKER_02It is. Well, Maureen Ryan, did you study with her in the documentary?
SPEAKER_00I know who she is, but I I didn't. Um we had very little focus on documentary in at Columbia when I was there. Again, things may have changed, but it was very much focused towards fiction filmmaking.
SPEAKER_02Um fiction filmmaking. Oh, well, yes.
SPEAKER_00But I do I do I will say I I do think there's more overlap than maybe people often think. And I have worked in both and continue to work in both. And uh in either case, you're telling stories, you know, you're you're you're leading an audience along, you're engaging them. Um things like I mean, technical, technical issues about how you visualize a story, how you use a camera, um, but also issues about characters and conflict, and many things are are actually carry over, I think.
SPEAKER_02Wonderful. That's really good for filmmakers to hear. Uh, so let's talk about going from cinematographer to director, because you've spent years helping others translate uh their directors translate their ideas into visual stories. So, what made you decide that Changing Lanes was the film that you needed to direct? Was there a particular moment when you realized that this is my story and I can tell it?
SPEAKER_00Right. Well, I will say, for one thing, having um shot, I don't know, maybe a dozen feature documentaries, and now being in my 50s, I'm often working at this point with younger directors and and less experienced directors. And and documentaries are usually a very small team. It's you know, it's often maybe four or five people really making the movie. And so I often felt like I was sort of almost co-directing some of these projects, which is fun and it's exciting to be sort of creatively engaged, but it's also a bit frustrating for for the ego because you, you know, I'm I'm doing the work and then but then the whoever is the director gets all the credit. So it so something for I I felt what I'm trying to say, I think is I felt quite well prepared at this point, having done this for as long as I have, and and and although a cinematographer technically is not a director, there there is a lot of overlap and a lot of collaboration with a director, especially in the heat of battle. Like, what should we be shooting now? How should we shoot this? The events happening right in front of us. Often, you know, we have a quick conversation and then it it happens. Um when the time came and where I had time to again to do my own thing, I um as was mentioned, I've I've been um pretty passionate about cycling for my whole life. I used to race bikes. I've also I also want to emphasize I'm also a driver. I have a car. I you know, I feel like I don't want to be seen as just one thing, but but but cycling is something I love and it's a beautiful way to get around a city, um, especially when there's you know some reasonable infrastructure to make that reasonably safe. And in in New York, it's uh it's been interesting that I came here in 1991 and I've witnessed a lot of changes to the many of our streets. And what when I first came here and would ride a bike around, it was very much an outsider activity and very unusual. And I remember showing up at some meetings like in the 90s with a bike helmet and stuff, and people could not believe that I rode my bike, you know, to get there. Um nowadays it's pretty mainstream. I mean, we have a bike share system, it's the biggest in the country with hundreds of thousands of people a day using that system. Um, so it's anyway, it's been fun seeing something that I was a part of become more and more popular. And the changes to the street have also been, you know, often exciting. Like, wow, now I feel so, you know, it does feel in many places much safer and more accommodating than it used to. However, it's been very uneven. And uh and then during the pandemic, the streets got really chaotic. Like I felt like overall, in the time I've been here, things were getting better, but then during the pandemic, it just became kind of the wild west. And this also sort of coincided with the arrival of all the new types of e-vehicles, e-bikes, e-scooters, um, some of which are legal, many of which aren't, but nobody seems to be doing anything about it, people going all speeds, all directions. And it anyway, it I thought, well, this is there's really something here to explore. And uh so I started looking for a particular story, and I was shooting, you know, going to a bunch of different meetings about different streets and different safety projects, and I came to one particular meeting that's featured in the film. Um it was held in a uh private, a private business held this meeting to discuss uh McGinnis Boulevard. It was billed as a public meeting, but then they locked the door and kept out the folks that disagreed with with the people you know organizing the meeting. And uh it was so over the top, I thought, okay, this is this is really looks like a story that's going to be interesting to follow. And um, that's sort of when I decided, okay, this is probably gonna be the focus of my film. And and I followed, so I followed that struggle for about three years. The struggle had really begun a couple years even before I I got involved, when a when a teacher in the local school was killed crossing the street on his birthday. Um that sort of incited, or I don't know, lit a fire, but in to to to do something about the street, which had claimed many, many lives over the years and injured sort of countless people. Um but it it very much divided the community, like so many, so many aspects of our politics these days. Everything kind of divides into two sides that are completely unwilling to compromise and just butting heads. And uh so I anyway, I thought, okay, this this might be the sort of microcosm I've been looking for that that let a way in to talk about um politics. Um I live about five miles away from from Greenpoint, which is the community where this street exists. So it's it's not exactly my community, but it was very nearby and easy for me to come and go.
SPEAKER_02Well, when you went to the meetings, did you photograph the meetings? And if so, how did you get approval to do that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, it's a complicated question. In general, I found that that meetings that are truly public, um, you can bring a camera in most cases. Um sometimes it's better not to ask. And uh many of those public meetings I just photographed with a phone because I didn't I didn't want to be challenged. Um and you know, uh a thing that has that is that has changed recently is that phone cameras are good enough for for often, you know. I used a variety of sorts of cameras and devices in my film, um, but many of the public meetings, it was it was often just a phone because I again I didn't want to draw attention to myself. I didn't, I just wanted to capture what was going on. It may not look quite as nice as as using bigger cameras, but every everything is a trade-off, and and I sort of had to decide on a case-by-case basis what's the what's the best way to to capture what's going on here without you know interfering or becoming a you know making an already heated situation even more heated than it already was.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. No, Bobby Martis, another filmmaker I love, says, I'd rather I'd rather apologize than to ask. So you did the right thing, you got the shot. That's the main thing. Did you get the shot? Yes, you did. That's for a documentary filmmaker, that's really important. That was so smart. So finding the larger story, let's talk about that. Because on the surface, this is a film about changing one dangerous street, but underneath that, it's about power, grief, community, organizing, politics, and the future of our city. So, how did you identify the universal story inside of such a specific neighborhood conflict?
SPEAKER_00Right. Well, it's a somewhat organic process. I mean, as I was following this story, I was reading a lot of books on the subject of New York infrastructure, you know, starting with the Great Power Broker, the book that many people know, the um about Robert Moses and his impact on the design of New York City. Um it became increasing increasingly clear to me that to tell this story well involved giving good context, good historical context, and understanding how this street fit in with, you know, how it's similar or different from many other streets in the city. Um so sort of naturally I started um lining up interviews with people that that could talk about these things. Um uh I guess the most central or most important figure in the movie is Jeanette Sodek Khan, who ran the transportation department under Mayor Bloomberg, and uh is considered sort of one of the titans in in the in the history of the design of New York. I mean, Robert Moses is the one that everybody talks about as number one as far as really shape the city, but after him, Jeanette Sodokan is probably the next biggest person. Um she did things like started the bike share system, she put in most of the cycling infrastructure that we see in the city. She uh pedestrianized Times Square. She did a bunch of things that people said are not possible, and she did them, and they've been pretty widely celebrated. Um, so anyway, that was an important interview. Sam Schwartz um ran transportation in the 80s under Koch. He was also an important person to talk about history. Um and I guess the biggest sort of celebrity in the film is David Byrne, the the singer that people know from the talking heads. And um he, it turns out is also a big advocate of cycling. And I thought he would be a great voice for talking about the history of the city because he's been here forever. And also about how this our city compares with other cities, because when I worked on a touring film with him, I saw that he and his band bring bikes with them all over the world where they perform and ride around, you know, in the in the mornings, I think to unwind, to see a little of where they actually are, and then they perform in the evenings. And uh anyway, he said he he was a great voice to be able to sort of compare and contrast and again give the sort of larger context.
SPEAKER_02That was a great idea to go after him and add him to your film. So uh let's talk about uh the movement began after the tragic death of the teacher Matthew Jensen in a hit-and-run crash. So, how did you honor that loss while making sure that the film did not reduce him or his family's experience to a device that merely launched the political story? What human relationship became the emotional center of the film?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a it's a tough question. I think a lot of documentary filmmaking, it comes down to sort of almost intangible aspects of like um sensitivity to other people, just how you conduct yourself on a on every shoot and every time you interview anybody or talk to anybody. Um I sort of just had to feel it out. And um I will say Matt Jensen, the teacher who was killed, uh, doesn't have, I believe he was single, so there's no like direct family. There, um, so you know, I I mostly uh, you know, we talk about him as sort of this inciting incident, but I didn't have to deal directly with people that that had suffered that loss. Um interestingly, I felt like it was absolutely essential to talk to someone who had really lost a beloved person. And uh the person that I that ends up having that role is a woman named Mary Beth Kelly, who's who's featured in the film Who Lost Her Husband, um, when they were both out cycling and he was hit by a truck. And she is a uh she somehow um was able to transfer her her sort of loss and tragic situation into activism. And she's sort of one of the leaders of the sort of safe streets movement in the city, and uh and a lovely woman, and uh that was my most sort of direct engagement with someone that's to whom it's extremely personal. Um, also the activists that are featured in the film who live in that community, um I feel that uh my relationship with them, like they're the ones that really had the most direct relationship with the teacher, and their their sort of passion to like again do something about this and and sort of not just let, you know, not not merely say, Oh, this is extremely sad, and we're not gonna, you know, and we're just going to be grieving, but to again, I I'm I'm very motivated by people that that transfer that that uh translate tragedy into positive action. And I think those people should be celebrated, and um, I think that's the best way to honor anyone who's you know, honor these losses is is to sort of celebrate that at least that they are being used to make the world, you know, these these terrible events can be um motivation to to make positive change.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. So, but you had to talk to people on both sides of the conflict and as a good documentarian bring us both sides of an issue. So uh were there people who refuse to participate because they believe. Believe the film had already chosen a side, or were you okay with that? Tell us about getting a lot of things.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a big, the biggest, maybe the biggest challenge, and maybe in some way, something that uh perhaps could have been better. I try I absolutely try, you know, when I would show up at at various events, I would often get this question of whose side are you on? And I would say, I'm not on the side. I really, and I meant it. You know, I'm not everybody in the world has their own personal feelings, and I'm no different than that. But uh again, I'm I'm somebody that I'm a pedestrian, I'm a cyclist, I'm a driver, I do all of these things. I think streets need to accommodate all of these activities that people do on them. And uh um, so I tried to present, and I also uh, you know, although I think my sympathies are sort of clearly more with the side of change than the side that was that rejecting change, I uh I tried to be respectful of everybody and give everybody an opportunity to express their point of view. The side uh the organization, which which calls itself uh Make McGinnis Safe, that was really promoting the change, was very open to participating and uh sharing their feelings and their um events with me. The side that opposed the change, uh, which was called Keep McCalled itself keep me Guinness Moving, was uh significantly tougher not to crack. Um I was able to shoot um a bunch of the events of of the folks that were against change, but they were uh can they were a lot less open to talking. Um you know they never exactly said no, but they also sort of never said yes, and I gave them ample opportunities. I feel like that ultimately that's all you can do. You can you can ask, and I did many times. And uh also ironically, of course, when the movie was done, their PR person suddenly emails me, Oh, I'm concerned about how we're portrayed in your movie. Uh he hadn't seen the movie, but he was concerned. But I you know, I said, Look, I gave you guys every opportunity to participate. If you choose not to, I'm sorry. Um, this is a little late for the for that sort of concern.
SPEAKER_02Well, thank you.
SPEAKER_00I do think also these fights or these kind of there's an author, Naomi Klein. She wrote a book called Doppelganger that I read during the making of this movie, which I also found highly relevant. Um and it's there's something about our politics now where again, where every fight sort of breaks up into two groups, and the two groups are completely at odds, and they often weirdly mirror each other. So you, you know, both but it's often a sort of false, false mirroring. Like um the group that wanted change was saying we need to make the street safer. We're you know, arguably supposedly up to a couple hundred people were probably killed there over the years. It's a lot.
SPEAKER_02Goodness.
SPEAKER_00And uh, but then the group that was against the change would also frame it as a safety issue. They'd say, Well, if you you know, if you if you reduce the car lanes, ambulances won't be and fir trucks won't be able to get to emergencies in time and people will die. I mean, it's it becomes very muddled and confusing because um both sides will I think one side tends to do it in good faith, and the other side tends to do it as a sort of strategy, um, a sort of political strategy. And the result often in our politics is that again, sort of stasis because people just get confused and uh instead of sort of informed. Um which is all to say, I while I believe that there are were certainly decent, reasonable people on both sides. I also think there are some of the people that were opposed to the the changes were not completely uh transparent. I think it was um you know there's there's a term called astroturfing. You have sort of grassroots organizations, which I think that the the group that wanted the changes, it's really bottom-up. It's people just wanting to make some change. And then you have astroturfed organizations which want to appear to be grassroots, but often are sort of sponsored by commercial interests, essentially. And I think that's largely what was the case here. I have nothing against commercial interests. I'm a small business owner myself. Businesses are important, but what I'm against is people um not being transparent. You know, if if if you if if your concern is it's gonna be hard for you to get your trucks into your business, then just say it. You know, don't don't I think the mistake is when they start sponsoring, quote, public meetings and locking out people and and things of that nature. Um, that's where it's problematic, but it's also that was um that's where this film I think mirrors our larger politics. It it talks about there's there's some bad acting going on here and and some dishonesty, and it really corrupts this the system.
SPEAKER_02Yes, absolutely. Well, let's talk about the cinematographer's eye, which you definitely have, because your vision for the film came across beautifully with your working together. So, how did you make traffic patterns, public meetings, street design, political negotiations cinematic rather than simply informational? Tell us about it.
SPEAKER_00Well, I think you know it's it's hard. I can't say that the political meetings are particularly um beautifully photographed today. In those situations, you're just doing the best you can to just show whoever's talking. But the uh but I did think that streets are actually very visually uh fascinating. You have color, movement, geometry, um, you know, and and you also have some very interesting new tools, um, especially drones, which I use quite a lot of to show streets in in ways that are uh you know, again, graphically interesting and and and and and perspectives that um really help tell the story. And uh so I think maybe like most films, my film is a balance of certain scenes are just are not particularly cinematographic, and and others are are you know, again, when it's more I think anyway, illustrating the street and changes to the street and the way people work on the street, uh all of that I think is is very uh there's a lot of opportunity as a as a as a cinematographer. Shooting public meetings, it's it's it's it's not so much. And uh, but I was happy that there's you know between the the shots of the street and also the archival materials, which I think add a lot of visual visual richness to the film, um seeing the streets at different points in time, you know, way back uh a hundred years ago before the automobile was even uh a uh a thing, is uh is it is visually exciting seeing the transformation.
SPEAKER_02Yes, exactly. Yeah, I'm sure. Well, let's get into the human-powered production because uh why was it important for filmmakers for the filmmaking process to look at the values and the subject of the documentary? Because I understand you transported the equipment by bicycle and bike trailer. That's incredible. Did this cause uh any reduce your costs, or was it for environmental impact impact, or how did it create a new production challenge?
SPEAKER_00Right. I think it was um well, a few things happened. One, I've noticed over the years the gear is getting smaller and smaller, which is great, and it's allowing smaller crews and even one-man crews, which most of this film I just did on my own, um, to do a lot. And uh, you know, I mostly thought it would be a fun, almost hook for the film to be able to say, you know, not only is it a film about getting around cities in different ways, but it's a film that actually sort of practiced what it preached. You know, it showed, because I think there is an attitude a lot of the time that, you know, bikes are sort of toys, but if you really are serious, if you want to really get anything done, you need a car. And I so well, I think this the film itself is sort of an illustration like, no, actually, you can make a whole documentary film with with just a bike, um, especially if if the subject of your documentary is only five miles away from where you live, which was the case here. So it um I also initially thought when I was sort of conceiving of the project that my that I would be sort of a bigger character in the movie, and I thought that maybe my you know traveling from location to location would be woven into the into the story. That sort of ended up on the cutting room floor. It just the story ended up being rich enough with enough characters. I just felt like I didn't need to be a significant part of it. But I I do like the uh the notion that that I was getting there um, you know, that again, that I was using this form of transportation and to really show off how much you can do. I would also add that uh it was a sort of challenge to me of can I actually make this movie again, sort of mostly by myself. I'm talking about the production and not the post-production, where I had a lot of help. Um and that's not a way I normally work, and there's it's challenging because it's exhausting and it's hard to there's a lot of responsibilities if you're it was pretty it was it's very easy to go somewhere and just shoot B-roll to go to some, you know, okay, they're gonna be painting the street today. You go and you shoot them painting the street, but it's it's more challenging when it's I'm gonna do an interview today, so I have to show up at somebody's house, bring in all the equipment, set up the camera, set up the light, set up the sound, now sit down, talk to them, and sort of be paying attention to what they're saying, but also the way it looks. It's it's a lot. I'm not sure I recommend doing a movie this way, but it but it was an interesting challenge, and I was able to do it. And there are some pluses to it. I think I mean the big besides that it's obviously keeps your cost down. One of the challenges in documentary is always um that you sort of have on that your sort of production interferes with sort of capturing something real or something authentic, you know, like just even shooting an interview when there's three other a sound person hanging over everybody and a camera person back there. It's just the interview subject is often just nervous and very self-conscious. Uh it's it's quite different if you just show up alone and then just have a conversation with a person. And I I think I'm very happy with the quality of the interviews that I was able to get. And I think some of that is due to the such having such a fall, a small footprint and it making it easier for people to just have a very human person-to-person conversation and not not feel like you know they're part of some big under some big magnifying glass.
SPEAKER_02Right. Well, this is working as a producer, a director, and a director of photography. Yeah, those are the three top jobs to do all of them yourself, puts a lot of responsibility on you. So I guess by the time you got to the location, first you have to set it up, convince them, get there, set everything up, and sit down. That was a great relief just to be ready with your questions. So putting the questions together was really important, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I would add, I guess the reason that maybe this all worked out is also because I shot over about a three-year period. It wasn't like, oh, you know, it wasn't like we have to do everything in two weeks or a month and do an intense schedule. It was just, it was very spaced out. It felt almost like a yoga practice or something. I just I sort of had this rule to myself like, I just want to shoot something every week.
SPEAKER_02Wow.
SPEAKER_00Like an event. If there's no event going on, let me think of a good person to interview. I just tried to just keep kind of gathering materials, but in a very this sort of slow way. So, you know, that one day a week I would do something would be exhausting, but it it wasn't, then I could just relax after that and just sort of recoup and and um another thing that I think worked very well is that I brought my editor Kristen Bai in about halfway into my shooting process. So maybe a year and a half in, I shared the material that I had gathered and uh she started organizing it. And we had regular conversations about you know what additional material we would want, as well as the story was still very much unfolding in in time. Um and I was very lucky that that the you know during the period the production period, it really did come to sort of an ending and an interesting and exciting ending. Um, because you could argue that this street this street was really created in the 1950s. It had been a small residential lane, um, about 500 houses were knocked down to widen it and make it a almost a highway. And uh ever since then it was problematic, and ever since then people were unhappy. But you could argue that there was a 70-year struggle to do something, and and I was in a way lucky that I I started my documentary at the very, you know, at the very end of that struggle, in the in the three-year period where actual change finally happened, um, which also tells you something about documentary. There's a big luck element. Uh, you never, you know, if you're following something that's happening in real time as opposed to like a historical documentary, you really don't know exactly what's going on. And uh you do have to sort of follow things where they go. And if you're lucky, if you're lucky, they go in a really dramatically satisfying direction, which was the case here, but I could have just as well not. And honestly, for most of the time I was making this movie, I didn't expect the surprisingly positive uh you know conclusion that that it that it has. I don't want to give away everything that happens in the film, but it it there was a great deal of of luck involved, and I think that's just part of the game.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely, but I I want to commend you on getting your uh editor involved so early. Is he a friend or how how do you do that?
SPEAKER_00It's a woman, Kristen Bye. Uh, she we had worked on other projects or other things I had shot, she had edited, and I had um especially a a movie, uh documentary uh called Obit, directed by uh Vanessa Gould about the obituary department of the New York Times. Kristen had edited that, and I thought done such a spectacular job that I that I always thought uh she would be well, so especially for this subject. She also used to live in the neighborhood that that my movie is set in. I thought she's the right person to do the job. Um so anyway, because we're we've known each other, um, fortunately, she agreed to to participate. And uh her only condition actually, because editing is hard, and uh as you know, and uh she uh she was pretty firm that she only wanted to work on it about three days a week, and I was fine with that. You know, I was saying I'm only shooting one or two days a week. Go ahead and you know, this is not we're not in a rush. I knew this was gonna go on for quite a long time. So that's how we worked. It was it was you know, again, it was sort of slow and dispersed over over a quite an extended period. Um, but it somehow it all came together. It's definitely a marathon. I mean, documentary making is always a marathon. This felt even maybe more the the case than than usual. And there were certainly times when I I mean, I think the difference between being a cinematographer and being a director in a way is when you're the director or the producer and the director, you really have to supply that sort of psychic energy to like get the thing done and to move it forwards. When you're the cinematographer, you just get a call or an email saying show up tomorrow and do the job, and you do it, and that's fine, but you're not driving it in the same way. Um in this case, I just felt like I just had to just keep moving forwards. And sometimes it's hard to keep your uh enthusiasm, and you start to wonder, is is this really going anywhere? Is there anything here? And uh, but I guess I've been through this process enough to kind of know that there are going to be periods that are that are where you feel kind of down about it, but you have to you do have to push through, and uh that's just the way it works.
SPEAKER_02Well, that was a brilliant uh opportunity to be able to talk to another person who had the images in their head and the story so that the two of you could make sure you were telling a good story.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I also knew I'm not really an editor, I know that, but even if I were, like it's very important to have another brain working on on the thing. And uh Kristen brought, you know, I had certain ideas that uh that didn't work, and and uh and Kristen had certain ideas I would have never come up with, and it's just it's it's fascinating how that collaboration works, and it's exciting when it's working well, and you're starting you're you're you know, it's it's hard when you're too close to the material. Sometimes it's hard to see something in a fresh way, and having that that other uh opinion oh, you know, about how to structure something or what anyway, there's an awful lot in the film that I would not have uh come up with alone, and having and she just I I think in most documentary, like the editor is almost as important as as as the director, and that collaboration is so important.
SPEAKER_02Exactly, and fun. That's the fun part.
SPEAKER_00Sometimes, right.
SPEAKER_02Okay, so once the film is completed, what was your festival distribution and audience engagement strategy?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, again, and make coming back to this luck aspect, to be perfectly honest, because the film has played at at this point five or six festivals. It it premiered at the uh it's called ADFF, which is Architecture and Design Film Festival in New York. And one of the great things about ADFF is it's a very small festival. They don't show a whole lot of films, but they also tour around the world. So through that festival, it's screened also in Los Angeles, Vancouver, Toronto, Chicago. Um, so that was sort of the initial exposure the film got. But what's been in retrospect, um again, maybe it's luck, but it turns out that it's very smart to make a film about a subject that's already got a very engaged and organized sort of activist community around the subject of the film. Um, because sort of separately from festivals, the film is now maybe screened 30 or 40 times. I mean, on a weekly basis, I'm getting requests from cities all over the world at this point to screen this film.
SPEAKER_02Oh, how exciting!
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it's great, and that is not, and it's not, I'm not doing very much to promote it, other than I've been I've I have done um my distributor, First Run Features, has done a good job with PR, and they've arranged many of these sorts of interviews like we're doing now, and I think that's been helpful at getting the word out. But but anyway, there are there's uh some people are so engaged with um urban transportation, and it's in every big city that I think there's a real appetite for this kind of content, and it's uh it's been really exceeding my expectations that that people would come to me and ask for things rather than me trying to push, push, push, which is hard.
SPEAKER_02Well, how do you like first run? Are they taking good care of you?
SPEAKER_00So far, so good. You know, it's it only uh we had a small commercial theatrical release in Los Angeles in April. And uh only last month it we've started streaming on Amazon and Canopy. Um, so it's it's only very recent that that's happened. But again, the fact that a small documentary is is is getting that attention is great, and I'm you know very happy about it.
SPEAKER_02Yes, because uh at the onset you think, oh, this is a little doc about a small uh city, uh a small group, but then when you start looking at cyclists, that's worldwide.
SPEAKER_00And we all want to be safe on our bicycles, so yeah, and I I also want to emphasize I don't think it's I don't talk about this movie as a cycling movie, and while that's an important part of it, I think it's a movie for people that live in cities. And need to get around their cities. And that includes it includes all the ways that we get around. And you know, again, walking. I mean, again, the the Matt Jensen, who was the teacher killed, was walking. He wasn't on a bike. He was literally walking across the street and run over. So it's it's a much bigger thing than bikes. It's it's about the way we, it's about cities, about why they're designed the way they are, about uh how difficult it is to make change, about uh, you know, what can be done to make change. It's about what looking around the world and seeing what's working really well in some places and maybe giving people ideas about things that could, you know, happen in their communities.
SPEAKER_02That's incredibly great. So I'd like you to give some advice to our filmmakers because after working on so many documentaries and now directing your first feature, what do you know today that you wish you had known when you began making changing lanes?
SPEAKER_00I mean, again, I think I knew a lot because I've been doing this for a while. Um I think it, you know, but it it's mostly this aspect that uh that I had mentioned that I knew it's hard to make movies, it's a slog, and it this reinforced that, but it also you know reinforced I the good the good news it is if you if you feel strongly about something and stick with it, um, you'll get there. Um I also this is definitely from a sort of production standpoint, in a way, the smallest movie I've worked on. It's smaller than the ones I've shot for other people, where we definitely had a larger crew and and whatnot. So I I think I've shown to myself and to other people that you know the the the tools have become small enough uh you can that you can do a lot with just a couple people and and that having uh I think the most important thing, again, which has always been true is the most important thing is having an interesting subject and uh and following it. And uh and it's very these sort of human factors, um, you know, I think more important finding a good story, finding people that are willing to be comfortable, you know, finding a way to make people comfortable around you so that you can actually get something real.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um those are sort of I think in the end, the more important things than having the right you know, light or microphone or something, like those things now are it's almost crazy how uh how accessible a lot of these tools are now, and uh and that's really good news. I mean it it does mean that all you need the good news is all you need is a great story.
SPEAKER_02The bad news is really hard to find a great story, like but sometimes the story will find you.
SPEAKER_00Yes, yeah, that's that's right. You know, I think it's important, I think everybody has something that they are passionate about, and and I think it's uh this is an illustration. I think if you follow what you know, your particular interest, uh it'll lead you somewhere. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yes, that's the whole thing, knowing that you've got a good story because it will take time. They said the average is six years to make a documentary.
SPEAKER_00How long that's interesting to know. Yeah, this was about a three-year process, which which again to people who don't do this stuff sounds long, but I knew you know that's actually fairly typical of projects I've worked on. I probably shot around a hundred hours, which again is fairly typical of projects I've worked on. Um it's just it's a marathon, as I said. There's no there's no way around it.
SPEAKER_02But the story held up, and you and you're very happy with what you've got.
SPEAKER_00I'm extremely happy, which is you know, that's a it which is wonderful. It's um because I've you know, I've also been disappointed in at various points on other projects, and sometimes you do all that hard work, and anyway, it's a it's a blend of you have to have the good idea, you have to persevere, and and you also have to be lucky. You need a lot of things to happen, and sometimes they it comes together and sometimes it doesn't. Um, this was absolutely a case, yeah, where it it for what the the somebody was somebody was on my side and and it it it did really come together nicely.
SPEAKER_02You had an angel on your shoulder.
SPEAKER_00Seems that way. Of course, now I'm trying to figure out what's the next project, and and it's uh that's you know, start you start back at square one again. Um, and I haven't I haven't quite figured it out yet.
SPEAKER_02Well, I hope you do, because we want to see more of your work. And I thank you for joining us and sharing the remarkable journey behind changing lanes. Because your film reminds us that a documentary does not need to begin with a distant country or a famous personality. It can begin with one street, one preventable tragedy, one community, and one filmmaker who recognizes that something important is happening. And you've also shown us that cinematography is not simply the act of making something beautiful, it is the art of noticing, watching how people respond, recognizing where power is operating and capturing the moments that reveal what an issue truly means. Uh, in my new book, You Are the Magic, I remind filmmakers that magic is not passive wishful thinking. It begins when you become very clear about what you intend to create. You give that your intention, your focused attention. You put your attention on your intention, and then you take inspired action. So, Ben, for example, did not wait for someone else to decide that this neighborhood struggle deserved to become a film. He recognized this story. He picked up his camera and he put his equipment on a bicycle, and that's how he got started. Uh, and that's how films are made and how movements grow. And at From the Heart, we believe in the power of independent filmmakers. Through our five annual Roy W. Dean grants, sponsorship, education, and filmmaker programs. We are here to help you move your film forward. So please visit our website at From The Heart Productions.com. Remember, you are the magic. From our hearts to yours, thank you for listening to the Art of Film funding and thank you, Claire and Ben, for a wonderful event.
SPEAKER_00Thank you.
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