It’s easy to forget the power of cinema. We get lost in grand adventures, quirky characters, and the opulent give of tales that lead us to and fro and any which way but the one we know, the one that goes on, briefly, without us. The escape of entertainment is greatly needed, it is a reel of therapy and endless creativity lingering well past the credits. We owe much to the art of the movie.
Then there are those films that do not carry us to far away places and the fringe of reality, but instead invite us inward, to look at the world we know from a different angle, to question what we thought or consider what was once ignored or unknown. These are the films of hope and why, entertaining through inspiration and, perhaps, leaving us somewhat better than they found us.
Present Perfect is the latter. It was filmed over the course of a year in a Seattle retirement home that also houses a preschool. It started as a look at aging in America, but it became so much more than that.
I recently spoke with filmmaker Evan Briggs about Present Perfect and the everything that goes with it.
Whit Honea: Everyone that I have spoken with about Present Perfect, just seeing the trailer and reading about it on Kickstarter, they have been very taken with the concept of the children and the seniors interacting on a daily basis. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m going to open with some backstory. When I was in college I worked at a public school, working with children that have special needs, and once a week we would take the kids to a retirement home where they would spend time with Alzheimer’s patients. It was amazing, beautiful and sad and wonderful, all at the same time. So when I saw this, it really spoke to me and I had to know more. For instance, how did you find the story, and was, is there, a personal connection to it or the location featured?
Evan Briggs: About 10 years ago I had it in my mind that I wanted to make a film about aging, aging in America, specifically, just because I felt so fundamentally uncomfortable with how aging was treated in our culture. It just seemed kind of wrong. We are all, inevitably getting older, and yet the way aging and the elderly are perceived, nobody wants to go to nursing homes because they’re so depressing, and when they talk about aging they act like it’s a thing to be avoided, which is funny, because it’s unavoidable, you know?
WH: Right.
EB: I wanted to understand how it could be different, what it would be like if it was different. There’s got to be another way. Obviously, there was a lot there, and so it was in the back of my mind, then a friend told me about her kid’s preschool where they went to visit the elderly on occasion, which made so much sense . . . programs that centered around the whole concept of intergenerational relationships . . . it’s funny, now that I’ve been working on this film for so many years, this idea of kids and older people together has become so commonplace to me that I forget that it’s a novel thing to most people.
I thought this was such a great way to start the story, to talk about aging and the role it has in our society without it being depressing or just pointing out the problem without any silver lining or a positive way to look at it. I think I was drawn to this story because this is a simple thing that could be implemented all over the place and it could be so beneficial, not only to the kids and the residents, but for all of them in some way, just the integration of all the generations together. I don’t ever want to tell stories without some sort of hopeful element in them, and this seemed to fit the bill in that sense. I felt this was a good way to get the conversation started and, I don’t want to say solution because that’s too simplistic, but . . . something that could be done with little effort and the ripple effect could be really huge.
WH: You touched on a lot there that is so spot on. For instance, it is a novel concept, but is it just a novel concept in our culture? In so many other cultures all of those people would be under one roof, the very young and the very old, they would be together, so basically, you’re taking the theory, the circle of life, and putting it in practice.
EB: Right.
WH: And to your point that it benefits more than just the people involved, the children and the elderly, the families, obviously, of each, but also the people who work there. How could anyone not be affected?
EB: Yeah, you know, going in I didn’t really know to what extent this idea would resonate with people, but it has been phenomenal . . . I had never heard of this, so I assumed it was new, this new thing, and then when I was talking to people it turns out that it’s not new at all, it’s been around for decades. I believe it was started in Minnesota in the 70s and it just never caught on, and to me, with people so into the idea, how did it never catch on? That’s such a weird thing.
WH: You said you filmed for year. Was it just you or a whole crew?
EB: Just me. At first I didn’t have the budget and I was going out on a limb. I didn’t know if this would become something, and I also wanted to be part of the background so the people there wouldn’t see me anymore. I knew that was going to challenging, especially with the kids. I mean, I have two little kids the exact same ages as the kids there and, kids and cameras are like, you know, I’d let the kids play and then they’d wander around bit. I just felt like the more people that were there the less intimate it would be.
WH: So you had a very small footprint there, and it allowed you to become part of the background, or at least part of their comfort zone. Who was easier with that? You already alluded to the kids, their wanting to play around, but were the seniors open to the experience? I mean, there’s a lot of disconnect there in terms of technology and the oversharing that we’re so used to, was that a hurdle or did they welcome it?
EB: It wasn’t much of a hurdle. Every so often I had some questions, but nobody ever said “no” although some family members didn’t want their residents to appear and I knew who they were and filmed around them. For the most part everyone was fine and on-board with it. It always surprises me the things people will allow you to film, you know? Things that, if I were them, I’d be like, “I don’t know if I want that filmed.” [laughing] People are really open and I knew that could happen just by my being there a lot. And people were quick to ignore the camera, too.
WH: What’s the best way for people to help out. I know you have a Kickstarter campaign.
EB: Yes, and it ends soon. It seems like things have really caught on in the last few days, mostly small donations, like $25 or less, and that’s great. I want to emphasis that, I would hate for people to think that giving $5 isn’t worth it. It’s totally worth it. The trailer has over 330,000 views on it, imagine if everyone that watched it donated one dollar . . . any donation would be great. That’s the whole point of crowdsourcing. It makes it easy for people to be a part of it.
WH: What is your hope with this story? What are you hoping that people get from this?
EB: I think this story is so unique to everyone that watches it in terms of where you are on the age spectrum. Whether you’re a 20-something who still thinks you’re never going to die or a middle-aged person dealing with aging parents and young kids, or someone who is older, you’ll look at this differently. There is so much takeaway, and I’m not here to tell people what is the takeaway, just that it’s there and I hope it starts a conversation, lots of conversations, about what is really valuable in life and how we value each other.
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Donate to the Present Perfect Kickstarter campaign (ends on July 2, 2015) and follow the film on Twitter and Facebook.
Whit Honea is the co-founder of Dads 4 Change, the Social Media Director and Community Manager of Dad 2.0 Summit as well as a Senior Account Executive at the conference’s parent company: XY Media Group. Deemed “the activist dad” by UpWorthy (and one of the “funniest dads on Twitter” by Mashable), he is a regular contributor to The Modern Dads Podcast and the author of The Parents’ Phrase Book—a family guide to empathy.
