INTERVIEW: Juan Diego Escobar

- By Chris Barnes

A film I’m mightily excited about seeing is Juan Diego Escobar’s Share We Me Your Brightest Colors. Since our interview with him last September (HERE), the production has taken huge strides towards completion and, luckily, Juan the gent agreed to have me publicly pry once more - here’s what I found out…

***

Juan! Welcome, sir! It’s a pleasure to have you with us exclusively for The Slaughtered Bird. I know for a fact all who read this interview and watch your trailer will be as captivated as I was upon seeing it for the first 10 times!

Even though you’ve made a feature, which will hit festivals in 2017, you still don’t consider yourself a filmmaker - why is this?

I consider that being a filmmaker isn’t something to be proud of. Filmmakers are liars, lords of illusion and they are mostly filled with ego, and I believe actually that when a person inclined to the arts lets go of his ego, that is when he or she becomes an artist - at least a true artist. Artists give gifts to the world just as God and the Devil did to humanity; they are true artists if I may say so.

I don’t consider myself an artist either, I am in the process of letting go of my ego so that I can be as free as I can be. Filmmakers and filmmaking is overrated to the point that there are studies about it and so on. I believe that film making as an art form doesn’t have to limit itself to the telling of stories and just entertaining people. I believe that filmmaking can be used as a tool to create change and, especially in my case, my goal is to create inner change, as I consider myself to be a film therapist or a visual poet. My way of approaching films and filmmaking is, I believe, more profound. How can filmmaking be different than poetry? I consider them to be the same.

That’s an interesting point of view. So, with this in mind, what are your hobbies? What do you enjoy about life?

I love many things about life, for example its grace and its nature. I love the occult. I like poetry, alchemy, the tarot, philosophy. I like also astrology and exploring the inner self. Mostly, if I may say so, I like things that can forge me as a person, question those things and through art find my way to explore the inner self and its nonconformity with things and its depression.

So you’re trying to develop a voice more as an artist or creator, rather than a filmmaker?

As an artist, as I said before, I have to let go of my ego to become one. The only true artists that I know are the above mentioned God and the Devil. But as a creator for sure I have. I want to make films that, through beauty, thought provoking tone, sublime visuals and music, can put the viewer into a state of mind where it led them to answer questions that have hurt them throughout time; as the goal of my films is to heal emotional wounds. I have healed through them and with my previous film, Live Life Dearest, I got awesome reviews and comments online and through the mail.

So, can we use this as an insight into this new film of yours called Share With Me Your Brightest Colors - the trailer for which frazzled my tiny brain…

Totally. This is the best example of this.

When will this film launch and when it will be released to the public?

Last year we made a crowdfunding campaign so that we were able to shoot the film. We shot it between Italy, France, USA and Colombia and finally have finished shooting the whole film, but the budget we had wasn’t enough to cover things such as color correction, VFX, texturizing and most important music. That is why we will be crowdfunding for 45 days, looking to raise $9,000USD so we can get things done. The idea is to make the music so sublime that it won’t be done only through computers, as happens a lot nowadays, but actually with an orchestra like the olden days or basically what happens in bigger productions. This film will be released in 2017.

I am really looking forward to seeing it all tied together because what I have seen so far looks pretty intense and beautiful. Here is the official trailer for Share With Me Your Brightest Colors and a personal message from the man himself:

Okay, quick-fire time - are you ready?

Favourite recent movie?

Beyond The Black Rainbow.

What are SWMYBC main influences?

The Better Angels, Tree of Life, Autumn’s Blood, Post Tenebras Lux.

Your most anticipated film?

Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Endless Poetry.

Crowdfunded or studio productions?

Crowdfunded are way deeper; more insightful and intimate.

Life or death?!

It depends. The moment we are born we are literally dying through our existence.

Poetry or film?

Poetry by far; film is my cathartic way of capturing those poems. Who said poetry had to be just written down on paper with ink and not filmed?

If, like me, you’ve been knocked sideways by the trailer, give Juan and the gang a hand by checking out their crowdfund campaign HERE.

- By Chris Barnes