Show and Tell 2018: Madsen Minax
Madsen Minax
Filmmaker
1. What’s your idea of perfect happiness?:
I don’t dabble in fantasies of this sort.
2. What drives you to make films?:
Compulsion? Maybe desperation to make meaning from the experiences unfolding around us, and share that meaning with other humans as a way to connect in a senseless world.
3. Where in the world would you most like to be right now?:
On a beach where the wind and sea are so loud that you can’t make out what the person standing next to you is saying.
4. When inspiration is waning, and you feel creatively sapped, what do you do to stay motivated?:
Read fantasy novels, revisit classic sci-fi movies and write predictively structured folk songs.
5. What films are the most inspiring or influential to you at the moment, and why?:
Su Friedrich’s “Sink or Swim,” is a film I always come back to. “The Human Surge” by Eduardo “Teddy” Williams and Tsai Ming-liang’s “I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone” are newer discoveries. I guess I’m gravitating towards these otherworldly, interconnected yet also isolated, character narratives.
Your top 3 favourite music tracks?:
Right now, Johnny Cash’s “I Hung My Head”, Gillian Welch’s “I Dream a Highway,” and Rhye’s “Open.” Every song by Pavement, Lucinda Williams, Sleater-Kinney, Built To Spill and Sonic Youth, these bands put me in a moment in time where everything was brutal, yet grand beyond imagination, or at least so in memory. So clearly I couldn’t do three.
7. What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever done?:
One time I was born.
8. What’s your greatest extravagance?:
I have a sneaker problem.
9. What turns you on – creatively, spiritually or emotionally?:
Complexity, intensity, and unashamed passion.
A final word?
Word.
