[2023-02-03] Francis Ford Coppola on art
Today, I came across a post I had written in 2011 about a fascinating interview Francis Ford Coppola gave that year. Coppola is probably best known as the Academy Award-winning director of the Godfather trilogy. Despite the fact that I wasn't a huge movie buff in 2011 and haven't become one since, I loved and still l love the article, finding in it many inspirational messages applicable to anyone who is trying to bring art to the world.
In fact, I believe we are all artists, especially when we define art—as Seth Godin does—as "the intentional act of using your humanity to create a change in another person."
Among the ideas in the interview I appreciated was Coppola’s advice to capture the theme of a movie in one or two words:
When you make a movie, always try to discover what the theme of the movie is in one or two words. Every time I made a film, I always knew what I thought the theme was, the core, in one word. In "The Godfather," it was succession. In "The Conversation," it was privacy. In "Apocalypse," it was morality.
For my part, I used to say that the theme of my first blog, Café Jen, was success at work. I now say that the theme of Jenesis is success in life.
Here are my favourite quotes from the interview with Coppola.
On always learning
I just finished a film a few days ago, and I came home and said I learned so much today. So if I can come home from working on a little film after doing it for 45 years and say, "I learned so much today," that shows something about the cinema.
On making something beautiful
An essential element of any art is risk. If you don’t take a risk then how are you going to make something really beautiful, that hasn’t been seen before?
On taking chances
You try to go to a producer today and say you want to make a film that hasn’t been made before; they will throw you out because they want the same film that works, that makes money.... They don’t want you to take chances.
On taking risks
I always had a good philosophy about risks. The only risk is to waste your life, so that when you die, you say, "Oh, I wish I had done this." I did everything I wanted to do, and I continue to.
On the most useful advice for a student
The first thing you do when you take a piece of paper is always put the date on it, the month, the day, and where it is. Because every idea that you put on paper is useful to you. By putting the date on it as a habit, when you look for what you wrote down in your notes, you will be desperate to know that it happened in April in 1972 and it was in Paris and already it begins to be useful. One of the most important tools that a filmmaker has are his/her notes.
On the best advice for artists
Always make your work be personal. And, you never have to lie.
On the biggest barrier to being an artist
Self-confidence always. The artist always battles his own/her own feeling of inadequacy.... We are very insecure. People are insecure, not just young people. Everyone is insecure.
While Coppola’s context is filmmaking, his advice—such as not thinking you’re always right—is applicable to all of us: "You can make the decision that you feel is best, but listen to everyone, because cinema is collaboration. I always like to say that collaboration is the sex of art because you take from everyone you’re working with."
The creation of art is an act of learning. It is impossible for an artist to make art without being changed in some way. They might realize something about themselves, learn a better technique for producing their art, or become more confident in themselves and the products of their effort.
One way to counter a lack of confidence and to create art that is beautiful, new and even risky is to produce something that pleases oneself first. In the introduction of her article, Ariston Anderson notes that one of Coppola's three rules of filmmaking is to self-finance his projects, a reality made possible by the success of his wine business.
I also love Coppola's advice to note the date and location of every idea. As I get older and spend more time thinking about how to organize my ideas for posterity, details like places and times take on more significance.
There's more to the interview than I’ve shared here, so I encourage you to read the whole piece, including the inside story of how Coppola first brought together the actors for The Godfather.
