EP040 – Stories Left Behind w/ Julie Goldman & Chris Clements

02.12.2026 - Season: 1 Episode 40

When we find Julie Goldman and Chris Clements of Motto Pictures in a Sundance hotel lobby, they’re doing what they do—sharing hugs and encouragement with the Oscar-nominated team from THE PERFECT NEIGHBOR. They’re the kind of producers who root hard for everybody in the field while juggling 8-10 projects of their own.

Julie and Chris know everyone—and they champion longtime friends and newcomers to docmaking alike. When we asked Julie to walk with us last year at SXSW, she was a quick and easy “YES,” but it took til Sundance for us all to be in the same place at the same time. And here we are. Keith knows the Motto Pictures folks from the 2016-2017 awards campaign when they were shepherding both LIFE, ANIMATED and WEINER. Ben’s lucky enough to be in business with Motto on his upcoming DR. DANTE project. So we’ve all spent time together, and this time we’re bringing you along for a winding view into Chris & Julie’s work philosophies and partnership—they’re married business partners who each offer different aspects to the films they produce.

We’re away from the hubbub of Main Street and onto the nature trail spotting birds, murals, tunnels, and trees, all while digging into the Motto approach: how they financed their first feature on maxed-out credit cards at Brooklyn College, why they Zoom into shoots they can’t attend, and how they handle story development and adaptation, including seeing a doc become a scripted comedy in partnership with Mike Schur and Ted Danson. Hear how Julie went from memorizing international phone prefixes at First Run Features to spotting potential in filmmakers before they see it themselves; and Chris drops a theory on why AI will never replace human storytelling—”it doesn’t understand doubt.” Join us as we stumble into a public art garden where we can’t resist trying our hand at live-scoring the walk with some sculptural instruments. And we land on a question that these walks keep coming back to: where does documentary go from here?

Plus: love for Errol Morris and Barbara Kopple, Owen Suskind’s flawless post-screening routine, the beauty of sad bells echoing through a Park City tunnel, and the tuxedo pigeon is back (still a magpie).

Timestamps: 00:00 Sundance lobby: hugging THE PERFECT NEIGHBOR crew goodbye 02:42 Meet Julie Goldman & Chris Clements of Motto Pictures 04:13 Motto origin story and the greatest hits 07:07 The tuxedo pigeon returns (still a magpie, Keith) 08:04 Married and making movies: how they navigate both 09:12 Eight to ten projects at once—parallel action as philosophy 11:17 Creative producing: Zoom-ing into shoots, feeding notes live 15:28 Julie’s sales brain meets Chris’s creative obsession 17:35 The credit card feature: Brooklyn College’s worst financial advice 19:01 Why producing called louder than directing 21:02 Owen Suskind wants a cheeseburger and three movies 22:08 Motto’s unofficial motto: dragging filmmakers kicking and screaming 25:02 The light at the end of the tunnel for doc filmmaking 29:15 Documentary is defense—and championships are won reacting 31:19 The pivot moment every good doc goes through 36:08 “AI doesn’t understand doubt” 39:03 The sculpture garden jam session 40:27 What Motto looks for: a new way to see the world 46:03 YouTube, platforms, and where distribution is headed 50:12 The Motto farm system: interns to A24 51:14 Advice for first-time feature filmmakers 55:04 Gateway docs: GATES OF HEAVEN and HARLAN COUNTY, USA 57:08 What they can’t stop thinking about 59:32 The short: FOR SOME KIND OF REFUGE 01:01:12 Sponsors: Austin Film Society & The Long Time

We're doing a podcast with these guys, so we're gonna go do that.

Hello.

I love that everybody.

That color is so good.

All so, but we're gonna

put, we're gonna keep everybody talk about it all And we're

talking, we talk about it.

We're talking and editing accomplishment of a new language.

That's what we're whooshing.

Yay.

That was kind of the perfect way to meet you guys, I think, by being around a whole

room full or lobby full of filmmakers because you knew every single person.

Well, they were all the same group.

That that was an easy one.

Well, the think it was Corey before that.

Oh, right.

Was this whole group.

That group was,

so that's the group of the team from the perfect neighbor who are incredible,

obviously, you know, Gido, Lisa Han.

They're just wonderful in the film.

We love, we saw here last year like you guys, and we're just so excited for them.

And they also have a short That's nominated

people.

Yeah.

Are you involved?

No.

Okay.

You're just, we're just, we're just excited for your friends.

Yeah, exactly.

That is a perfect encapsulation of how I feel of a documentary community.

Functions.

Which is like

on a good day.

On a good day.

There are competitive people too.

That's true.

But I think in general, it's the idea of like rising tide lifts all boats.

Yes.

And you know, when a documentary succeeds, we all succeed.

And at least that's my very rosy

No, I completely agree.

And that's kind of like the philosophy that that, you know,

kind of we come from as well.

So it's,

I, yeah, it's like being part of the dialogue.

It's like you're making films and your friends are making films and you feel

like they're filling in spaces that you, you're never gonna get to, but

you're loving what they're doing too.

Yeah.

Just kind of, it creates kind of this lattice of trying not excited.

that film is incredible, you know, and that opportunity and the

ability that they had to make it and to elevate it the way they did.

You know, there's a lot, A lot of the films that are

shortlisted are really wonderful.

There's something about a film, everyone, it used to have been less,

it's infrequent, but when you see a movie and you walk out, you say,

I've never seen that movie before.

Yeah, right.

When you say.

This is a brand new thing,

which is rare with fiction

these days.

It's great.

And that's what Judas Film really was.

Yeah.

I walk, I felt like, wow, you've really utilized a, a source source

material in a, in a brilliant way that immersed us in the human experience,

which is exactly what you're going

for.

That's amazing.

Well,

I'm gonna jump in here, Ben.

I was gonna say I should introduce her.

Well, I'm gonna say let's not introduce

these folks because I wanna tell these people what's going on,

which is that I'm Keith Bain.

That's Ben Stein Bower.

This is Doc Walks.

We're in Park City, Utah for Sundance 2026.

We started and Media race, as they say with watching our

special guest right here, say goodbye to their special friends.

The as of last week nominated documentary filmmakers Behind a

Perfect Neighbor, which premiered here at Sundance last year.

And that is what is going on.

That is why we're here.

We're sponsored this episode by the Austin Film Society.

Yes.

Cool.

We're friends at the long time and our friends at the

long time shout.

And in one moment we're gonna play that little music that starts this podcast

and when we come back we are going to introduce you to these delight of people.

To my right, to Ben's left.

But first

do, do, do, do theme song and

cut.

On your left,

you're listening to Doc Walks with Ben and Keith

are back and we're on The Little Nature Trail where Just off Main Street.

And we are pleased to introduce you and our special guests.

Julie Goldman and Chris Clements.

That's right.

Would you, you go by Chris or Christopher?

I always call you Chris.

Um, I'm Chris in my credits.

I always go Christopher 'cause my mom named me that.

Stick to it.

There

you

go.

Very annoyed.

Well, I'm happy

you'd

be annoyed of it was.

So Julie and Chris are the long time producers behind Motto, motto, pictures.

Yeah.

And, uh,

when, when people ask me about you, Julie and Chris, I always say, well,

you know, motto and I swear nine outta 10 people who know anything about the

doc community go, oh yeah, of course.

Motto pictures because I feel like you guys are synonymous with

quality films that are able to get funding and then distribution.

So could you just give us that all, could you just give us like a greatest hits?

Like how about like,

look, before we jump into the greatest hits, we have to take

one second to acknowledge.

Yeah.

Great.

Oh, whoa.

Yeah.

Amazing.

What we're seeing here for people, you know, we mentioned before that

this is a video podcast for people who choose to watch it, but a big voice

of our audience is also listening.

So we like to tell 'em what we're looking at.

What are you seeing?

Word picture?

A lot of boots, sneakers, what do you call it?

Like a, like you would having a lamppost in Brooklyn.

We used to throw them over wires in Brooklyn

last day of school.

Yeah.

pair old

head.

Yeah, I see everything from a pair of slippers over there to ski boots, which

that's, that's an expensive thing to do.

That was a lot of effort.

I couldn't afford to do that.

Lot of weight.

Yeah, you're right.

I, I

wonder if these are like the shoes that people leave behind

and like the hotel just like comes here and throws 'em in the tree.

This is, this doesn't feel like a hotel operation.

This feels like an ad hoc operation,

but this also feels a little bit like a message of Sundance 2026.

You're out.

Stories we left Behind.

Yes.

I love that.

Oh my goodness.

Wow.

That could already be our episode title.

It usually takes us a whole hour to come on, come someone into a phrase that works,

but the stories we left behind, we'll

put that on the list.

Yeah, that's a, that's a contender.

Uh, well, speaking contenders.

Yeah.

In fact, to Julian and Chris, who are not only contenders, they're successors.

They're successors, they're mentors, they're producers.

Well, tell us about motto.

Good.

We started motto, uh, basically without any around

15 years,

second.

What b What was Buck?

Buck was

2010, so yeah, 20 15, 16.

Yeah.

Uh, and

we started with a filmmaker who wasn't a filmmaker.

She was just a photographer.

And we were trying to find a filmmaker to make this film Buck Buck Brown and be

the real life force

whisper real wife, life horse whisperer.

And we realized as we searched for a director, that she was the director.

She just hadn't directed and we knew that we could help her do this.

'cause she was a photographer and she knew how to get a frame and we

kind of turned her into a filmmaker.

She could have kept going.

She chose not to.

Now she's, she's a producer.

Yeah.

But that was like the star.

Oh, she just made another film though.

Actually.

She had directed her second film.

That's true.

Right?

Or third, she's done three films.

Cindy,

we're not giving Cindy enough credit.

Yeah, we're not giving.

But yeah, she, and, and we had like surrounded her with people like with,

with like Andrea Medic, who was a consulting producer on it and Amazing

person and Toby Shiman to edit.

And it ended up being.

A great experience and it was here at Sundance and it, we won

like, uh, the audience award.

Oh wow.

It did really

well.

And that, and Laura Redford was in it.

Mm-hmm.

It was, you know, 'cause he That's a good way to get

into Sundance.

Yes.

Yeah.

I'm, I'm, I'm shifting it in.

He worked with Buck as his advisor when he did the Horse Whisperer

Cedar.

Oh, cool.

So that kind of

set I think us up.

Yeah.

Usually Bird back there.

We call it the Tuxedo Pigeon.

Oh yeah.

That, yes.

Does it get a shot of that?

It's

beautiful.

Oh, beautiful.

This is actually a throwback to my, our second episode when we came to Sundance

and Keith was trying to make our film podcast a, uh, bird watching podcast.

I like to describe what I see and you know, the birds they call to me.

Yeah.

Especially magpie.

Lovely.

Exactly.

Didn't we find out?

It's not actually called the tuxedo pigeon.

It's the magpie.

Yes,

the magpie.

But I'm gonna keep calling it tuxedo pigeon.

That's what I,

I feel like it's important to stop and mention that you guys,

in addition to being business partners, are also life partners.

Yes.

I feel like that, can you imagine?

I feel like that was well illustrated in the description

of how, how motto came to be.

Yes.

Where there was some arguing about the dates and

always, oh, we argue all the time.

That is, but that, that's, if you don't, we can't.

We just found out that somebody who we know is on the other side

of the wall is like, get ready.

You're gonna hear as like a, like we very, very, we both grew up in New York.

Chris was from Brooklyn.

I'm like the Bronx in Manhattan.

And so we are extremely loud generally because that's how we were raised to be.

I love it.

It's our culture.

Yes.

How

I'm always so interested to hear people's description of this.

'cause I feel like it's subtly different every time, but.

I'm curious to know, and I'm sure you've been asked this a million times, how do

you maintain a work life balance when you work together so passionately, so closely

on something like documentaries that take such like commitment and around the

clock attention and that sort of thing.

So how do you, how do you guys navigate that, that It's

definitely a vocation, not a job.

So you're, you are a lot.

You're living your life while you're making the movies.

It's not like you, it's hard to relax.

It's hard to turn off.

That's why

it's,

here's here was our trick.

We realized, we started in college even realized, oh yeah, we

went to, we met

in, we went Brooklyn College.

We went Brooklyn College Film School.

Wonderful time there.

Okay.

We realized you had to have at least two films going at the same time.

'cause you're gonna be obstructed no matter what, and you'll

waste time if you only have one.

So you need to be able to switch over.

And over the years we kind of built that up so that we would have

eight, nine projects going all time.

Yes.

And at motto, they're at different stages.

Some are developing, some are getting close to finished.

And what that does, I think what it keeps the balance in.

So we're always doing all of it.

Sometimes we're in the middle, sometimes we're mixing, sometimes we're just, I love

to do decks because the decks get you into the mindset of the themes and the ideas

that are gonna inform the whole thing.

Right.

And it's something you can go back to when you lose yourself while you're shooting.

That's really interesting.

'cause you know, we're working together on a project.

And one thing that I recognized right off the bat.

Mm-hmm.

One of our first calls, you rescheduled because you were on set.

And I thought that was so interesting because my understanding of how you guys

work was that you were more, you know, helping to get financing and just abuse.

Yeah.

No, the fact that you guys were like in the weeds and on set was really

cool.

We were very much of like that creative producers, the idea of creative producers

or even creative executive producers.

So Chris,

some filmmakers don't like.

Yeah.

But

because we tell them names,

you can feel free.

No, but we do this, this, we're starting now to say, we're gonna be

all in your wheelhouse, so we're gonna be talking about everything with you.

We're not forcing anything.

We tend to do this, like a lot of films come to us where they already have

some stuff shot and we have a sense of it and we, we look and we say, oh

wow, we could see this film going in three, maybe four different directions.

Any one of those could really work with this material.

Yeah.

And then we get into a dialogue and if the filmmaker is kind of

going in the similar direction, we realize, okay, this is something

that we can really work together.

Yeah.

If they have an agenda that seems to supersede what the material promises,

we, we back away because we realize, oh, it's gonna be a tug of war.

They're gonna keep trying to wedge in things that I don't

know that they accomplished

right.

In the shooting.

And I don't know that they could get, perhaps.

Yeah.

I mean, we're very involved with like, you know, sometimes we don't go to shoots

because we want to have a shoot that's like the tiniest footprint possible.

As we all know with documentaries, because you have a sensitive situation or you

have for whatever reason you want that.

But what we've started to do, which is to have a setup with Zoom.

So we're actually, even if we're not at the shoot, we're watching it and

we can like in between when we're taking breaks, when they're taking a

break or resetting, yes, we can have a conversation with the director and talk

about what's going on for, that's such a

great idea.

Even live, if we send notes sometimes through like we'll have Kendall or

one of our colleagues from from MA will be there and we'll send them so

that while they have the person there, they'll have said something, but the

director may not have thought, oh, this is a good follow up question.

Yeah, take us.

You are not, you know, so one of us will write that and say, flip this to the back.

I love that because I, we did that on, we were shooting at the height of COVID,

but we made a Kid Rock documentary with Danny McBride as the executive producer.

Oh yeah.

Long story never came out for lots of reasons.

Uh, first

of of all it was Kid Rock.

That's reason number one.

Yes.

One, two, on three.

Really.

But we, it was, uh, often very funny because the people we were interviewing

just had these wild stories and we got to the point where we were interviewing

his band mates and we would have the editor who was editing the movie,

listening to the interviews as we were going, oh, that's really smart.

And it was so helpful because he would do exactly what you just said,

Chris, where if there was a funny line and I would miss a follow up joke.

He would be like, have him get him to prompt him with this.

And then we would often get like the button or like a

little laugh out loud moment.

Yeah.

From that.

And I had never done that before and it was super helpful.

It's like brain share because you are out there, you are the

point talking to the person.

You can't be completely like immersed.

Yes.

You're immersed in that.

So like if we're all kind of clear on what the objective is,

we can all bring kind of all of.

Sens sensibility to it.

Yes.

Yeah.

And, and the, the most of the filmmakers we work with are

really, really amenable to it.

Yeah.

They really, we find different ways to communicate.

So it's not to muss up there.

Everyone has a different process, but we find a way to make sure

that we can communicate it.

That's really cool.

Cool.

I can put a number on it.

How many projects are living in your brain at a moment in post, in

production, in development pitches that you've heard that you're considering?

Eight to

10 to 10 is, is a fair assessment.

And, and I will say that this is also something that is really helpful when

you do have a problem with one film.

You stop and you say, I don't have the solution for this, but you

have all these others that you have to work on, so you shift over.

Right?

Yeah.

And when you shift over, it changes your, your, your objective, your

mission is totally different.

Sure.

And that's when it frees up, when you finish what you were doing for the, the

other project, you'll wake up the next morning and there, there will probably

be a solution of some sort There.

Yes,

I, I just find that the parallel action is really our best

friend in really manageable.

But the key and the most important thing is that when we're like focusing on one

project, that's what we're focusing on.

We're not thinking and talking about other ones.

And I think that's why filmmakers don't feel like, oh,

you're doing 12 other things.

Because when we're with them, we're with them.

And That's right.

Always been the ethos that like it's one thing at a time and then immediately

you turn to something else, but yeah.

Right.

And do you divide and conquer?

Well, we have like complimentary skillset, I would say.

That's fair.

Where I'm kind of like a bit of a bird's eye view of things.

Like a lot of the kind of like the, the fundraising, the kind of how

we're gonna position the film, that kind of thing is more my wheelhouse.

And Chris will like watch all the footage and be really across everything

and be very deep in the edit.

And I will watch cuts and.

Be deep in the edit as well, but he's like in there on a different layer.

I appreciate that.

You know I did a call with Chrissy, Julie last fall.

We were talking about an animated element for one of your projects.

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

And it was interesting 'cause there were several execs on the call and

mostly we were talking about like big picture kind of questions like

approach dealing with animation.

Yeah.

But then the second we started getting into creative, Chris lit up and we

went back and forth on five or six different little creative ideas.

And I realized, like I saw in you like, oh, I think he'd be glad to have

this conversation for the next hour.

I know, I certainly would.

I do.

That is I go on and on 'cause I like the back and forth.

'cause it enhances everything for you and me.

Right.

Well

it was fun.

I mean it was fun.

It was fun.

Once you start talking about like the, the creative, you know, so many of us

have to wear different hats, right?

We have to be a producer, we have to be a director.

Producers have to think creatively.

We all have to be able to kind of wear different hats and step into

other people's shoes literally.

But there's also kind of like.

Where, what brings a heart to the surface or what brings the blood to the surface.

Right?

Yeah.

Our pulse.

Exactly.

And so that strategy side for you, Julie, when did you feel

like you were hitting your stride?

That's a good question.

I mean, I've been doing that part of it for a long time.

I mean, I came from having like experience in sales and I did like,

like film sales?

Yeah.

Documentary.

Okay.

And while international college in college.

Yeah.

While we were in college, I worked for like first run features at gross films.

Oh, no way.

And I That's cool.

And I domestic sales to like the non-theatrical and that market.

But then I did international sales and co-productions and

so that kind of always had.

Switch my brain into that gear.

Sure.

So it's, it's kind of a weird background, but it really works.

Oh,

it's, well, it's so helpful.

Rare knowledge, you know, from like, for on our side of things, like anybody

who's got a key into that world,

I mean, there's still people so many years ago who I will see like from

or whatever, and they're still there.

I'm like, oh my God.

They like that.

Truly used to memorize all the phone numbers for like all the

different people she sold to.

And until we knew all the prefects numbers for every state

back when you had to do that.

Oh wow.

That's what,

and then Chris is like a real, like a incredible writer.

And so he also can like take the decks and really shape them and, you know,

work on that part of it in the kind of like the outlines and all of it.

So we, I think it's like a really kind of, it really is complimentary.

Yeah.

I think that we had, I will say we, I mean we started, which is

part of why like we stay married.

I think if it wasn't, we feel each other.

Yeah.

God's

right.

No, because before we started this company, we made films in under other

guises and made different documentaries and things, but we did a feature.

And we produced it on credit cards.

Yeah.

Back

when that

was the thing.

Back when that was, it was insane.

But we were young and we had deniability and we said, I think I'm gonna do this.

And our professor told us to do this.

Bill Hornsby.

Oh boy.

He said

he's responsible.

Totally.

He's like, you see all these people around the campus that are offering your credit

cards, sign up to every one of them.

Yeah.

We'll have small amount of things for three months and pay it off,

and then every three months you can get it, get it raised right.

Your limit raised.

When you hit your budget, shoot your fill.

And we were dumb enough and young enough to do that.

And it was crazy.

It sounds like a real 1991 story.

Yeah.

It's back there.

Not

quite, it's not quite that far.

Okay.

It's back there and you cut to Julia, Chris screaming it on the

streets saying, what are we gonna do?

But we did finish the film.

Yeah.

It went out.

It was on VHS, it was stores and stuff and we were thrilled all,

and that's a stepping stone.

It didn't make us any money or anything, but it,

it made back its money

back throughs international, successful for sure.

And I'm like, this is fine.

Right.

You know?

Right.

Yeah.

Well, I curious experience, I'm curious to know, speaking of film school,

you guys mentioned you met there.

Yeah.

You, you know, scrimped and saved and probably made poor financial decisions

to making that first Absolutely

Give, roll your money to Kodak and do art.

What was it, what was it about producing that you guys were drawn

to versus like directing for example?

'cause it sounds like you, 'cause you

directed.

Well, I've directed before and I liked it a lot.

I thought it was really.

Really, I, I, I love, like, I like to collaborate and I, I

always feel like I'm enhanced when I'm working with someone else.

And I think that that was probably it.

I started to realize that maybe my skill is seeing capacity in other

people and it's easier for me to be a producer and be able to, 'cause a lot

of times people are really talented, but they can't see how far they could go.

And then there are others who aren't, who think they could go very far.

Right.

I like the first part of that.

Second, when we see the, when we see people like that, we're like, this

is something like, I always feel like that with like, you know, you know,

man fu and, and, uh, ma amazing.

They're like, we just, we, you know, these are people that we love.

They're, and they're like

brilliant,

brilliant and, and, and alive.

And that's kind of what we're always looking for, that it can be this kind

of vibrant experience from Stem Stern.

Roger Roger is Roger

Rus

Williams.

Roger is like, we're doing something with him right now with two things.

can't say what they are course and I can't say what

they

are.

But we could talk about wife animated, which you guys did.

Oh yeah.

That

was, yeah.

I do wanna say I always wanted to be a producer.

Even in film school, I was like, that's, I knew that's what I wanted to do.

I never wanted to direct.

And how did you know that?

What was it about?

Because I produced somebody's film and I was like, this, this,

yeah.

I wanted to be a second unit director.

Yeah.

Ing I was being realistic.

Yeah.

And this was back when they had live, like large scale action things.

And I loved engineering mechanical things like crashes and things like that.

And I did like a crazy car crash film when I was in college.

And um, oh yes you did.

And I thought like, I was so foolish.

'cause it was so, it was so reckless.

But I thought, oh, they'll see this and they'll say, look,

he did this for like 10 grand.

Let's hire him.

Right.

And it's like, it it, it never happened, but it did.

Again, it's another one of those things where you're like, aha.

Alright, now you should do that, right?

Yeah.

Let's do this next thing.

And I'm thinking about,

yeah, everything is the next step.

Yeah.

But life animated.

It's funny you say that.

'cause when we were originally walking

Yeah.

I was like, oh, there's the pool at this place.

And I always think of Owen.

Owen Suskin, who is the main subject of life animated and Owen's like

relaxing thing after a screening, which was intense for him.

He's a autistic young man and he, it's a lot of input, but he loved it.

Mm-hmm.

But then he was like, I'm done.

I wanna go to the pool.

I wanna go back to the room.

I wanna have a cheeseburger.

I wanna watch some Disney

film.

Three movies laid out, ready to go.

Wow.

This, this was his.

I learned a lot from being around him because I realized, wow,

you could shape your own life.

Yeah.

You know, you don't have to follow everything that's going on.

It was very, very liberating.

Yeah.

But that was an amazing family.

Whole family.

Whole

family.

We're still in touch with them.

We love them.

They're, they're wonderful.

Wow.

You're basically saying it with all, you know, all these stories

that you're telling us about how you work and who you work with and

the kind of subject you're drawn to.

But is there sort of like a. What's the right word?

Like a mission statement or ethos to remind, yeah.

To, to motto pictures.

Like if you were to sum up like the kind of work you're drawing there, what

is the motto?

Ah, yeah.

I did come up with this one, but it was a joke, which was dragging filmmakers

kicking and screaming to their best work for over however many years.

Yes.

I was thinking, well, we hit 20, maybe we put that on a shirt.

But that's, you know, it really wasn't, it's that.

No,

it's not.

Um,

I mean, I think it's, it's

kind of any

story telling, telling stories that, that mean something to us with

people that we enjoy working with.

I mean, I don't know.

That's so simple.

Yeah.

No, I think it's also, if you're curious, if you find the world curious

and you can get into somebody else's passion, you know, when you watch

a documentary about something you would never do in a million years,

but you could understand the passion.

Yeah.

Like that's kind of, I think where, which kind of drives us, you know?

love that.

Yeah.

I think that it's that.

We, we hook into stories that we never knew existed.

Like, uh, like, uh, chicken People is a perfect example.

I never knew.

Oh, that's a

great one.

Love that movie.

And I learned so much about chickens that I would never know.

I'm not familiar about chicken people.

It's so interesting.

Like, like best of

show with Chickens.

Oh, that's a good pitch.

Yes, it

is.

That they have a,

except for real,

since like 1890, they had the, like the articles of perfection

and every subdivision of chicken has a measurement for everything.

For the waddle, for the, and I came from Brooklyn.

I grew up in Brooklyn, but now I know, I don't know from chickens.

I can look at it chicken and say Nice waddle.

I go check and say it needs a little salt.

I'm gonna come up with a motto before or after this podcast.

That's, yeah, we should have a

name like motto.

We,

we could always update.

We used to have updates like, I mean, we used to update like on our website

and different people, different mottos, quotations, but we stopped.

Oh, that cool.

Pretty early.

We've gone through several tunnels and the conversation

has been flowing so naturally.

But we haven't been commenting

the tunnels.

On the tunnels, on the murals.

And I wanna say we walked through a tunnel that was all about the art of,

or the, the slog that is the labor of mine working in mines, which I guess

is what people used to do out here.

And

yes, this was a mining town

and it was right when you guys were describing your work life.

And I did want to interrupt.

Oh my God.

And I looked

right through it.

Right?

I did

not see that.

This is a little like crumb ish.

Yeah.

There we go.

Little rum ish.

It is a little r crumb.

Yeah.

Although there's a, there's a film camera.

It's a great 1930s style.

Uh, appreciate

they're gonna erase that after Sun Ross moves.

They're gonna make that into something else.

That's right.

I'm still, what would it be like a pair of ski boots

or, yeah, exactly.

In a, in a prayer for snow

walking through the tunnel with Julie and Chris.

We see a light at the end of film.

We do.

What is the light at the end of coming for dock filmmaking in the industry right now?

I think it's that, you know.

It's always these extremes of people saying it's the golden age,

it's the depth, there's a, a line.

And if you've been doing this for a long time, I think you see that line.

And, and there's moments that are more advantageous for us.

And there are moments that feel like there's a real dearth of

opportunities, but at some point there's always something else that comes.

And there's some way mm-hmm.

That we find other outlets and other opportunities.

I don't like to say like, it's dead.

You know?

I, I think it's, it's too easy.

Yeah.

It's not, I mean, 'cause the world just keeps spinning and stuff keeps

happening and we're always gonna have to try to get our arms and

our brains around what's going on.

And stories are the best way to do it.

And, you know, it's healthy to have, like, I like the investigative work that, where

we work on investigative journalism stuff.

I find it very interesting.

'cause I find like, like we did a thing on Robert Fisk.

And he was fascinating person and he, like, the, the filmmaker was with him

and they, I forgot where they were.

There were some like in Jakarta or something like that.

Mm-hmm.

But he was so known as a, you know, like a kind of a activist journalist

that he explains to to, to young.

Uh, the director, he's like, there is a coffee place three stalls down.

Like when he comes in, they come in on the plane, hang out there, I'll

be there in about three, four hours.

Because he knew that they would take him in because he's always taken in

and they went through everything he had and they thought, it's hard driver.

They're copying everything.

And then he just comes back out.

It's like, it's, it's the price of doing business for him.

And so you meet these people and you get to know that people operate.

Robert,

it's such a weird life in that way.

You have this kind of strange series of people that you find and connect

with and sometimes stay in touch with.

Well, it sounds like Yeah.

In the case of the life animated.

Folks.

Yeah.

Oh, in a lot of the cases we're still in touch with people.

Yeah.

Well, let's, let's go back to that transition moment.

When you were going from Julie, you were going from being in sales.

Yeah.

Chris, you were scratching, creative itches, trying for second year directing.

Mm-hmm.

And some writing.

And where did your partnership as producers kind of congeal after

you made that credit card film?

Uh, do we, is motto the next chapter?

Or is, or where do you guys go from there?

I think we were still with our Central Films thing, which was a, and we made,

we made a film on the X-Files under that,

the fans of the X-Files,

the fans of the X-Files up in the nineties.

And this was actually one of the first times the internet affected

a show where it was like, kept it

alive

originally.

Very interesting.

And that was like one of the early investigative, and we

did, it was a co-director thing.

I co-directed with a, with another director with Maria, who went to school

with her, went to school as well.

And Julie produced, and I think that's when, right after that.

Yeah,

I think we shifted, I made a short animation

and I had a job to make money, which turned out to be okay at Wellspring.

Well, we had insurance.

Yeah,

that is okay.

Which is like Wellspring spawned a lot of people that

like, you know, that are great.

Like Marie Ergos and Ryan Werner and

yes.

Oh, that's cool.

Julia Chetty fit people.

Awesome.

Wow.

Yeah, it's like a duck filmmaker factory.

It was Richard Lauber's company.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Great.

How cool.

Well, I'm curious to know why documentary and not, you mentioned shooting second

unit for action films like, you know, I think documentary I've described

it as, to use a football analogy, documentarians are like the offensive

linemen of the entertainment industry.

Meaning often overlooked, unrecognized, but central to sort of

the heart and soul of the endeavor.

So I just wonder what it is about documentary that keeps

you guys coming back that.

You've wanted to vote your

Well, the question is, do you agree?

'cause I don't know that I agree with that analogy.

You've brought that up several times.

Self, this o lineman.

I wonder if they agree.

I'm not good with the football analogy.

So you go,

well, I get the, I get the, the lineman because without them

it wouldn't even be game well,

meaning the quarterback gets the credit.

Right?

Like the, you know, the linemen are not the stars, but they're integral.

But that's the same with like directors and producers and fiction.

Yeah.

Like we're friends who are,

he's a tricky thing.

I think producers think we're like, we're more like the defensive coach

instead of the linemen in particular.

Because I think we have more to do.

Like those guys are the wall.

But I think we also have the, like, you know, all the, the

coverage people and everything.

We, we talk about the strategy and we, again, it, it goes back to

that thing when you see capacity.

Right.

You say, I know you can get there,

right?

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

And

I'll show you how.

I didn't think you were gonna be talking in depthly about football.

Well, and I wanna say I wasn't looking to, oh, no, I'm saying I wasn't looking

to stretch the metaphor anywhere, but I love saying about defense because the

reality is like, I'm gonna make a dumb statement that I think the non-fiction

side of the business is the, the defense.

Oh.

And the fiction side is the offense wowing.

So people pay attention to the score and the quarterback and the receivers of the

running backs are the stars of the show.

But championships are won on defense.

Ah.

Defense not only has to have a strategy, but it has to be

able to react to the moments.

Yes.

That's it.

Exactly.

And I think that's what documentary is.

It's all about ent.

Yes.

Utterly.

There are so many times where we go in with a thesis and we

get in a certain distance and we're like, oh, we were wrong.

Yeah.

And then you can, you either retool it or you back away and you know, yes.

We backed away from something once.

After a while because you realize the thesis doesn't work.

Yeah.

And the filmmakers were not so certain that they thought they could go on.

There should

be a name blame for that.

That thing that, that we talk about a lot with and you know, we're

always talking about nonfiction.

Yeah.

Uh, creators.

And we always talk about nobody knows the third act when they get started.

Right.

And if they do, they're a fool.

'cause it's not worth gonna end up if it does end up there.

They didn't make a very good film.

Exactly.

But that moment of recognition, when you've got to pivot, when you come to

recognize, and I don't mean like the early moment, was it the capturing

the freedman's moment where you set out to make a movie about clowns.

Yeah.

But you pitch the other movie.

Yeah.

Right.

But more the mo moment that every good doc kind of goes through.

Yeah.

Where you thought it was about this, but you realized it was about that.

Yes.

Oh, utterly.

Yeah.

Yes.

I love that though.

That's a magic moment.

It's like sprung on you.

Yeah.

You've built this whole infrastructure and you didn't even realize it.

And then, and it's, if you step into it,

it's in front of you.

And if you're open to it.

Yeah, you're gonna see that, that, okay, wait a minute.

This is really an opportunity and we just have to be, we have to be,

we always say,

and you have to be fluid with it.

Yeah.

What were you gonna say?

Yeah, exactly.

I'm, I'm, I'm what you're saying like, like don't be afraid

of making the film you shot.

Yeah.

Because you, it might not be the thing you intended, but the one

you shot frequently is better.

Is better.

Yeah.

Yes.

And that's what keeps me coming back to documentary.

Mm-hmm.

'cause I feel like it's this sort of life lesson in a way where it's like

you're head in a direction with the best of intentions and what happens is often

better than you could have predicted.

Yeah.

But you have to stay open and improvise.

think you have to get really comfortable with being in doubt.

Yeah.

I think that's your best friend.

If you're certain, you're almost certainly driving along a line.

Somebody else is always Dr. Already driven along.

Right.

And that's where the certainty's coming from.

Yeah.

So if you're uncertain, but it's resonating with you, that's a sign.

I like that.

'cause you make me finding something new.

Right.

I'll tell you where we're finding a space in fiction is in the kind of use the,

our films have been remade essentially.

Oh,

interesting.

And the documentary is the ip.

interesting.

We did a short with Roger that was like for New Yorker present.

Yeah.

And then he optioned the person's life story, Saul.

And then we made Cassandra, which was his feature directing

debut with Gael Garcia Bernal.

Right.

Yeah.

Brilliant

experience.

Yeah, great experience.

Mole agent.

And the Mole agent has become the series of man on the inside.

Right.

We became friendly with one of the producers, Morgan Sackett.

Yeah.

And we

just hung out is like a showrunner who's an executive producer on everything.

He's amazing.

So we just started to like, like would invite each other to things or share

links and we sent him the MO age and just 'cause we thought he'd like it.

And then he called and he was like.

I love this.

This is a remake and this should be a series or a film.

And we were like, well, somebody kind of has the rights and it's a messy situation.

So he is like, okay.

And then like a year later we saw him, this was, she

was

a really

good PGA awards.

And he was like, what happened to the mul agent?

And I was like, are you serious about this?

I said, yeah.

And we were like, she said, okay,

all right.

I'm unleashing myself.

She accepted to

out of this other situation and I'm, and we did.

We, because the option is never,

she really,

really finalized.

Right.

And we didn't wanna work with those people.

So we went back

and we should speak to Mike Shaw and that team.

Yeah.

Who the first season was like, like, first of all, my favorite thing was they

pitched us and like the stuff they pitched us was stuff that was in our documentary.

Yeah.

We couldn't make it work.

We didn't.

Interesting.

We took it out.

They intuited that that stuff exists.

Yeah.

Oh,

you're the world of this story.

Yes.

That's so

cool.

And I was like, this is, they're

like on the right.

My, and

they like, and they really cared about the documentary

tree so, so respectful, like

wonderful about the documentary and they so respected Maite and Oz and Marcela Wow.

Who produced it.

And we, what a

great experience.

We went to the set, we've run to the set for both seasons and mm-hmm.

We like they, we see every script, we see every cut.

Wow.

I love this because I'm a huge baseball fan.

Yeah.

And I'm also a fan of Mike Shore and I just found out he does a baseball podcast.

Yes, he does.

With a very famous baseball writer.

And I friend is Levi?

No, it's Joe pki.

Okay.

He wrote the baseball 100.

But how he finds time to make all his work.

I know.

And to do a baseball podcast and know everything about professional

sports is, blows my mind.

He's really such a, personally, he's such a, an.

A brilliant guy, but he's also, I could imagine how he does that, because

I can

too.

You could see him compartmentalizing into all of these things and being

able to develop a new show and work on this and figure it out in

a really hinder and respectful way.

Yeah.

Every step of the way.

They were

absolutely, they were, he was working on something when we were

talking to him about this that had something to do with baseball.

But

yeah,

I'm sure he's gonna do it at some point.

'cause it's a really good idea.

But like we were just talking about this actually good ideas can't, like

we've had so many different friends who had like, things that were

just like going gangbuster, you're like, this is an amazing story.

And you're like, can you get it out there?

And I really feel that there's kind of a breaking point coming up where

we're gonna start seeing movies coming out a bit more with voices.

What do you mean?

Like, like even, uh, the, the, the short that we have here.

In with Alexandra, we have a, some kind of refuge, some uh,

some, some kind of refuge.

This is a Sho Dock is playing.

It, it's here, it the Sund.

Okay.

The objective of shifting in a way that I think that the stories are gonna

be more embraced and I think whenever we get past, look, I have a theory

about AI and why it's gonna fail.

Oh, let's hear it.

AI doesn't understand doubt.

Doubt is the basis of everything we do.

Everything that's like you're trying to say something that

you're passionate about right now.

Yeah.

And it's alive.

All it's ever gonna do is tell us old passion and so it, it, it's

a great mimic, but it's dangerous to think that it will ever come up

with something that's, that breathes

Right

the way something that a human makes.

Yes.

Speaking of breathing, like humans.

Yeah.

Can we go our way into those belts?

I need to go.

You guys comfortable trugging across this?

I just think it's been oversold to us.

And I think that when that clears, when the fog clears, yes, you're gonna realize

you're gonna need all the artists.

This will be a tool for us.

We're using it in animation and it's brilliant.

Right,

but you don't leave it up to the the ai

No.

You tell the AI what to do.

What to

do.

Yeah.

And I think that's what we're gonna be doing.

I hope so.

I mean, that's the way that we're using it now, right?

I mean, is it like, it's a supplemental tool and it's pretty amazing as that

utterly.

It's a great tool.

But what's like, this is an industry that has oversold what

it's been selling us forever.

This is a pretty wild, uh, concert Jew is putting on for us.

I'm not

gonna be a professional bell player,

but this is just subtle plays into like the sad Park City of 2027 narrative,

the shoes hanging, the sad bells.

Butch

things we're, we're doing a, a baseball film now.

Oh, you are?

Yeah.

About Joe Tory.

It's very

interesting

about Joe Tory.

Yeah.

Oh, amazing.

What a lovely guy.

was really

cool.

He really was.

His story about winning the World Series.

Oh yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Ah, it's like brings me to tears.

Every time I hear it, it's so

incredible.

And he's such a me.

That's a guy who's a mensch too.

Yeah.

Oh my goodness.

Yeah.

He's amazing.

Here, Chris.

Go for it.

I'm not,

won't.

Not musically inclined.

I found out.

Yeah, there it is.

All right.

These are hanging sculptures.

These are like found wood musical

and found

metal concert opportunities, spontaneous creativity unfolding

under the Bruce ca here.

Have you been to this before?

No.

Didn't.

Me neither.

I don't think so.

I think we just discovered it here.

I didn't even know about this path until this trip.

Yeah.

Isn't this fantastic?

Yeah, that one's pretty good.

Oh, that's good.

I love this thing.

Yeah.

What is that?

I look here about that love old industrial stuff.

For sure.

Look, it says, uh, uh, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Yeah.

In their corner,

made by William Play Now, or something like that.

It's called Warfield.

Warfield.

I introduce you to Warfield.

I I give

you, it's a sound garden.

Well,

that's,

this is an,

oh, it says it right there.

Oh, I

love

that

band.

It's a sound machine, but we're not in Miami.

Exactly.

This, uh, yeah.

This is like a, it's like a little mini storm king.

Yes.

Except I don't think you're gonna play the, the sculptures Well, they don't

like it.

You just

go bang on

the sculptures,

but you do

it anyway.

Yeah.

How can you resist?

Okay.

We've been doing a great job of kind of bouncing through

both history and philosophy.

Yes.

And, uh, I think this is a wonderful conversation.

I wanna get to the birth.

Of motto.

Yeah.

The modern version of motto and the growth of motto.

'cause I know every time I've been on a call with you guys, it's not just the two

of you sitting on the end of your bed No.

Working in the back of a studio apartment.

No.

This is a large operation that juggles a lot of different things.

A lot of filmmakers endeavor to get in front of you.

And I think the more they understand kind of what you, where, where you

started, where you're going, what you're, look, you know who you

are, they can figure out maybe what

you're

looking for in,

I mean,

slide into your dms, looking for something new, a new way to look at

things, a new way to see the world.

It's a,

a story that hasn't been told before.

story that hasn't been told before.

Good.

I, I remember talking about your film with the letters.

I was like, that's such an original idea.

And also you had this like, wealth of material that was like

nobody had ever seen before.

Yeah.

There's things like that.

We have a project right now where there are, there's, they've been seen,

but it's like the idea of kind of.

Reading material that people haven't really been familiar with.

It's, and, and that's gonna be like a component of it.

It's recited.

Well, so how did you get to, let's, how did, how did the beginning of motto

turn

into who you are now?

We never reflect on this stuff.

We're just like, I think a thousand miles.

There's

a Tory quote that he says, says, if you stop to look at what you're

doing, you're not doing it anymore.

And I know that that's really simple, but I thought that, that, I always

thought, I was like, I, I agree with that.

I think that you doesn't keep going and you, you feel good.

I do feel this, I feel like when the film is done, when we walk out after

the, the, the, you know, we, you know, EQD and everything, I do feel like,

and it should be okay on its own.

I will say, like to the question that you asked.

'cause we are like, seem to be side lu.

I'm

sorry.

I'm No, that's quite right.

There's, there's no wrong answers, although I do want to fault in mirrors.

So we started with.

Fuck, as Chris said.

Yeah.

So that was like the beginning and we just kind of took off from there.

It was like kind of a wonderful ethos to work with, as Chris mentioned, like

it was somebody who was an emerging filmmaker and that was something we did

a lot of at the beginning, work with new filmmakers time and that even like working

with Roger, it was his first feature.

Mm-hmm.

You know, things like that.

Everything that we did was like kind of building these relationships and

these foundations with teams and filmmakers that were like excited

to join this adventure as we were.

So it went from pretty quickly.

We started to develop and work on a lot of felts in the early days,

and it just kind of snowballs.

Perfect timing.

And you know, you mentioned Life Animated Wiener.

Those were the same year?

No, those were the same year.

Interesting.

Yeah.

Big Year seems like they were

so it was a crazy year.

That was a crazy

year.

It is a crazy year.

You're managing both of those.

'cause they were two, just different Oh yeah.

yeah.

Energies and, and

there was a huge amount of anxiety

or anxiety about, you know, the effect.

Yeah, sure.

And 'cause the election was coming out.

Yeah.

There was a, yeah.

There that was an intense experience.

But you know, to that end, the idea was like, okay, what if we get

distribution before Sundance and we go in with like a, with cover essentially.

Right.

And that was,

and did that happen?

That did

great.

We took it out with Josh Braun at Submarine and, and it went

to Showtime and IFC films.

Cool.

Two places that no longer are doing.

Right.

Well, going back to, I like what you said about how our industry is always in flux.

Yeah.

Richard Linkletter has this great.

Quote about AI where he basically said, our industry has

been dying since it was born.

And that it's always, you know, it's still progressing.

Here we are, you know, a hundred plus years later, films

are still vital and relevant.

And so as you guys,

news of my demise is very exaggerated, but it, yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

So we often talk about doom and gloom in terms of the documentary landscape.

I wanna hear some positive things about the documentary

landscape from you guys right now.

Absolutely.

I mean, you know, kind of in a weird way, having the shortlist with three

streamers, each having a film is a positive thing because the kind of excuse,

well, you know, it's so hard for us because internally, you know, we support

these films and then we get shut out.

You know, now they don't.

Right.

And there's two independent films as well.

And I, I have to say about like that's not a film that's like, even though it was

under like crime, people stayed with that.

Fair, yeah.

Means that they're ready for challenging, they don't need to be led by the nerve.

And a lot of things, like we do have films where, you know, it's always

like, well why don't we just say it?

And it's like, no, no, it's better to show it.

Right.

And that's, I think, how that, you know,

but I think that is a positive because there's always like politics of it, right?

And we want to have an ecosystem that supports independence and where you

can have an independent film and also have it acquired for distribution.

And where you can have films that are supported early on by, by

funders or even, you know, end users.

If you can mix that up.

And if we can kind of keep that going and have realize.

There are huge audiences if you do it right.

Hmm.

And that's the thing, it's, there's so many people looking into what to

do and what the, how to solve this problem of the documentary space,

the theatrical space, all of it.

And, and I think they're gonna come up with interesting ideas.

I don't think they're all gonna be great, and I don't think they're all

gonna work, but I think some kind of Frankenstein of them will be interesting.

Yeah.

And I like what you just said there too.

What I heard in that was that if you do it well,

yeah,

it may not be getting a theatrical release, but it'll still find an audience.

And that's really the, the key is like, if you make good

work, it will find an audience.

I mean, for us, whether it's a YouTube, YouTube series or a audio feature doc,

let's talk about that.

Those like YouTube series of it all.

Is there an expanded.

Platform.

We're back in the coal miner tunnel.

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

So let's talk about the hardest part of our job and remember that we're not waking

up at 4:00 AM to go down into the max.

Exactly.

Which is, this is not, we have a pretty good

Yeah.

Uh, I have to remind myself, but what, so where is this industry going?

Right.

And where is the platform or the tactic or the rethink that you are

excited about that you think you might embrace or some of the filmmakers

you're working with are dabbling in?

Yeah, I mean, I think YouTube is gonna be, it's, it's, it's where it's gonna go.

I mean, there's kind of not much of a doubt that that's

gonna be a big play in that.

And I don't know, is that okay, what that's gonna mean in terms

of like actual revenue streams?

Thank

you.

And I think that's the thing that we have to figure out, but the audience is there

and we have to be able to like find a way.

If we're gonna do a 90 minute film, how do we then have that film?

In ways that can either entice people with like what's digestible to different

audiences to bring them in to then watch the whole film or to parse the film if

it's that kind of film that can be done that way into sections that they can

watch and then keep watching serialize.

So, I mean, I think we just have to be very open-minded right

now because it's a pivot point.

Yeah.

Well, and the numbers are staggering.

Like when you talk about the amount of people watching YouTube mm-hmm.

Versus watching literally anything else, including Netflix.

Mm-hmm.

It's just not even a contest.

I mean, it's just, I wish I had the numbers that dim my

tongue, but it's startling.

I mean like so many people are just consuming videos on YouTube.

My biggest question is are they watching full movies or are they

watching snippets and things?

'cause like that kind of metric would be really interesting.

Yeah.

If this were a platform that could be moved forward, I

know that, like I use that.

I use YouTube to find obscure old movies that I missed when I was a kid and I,

you know, and you can find them, right?

Uh, but like, so you can watch an entire movie there.

So it has the capacity to do it.

The question is if the culture can continue going the way it's going, which

is clearly a working culture, and yet still be able to pull in longer form

material that's made specifically for it.

Right.

Now they host what was made for other purposes.

Right.

So it'll be interesting if they could.

I'm not sure if it, how it would work.

Yeah.

I think we're all trying to figure it out.

I mean, that's actually one reason why we started doing this show is just the

idea of like telling stories in a new way, connecting with storytellers, trying

to parse this idea and just basically celebrate the art form that we love too.

And I feel like kind of goes back to what you said, Julie, where if you just are

sort of telling stories that you love and trusting they will get out in the

Yeah,

that's,

I mean, it's gonna work out.

It's a lot of work.

Yeah, to get it out into the world.

But if you have a group of people that are determined and use an

experience and relationships, you'll be able to find a place.

It's been very rare that we haven't had a film, I don't know if this ever,

that didn't find a home in any way.

I don't think any film we've done has never found a home.

We've been fortunate enough to,

but sometimes it takes a while.

Oh, it takes, yeah.

Sometimes we're working on something that we're making a film that we're working on

for nine years that that has happened, so.

Right.

You didn't intend to tend to do that better

find a

home, but it better found home.

Sounds like you built a, you need to build a

Exactly.

But I mean, kind of to your point about motto and like, so we have, you know,

a group of people that work there and

they're really committed.

Yeah.

And they're like, we kind of, people come in as interns or as assistants

and then they built it with our become APS researchers, co-producers.

Producers.

Yeah.

And,

and

we trust them.

They're, they're really,

yeah.

Good.

And we all work.

And they have,

we're all

trained in kind of like our, in our ethos, in our, the way that we work,

in our kind of system that we have.

And so we don't have any questions.

Like, and if they go, you know, Marissa went to a 24

Yes.

And Carolyn went to ESPN or like as people move on.

Marissa

Torres.

Yeah.

Okay.

I didn't know she started with you guys.

Oh,

like seven years.

Okay.

Yeah.

I know her through a 24 for, you know, from a to

she's from Texas.

Yes.

That's it.

We had a

lot coming.

That's something that we do love.

She's from

Austin.

We also have great interns, like the interns themselves.

Like if they, if they don't suddenly part of a model, they're co some

and then they're working us.

That's so cool.

That's my dream that I'll be pitching to somebody who was an intern.

Well, like, like we shot, uh, the scene at the beginning.

You guys know what this is a.

Small, small circle that we operate in and, you know, it's tinies of

worlds.

Yeah.

Well, we like to finish the episodes with what we call a speed round, which, uh, we

often are not very speedy about, but Okay.

Consists of just a couple questions.

Excited.

We hope that this is a, uh, podcast that people who are just starting

out in film can get a lot from.

So what would your advice be to somebody who is making

their first feature, let's say,

before I do that, I wanna point out the show of force.

Oh, wow.

Be police presence here.

That's, that's a show of force.

I just have to,

you

know, that, that's great.

Sorry.

Um,

yeah, it's like such a great thing to see right now.

I would say it's, what's really important is to, to make

alliances with other people.

Yeah.

In the films.

I mean, that's really key.

You know, find, look at, look for other people who you wanna work

with, who have done films that are similar, that may be like.

You know, there's a lot of programs where you like pitch, you know, whether

it's Hot Docs, I don't even know if they do it anymore, or Sundance or

any of these places where you pitch and try to go to something like that.

Mm-hmm.

And see what it's like to kind of how you present a film so that you can,

and you can watch a lot of that online.

Right.

So get an understanding of how, you know, because you, it's really important how

you showed the, the sizzle if you have one or some scenes from it or a deck.

And it's really important how you present that and how you get that out there.

And there's so many tools online to figure out what the best way to go is.

And then there's also ways to find people.

If there's films that you love and there's somebody who was like a

co-producer on that film, well maybe they're looking to be a producer.

Right.

And you have the same kind of mindset as they do.

And that to me seems like a, a good way to find life alliances with others.

Gotcha.

Building community, forming alliances.

I mean, when you describe like those pitch scenarios, I've given the executive

advice, it was, the advice I was given when I started was go to Hot Talks.

Good.

Or the.

The, the pitch forum.

Mm-hmm.

I watched Waltz with Bashir get pitched and say, that didn't

change my life would be a a, a lie.

Yeah.

You know, like that moment being in that room and realizing like, oh,

animation documentary is a thing.

Yes.

That could be a thing.

I never knew that before that moment, but I also saw professionals at

a table kind of giving feedback.

Yeah.

And, and I saw filmmakers in the audience.

The audience was filled with filmmakers all trying to figure out, I feel

like, like you said, I don't even know if that thing still exists.

I don't know if it still exists either.

It's not in the same form it used to be.

Now there's like round tables and things like that, and it did get to be

like a little bit of like, you know, annoying high school where there were

like people who were like at the table who would be, you know, really critical

so that they could look good in front of their other friend at the table.

And I'm like, you're gonna give $5,000.

They might sleeping right.

On their international trips.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Exactly.

And, and you're gonna give us $5,000 and you're putting us

through the fucking ringer, so.

Yeah.

Right.

Um, but I would also say, uh, to Julie's point.

The, the reason you're looking for other people is 'cause

you're testing your ideas.

Yeah.

Like we all like are in our own head and we like our ideas, but the people

that you, you collaborate with other people you trust and you can show them

your ideas on varnish, which is the best way to assess whether they're

working or not and how to fix them if they're not working or not to me is

like always been real, really helpful.

Yeah.

Collaboration has always given great insight to correct things.

Absolutely.

To move in the direction you want.

And the most important thing, don't get mad at the people who give you notes.

Yeah.

If they're telling you something you want to hear so

good.

That's perfectly fine.

Take it in.

Why?

Because they came up with that on their own independently,

which means it's in your film.

Yeah.

And if you don't want that in your film Right.

They've just told you it's in your film and you don't wanna go to your

premier and have everybody see that.

Right.

And that's your best friend.

Yeah.

And just take and say, okay, I'll think about it.

You don't have to like,

you don't have to commit.

Yeah.

Right.

A lot of times what we do is we'll talk to somebody and we'll say.

There's a deficiency here, but there's a thematic deficiency,

there's something missing.

But looking at the way you've told this story, we can see several different

ways where you can like set the audience so they understand when you get here,

they'll understand what that means.

Right now, you, you haven't done it.

Right.

So as a result, they're just gonna breeze through that.

You think they're picking something up that's essential.

Yeah, and they're not.

And that's kind of what I think we do.

Like, we, we do the, the wing people watching for that to help

the filmmaker make sure that, that they don't trip over that.

That's cool.

Next question is, what was the Gateway drug film documentary

for you guys that you saw that you were like, I want to do this.

I wanna make docs

for documentaries?

Yes.

Probably Gates of Heaven for you.

Gates of heaven

For you.

Well, you said Gateway.

I was like, that's a good one.

Yes.

And what about Gates of Heaven?

Because it's not about a pet cemetery, it's about a family and desperation

living in the, like I loved American Family, if you know that, that series.

Yes.

Yes sir. The gates of heaven, I think accomplished in one go.

Like I really, I what, uh, American family did that was an American

family and the desperation and was when the sun is playing his

guitar with his amplifier over the

of the

cemetery.

I'm like, I'm like, you don't, there are no words.

You just need to watch that and you're there.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

Beautiful.

That's great.

I would say it's, it's Harlan County, USAI went, my mom took me to see

in the movies and she was at that time trying to organize a union at

a place, and so it was a really, it was a interesting moment to see it.

Have you ever talked to Barbara about it?

Oh yeah, of course.

Yeah.

I love Barbara.

Yeah.

No, I told her that absolutely.

It's one of the most incredible things about this industry is we're

inspired by great artists and great stories, and then if we get, if

we're lucky Oh, thank you, Matt.

Then if we're lucky enough to get a foot in the door Yeah.

You get to meet those great artists Exactly.

And engage with those great stories if from an entirely different angle

and maybe work with them.

Yeah.

Is there, besides Barbara, is there anyone else that, Barbara Kale, of course you're

talking about, but yeah, no one else that is, that kind of checks that box for you.

Like, have you worked with Darel, for example?

No, we haven't worked with him.

No.

Yeah.

Love

stuff.

Uh, I mean Steve James was Steve

James.

Steve James was a Yeah, he's he's really a good collaborator.

We did Advocate, yeah.

Like huge fans of hoop things of course.

And so yeah, that was really special to work with him.

Yeah.

I mean it's like meeting Fred Wiseman or meeting Al Mazel or Henry or Chris

Hedges, like all of those people.

Right.

Last question, which is, what can you not stop thinking about right now?

And it doesn't have to be film related, like what is the thing that you are just

waking up thinking about falling asleep at night with rallying around in your head?

What, what are you thinking about?

I mean, we're pitching a film here and so I've been thinking about that

film a lot and you know, we've kind of had conversations at night and had

conversations in the morning, so I think that that's been in my head a lot.

You

may have caught us on that track.

Oh yeah, we say that 'cause like we have the other eight tracks, but

we haven't actually looked at it.

For Look at those and

Yeah,

for,

we've been really so focused on that.

We got the

to hold, they're holding

story.

I mean the world is like, you know, the, the, I don't know, this morning what

we were talking about is like, what's the deal with that barren Trump story?

That's a weird one.

Oh,

check it out.

I didn't know it.

Check it out people.

Okay.

It's very weird that right.

He's not Trump's son and he's that another

guy.

No, no, no.

He, he has some weird connections in any

other scheme of reality.

This would've been the biggest story.

It's just

so scary.

He called in 9 1 1.

He called in 9 1 1 in the UK from here for some woman that was being

beat up by the guy from Russia.

It's, he was on Zoom with

what?

Yeah.

This

is why we

need

investigative journalists.

Just both of us read it separately and we were like, did you

see that parent Trump thing?

Anyway, but like we're thinking about is like the world is imploding

and we're trying to, you know, tell good stories and Right.

And we're trying to not be distracted all the time by what is happening,

which is pretty hard to do.

Yeah.

And every, every part of it

and, and not only like politically, but just we have a distraction

machine 24 hours a day in our pocket that is just trying to maximize our

attention not for good versus trying so

hard not to get lost in that and realize focus on, on the being with people.

Like that's what's really nice about being here.

Yeah.

Is just seeing everybody and actually connecting with people.

Right.

You know, you get sick of it after two days, but the first two days are fun.

Yeah.

I recommend going on for an hour long walk with

I've heard.

That's great.

Yeah.

I would just say very quickly that the end has always been Nye.

I've read through, I was gonna die in a nuclear holocaust.

I was assured of it by my adults friends and you know, and somehow we always

sort of squeaked through and I think it's a really ugly time right now.

But I remembered when W was president and I thought this is the lowest.

Stage we've ever been and I'm like, I'll never say that again.

Yep.

Uh, and you know, eternal vigilance, we just have to

bring, we can build it all back.

Yep.

All they did was break everything.

Right.

We're smart.

We can figure out how to put it back together

and ugly times often produce amazing works of art.

Utterly.

Yes.

Yeah.

Utter.

That

is, that

is innovation goes crazy jar.

Bad talks.

Yes.

So there is that silver lining.

Alright.

Yeah.

All right,

well thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

Congrats on the, the short films.

We didn't really talk about that.

Oh yeah.

Can we just get the one liner on Sure.

Presenting,

yes.

It's about a community that's along the Mississippi River and New Orleans that's

being kind of reclaimed by the river and how they are, how they are handling that.

And it's quite beautiful

in a non activist way.

They're not trying to fix it.

They live among it.

They recognize it that the Mississippi has changed its banks.

It's moved around all the time and they're accepting of it.

Somebody had built in this bowl, they've lived a wonderful lives and they have

these people who are still there and they're like, when it goes, it goes.

But for now

it's very kind of evocative and philosophical.

It's really lovely.

What's the title?

Who's the song maker?

Some kind of refuge.

Alexandra Kern is the director, and Colin Karo is the producer.

Great.

Cool.

It sounds beautiful.

It sounds a little bit like Vernor Herzog's Volcano movie where he

goes to the active volcano and interviews the people who stay.

Yeah.

Werner is another one that I love.

Oh yeah.

Oh my God.

You never know what you're gonna get from him.

He's amazing.

Yeah, he's terrific.

So if he's listening, Werner work with Motto Pictures.

Oh, Chris would love

do that.

Oh, you brilliant.

You do guys so much.

This is experience.

It's kind

of thanks for everything.

We are gonna let them get going and we are gonna move on down

Main Street to our next interview.

We'll catch you guys next week.

I'm do.

This episode is sponsored in part by the Austin Film Society, the 40-year-old

film institution, founded by Richard Linkletter, Austin Film Society supports

nonfiction filmmaking year round through its monthly doc nights series at a FS

Cinema, along with its annual documentary film festival doc days held every May.

Learn more@austinfilm.org.

This episode is also sponsored by the longtime.

The Longtime is a one of a kind event space located in Austin, Texas,

hosting everything from sandlot baseball to commercial film shoots,

art exhibitions to surprise weddings.

It's the perfect home for your next creative gathering.

The long time is the home of the Texas Playboys Baseball Club, the

host of the Annual Wizard Rodeo, and available for private events year round.

Learn more@thelongtime.com.

Next time on Dock Walks, we are off Main Street and walking the icy

slopes near the Park City Library with Joy Bubbles, director Rachel J.

Morrison.

This is an exciting chance to dig into the life of an archival producer

turned first time documentary maker to slip and slide your way around

Park City, and to learn all about the secret life of Phone freak Joy Bubbles.

Next time on Doc Walks.

Doc Walks is created, produced, and edited by my friend Ben Steinhower of the Bear.

Hello, and my friend Keith Maitland of Go Valley.

Thanks for tuning in.