I was going to avoid talking about the subject of failure on this blog, possibly due to a fear that it will lead to a trend of focusing on failure and that isn’t a very good idea. So I’ll just write one post about the ‘long hard road’ to getting films as a creative artist made, and move on.
Whenever a film, or script of mine doesn’t get accepted into a film festival, or fails to gain someone’s interest, it usually sets the mood for the entire year. And frankly, it does have a negative effect my outlook. This has to be a weakness of mine, hasn’t it? I mean, accepted advice tells us how we’re supposed to endlessly bounce back from failure and come up with something new and creative all over again, despite past failures. But it just isn’t that easy for artistic, creative people to do when our work doesn’t appear to have been acceptable.
However, failure is part of the film industry. It has a higher stakes, riskier projects and productions with more success than failures than perhaps any other industry. I recently heard that the USA produces 4,000 films a year and only 400 get any form of distribution. And that includes Studio movies. That means thousands of films are produced every year and they are never seen by an audience!
Having kept track of professional filmmaker’s experiences over the years, even for very successful people there are always projects that stall, get stolen and copied, or even lose their ‘secured’ funding just before going into production. It’s the nature of the film industry to be highly competitive and highly risky. And when films are released, it’s a well known fact that even for a high quality and well marketed film, box office success cannot be guaranteed at all. Only a handful of people really make millions and there are thousands more who barely scrape by. The same scenario is found in the Music industry and I’d be surprised if it’s set to change with the new Streaming era. Films stars who would never stoop to doing TV in the past, now appear in ‘series’ that have multiple episodes. But it doesn’t really change a thing. They still can and often do, fail. Risk is an inherent part of every production.
So if financial and critical success can’t be guaranteed, why do they bother? Most creative types aren’t just producing their art for money, they do it for the passion they feel, which drives them to make a contribution to the artistic pursuit they genuinely love and feel a connection to. Painters, Singers, Actors and Dancers do what they do for self-expression and a deep sense of connection and satisfaction and faith that they are making something that holds a certain beauty and romance for themselves and others to behold. The money made just pays a few bills. What else is money required for anyway? Fulfilling the soul and filling a bank account don’t really compare in terms of life satisfaction. Yet, many artists struggle as a result of their passion and the difficulty in paying the bills. It’s been the way for many many years. Centuries, in fact.
Producing art is done with emotion. When a writer writes, they harness their inner soul to dream up imaginary worlds and create unique characters with complex personalities and histories. Sometimes Artists will wait for inspiration for exceptionally long periods of time before finally setting paint to canvas, if at all. I’ve heard of displeased Artists destroying their work, when their mood sets them against themselves. And without emotion, Musicians can’t draw inspiration and lay out instrumentation that moves people to dance, cry and be inspired in themselves.
So, I’m inspired to talk about not fearing failure here. Failure is what happens when something doesn’t quite work out – when an Artist builds on their skill and the ability to create the most beautiful art they possibly can. Failure forces the Artist onward, to try again and complete that which they’re setting out to do. Circumstances may work against the Artist, but still they carry on – endeavouring to produce their art, no matter what. No matter whether they have a roof over their head, or food in the fridge. Somehow our souls are fed by the art we produce, which for a short time can actually take the place of life’s other necessities and nourish the Artist and keep them alive.
So without that cycle of failure, the process of trying and failing, trying and failing. There would be no great art whatsoever.
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