June
17
2009
By
The Staff
of Valet.
 
3
Questions for:
Alexander
Olch
 

Alexander Olch's "The Windmill Movie" began as raw footage from the autobiographical film of the late Richard P. Rogers. Olch, a student of Rogers' at Harvard, was helping sort through the film before deciding to pick up where his professor left off. A collage of archival material injected with dreamy fictional sequences, it's a portrait not just of a man's life, but life in general.

1

You didn't start out with intentions of making this movie. When was it clear that you'd pick up where he left off?

Four months in, I had the feeling there was a project lurking within these dusty boxes of footage that was too beguiling and fascinating topass up.

  • Eight different types of production footage were used, from 16mm to VHS tapes.
2

While you were working on the film, a design career sprouted ...

That helped, actually. It's nice to have two very different creative problems to solve. And it's very useful when working, to clear your mind and think of other things. In my case, ideas for the film would often come while I was working on design, and vice versa.

3

Do you consider yourself more of one than the other?

My first dreams as a young boy were to be an inventor, like Edison—applying creativity across a wide area of disciplines. I can't say I have any patents to my name, but I have tried to forge a career of inventing creative things. How those projects evolve in different forms, cinematically,

 
in design, or in other mediums is part of what makes them exciting.

Opening today in New York, tomorrow in Washington, DC

 

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