And the Rest is History…

My first semester in film school, I filmed us committing crimes on school property.

In all seriousness, I wasn’t very aware at the time. It was Filmmaking 101, and we had three projects that semester: film one interview, film one narrative, and film on documentary. I wasn’t thrilled about the interview or the narrative, as we were required to film in class and were limited as far as set, actors, and scheduling was concerned. However, the documentary project gave us more freedom, and we were not given any kind of limitation on subject matter.

So I contacted the Midnight Knitters, and documented us tagging the streets with knitting.

Which is technically crime.

According to California law, vandalism is considered anything that “destroys, damages, or defaces with graffiti or other inscribed material” on someone else’s property. It’s considered a misdemeanor if the damages is under $400; a felony if it’s above. I’m sure we could argue that knitting doesn’t count as “graffiti or inscribed materials,” but I’m also sure it could be argued that it does. I’m also sure that committing such an act on federal property, like a public school, could be considered an even greater offence.

Luckily for us, no one felt the need pursue the matter. However, I was informed that the unlawful nature of the film was one of the reasons the school chose not to feature it on the school’s homepage, as it did with every other Filmmaking 101 documentary.

Almost 10 years later, I would be involved in The Muralists’ Beautiful Pain, another documentary about street artists, and I couldn’t help feeling like I got ripped off during the making of my first documentary. They missed an opportunity to introduce us to the real world social impact of filmmaking, and responsibility we have as storytellers. I also feel like they just turned us loose and gave us no warning of what we were actually doing. We had to write Pre-Production plans, and present our ideas to the class. We were never told what the potential legal backlash could be. I wonder how many students have done exactly what we did, and are facing prison sentences. All it would take is one self-righteous stickler for the rules or racist teacher who was willing to go out of their way.

And many people might say that, as college students, we’re officially adults and therefore shouldn’t need teachers holding our hands. But every single teacher presently working the US right now knows that never once in the history of our education are we taught the intricacies of how our laws work. When we talk about educating kids on the reality of our country it’s always “Just let the kids be kids,” but the minute they become adults it’s “They should have just known better.” The kids can’t really be kids if no one is willing (or able) to be real adults.

Anyway, that’s my rant. Here’s my documentary, which I’m still really proud of. And if you ever see kids tagging in the street, ask yourself if it’s worth spending $130,000 in taxpayers’ money to throw them in prison, or if you’d rather just pay the $400 to clean up the graffiti.