A film about oil
Location:
In bed at home in Camden, North London
Mood:
Quietly confident
Soundtrack:
Cat snoring gently on my knees
Ailments:
Mildly hungover
Date:
26 June 2002
Current crisis:
Next five years mapping themselves out alarmingly
Current silver lining:
Takes mind off recently departed boyfriend Was snowboarding through perfect powder yesterday afternoon, so didn't want to wake up and answer the phone. But it did insist on ringing and ringing on the landline and then the mobile and then the landline, till I suddenly panicked that my dad was dead and leapt to it. It was my filmmaking friend Alex Cooke, wondering why I was asleep at 7.45pm when we were meeting in Kings Cross at 7.30pm to go to a documentary seminar. She was remarkably understanding and suggested we forget it, but - thankfully, thankfully - I felt bad and cycled down there quick.
The talk was boring so we sat outside in the foyer with alcohol. She said she wanted to make a film about oil. Some time passed. I got up to go to the toilet. As I walked out of the room, mildly intoxicated, the word 'Traffic' popped into my head. I didn't know why.
Walking back in, three minutes later, I realised that we should make a documentary about oil, pinching the ingenious structure of Stephen Soderberg's movie Traffic. Five human stories weaving themselves around all sides of a complicated issue. I told Alex. She agreed it was genius and we should have more beers.
It's now the next morning and I still think it's genius. But a little overambitious.
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