I created this short a few days after we watched Leviathan in class. I was inspired by our week of studying the Anthropological mode, because it made me wonder how one could be an anthropologist without the obvious set of tools, setting or subject matter (i.e. without being in Africa or any other continent that has interesting and rich culture to be studied).
Then I began to think about how, growing up, I would always watch my mom cook in her kitchen. The effortless care of her fingertips when chopping onion, the out of place gracefulness of her fists tenderizing meat, or the fluid switching of her wrist as she whisked eggs and turned them into warm, crumbling pie crust somehow. It had always fascinated me, made me envious, made me long to be older and as knowledgeable as her, and today I still feel all of those things. I knew I wanted to translate my admiration of her cooking into a film; to catch all those movements and all that talent I had always seen and still do.
Before I began the project, there were a few things I knew I did and did not want:
I didn’t want it to seem like a cooking show so when I told Mom my idea and she asked, “Do you want me talking in it?” I said, “No, I want you to cook as if I’m not filming it.” She gave me a look and nod that I had seen often throughout my life – the “You’re wearing that?” look, the “I don’t know why you want this, but I’ll buy it for you, I guess” look – and it only served as mild comedy, knowing that even if we didn’t understand each other, we still respected each other.
I did want the audience to experience watching my mother cook as I always had: close up, with the droning of laundry running in the background, with an idle TV talking to an empty couch, with the crisp, metallic chops of her reflective knife. I used three different camera phones to capture different angles; one of which I placed on one of my dad’s music stands, on the island counter top, facing down (an aerial view). The other two I managed to prop up with random objects: a roll of duct tape, a napkin holder, some books, a stapler. Everything stood on its own, and I merely hit play and let 37 minutes of her cooking happen without any stopping. I made this decision because it was my hope that the film, despite its subject matter, would be anthropological. I wanted everything untouched; I wanted to explore, silently and unobtrusively the Mother, the Wife in her kitchen, providing a delicious meal for the ones she loves. (Feminist Footnote: I am not saying that mothers and wives are the sole cookers of their families or that they all enjoy it or that they belong in a kitchen; it just so happens, that MY mother, as an individual woman, loves cooking and being in the kitchen).
A few moments within the short that reflect elemental filmmaking we have discussed during the course of this semester can be found throughout.
The film without context is indicative of the observatory mode, since it remains a mildly edited piece that can stand on its own, with the main objective being for a viewer to simply watch. However, my decision to focus specifically on my mothers hands and process of her working suggests something more anthropological; reminds me of watching the N!ai documentary when John Marshall and crew filmed the tribes making, working, cooking different things. It is like watching the formation of culture happen in real time.
Since this is my mother and due to the fact that the title of the short “Mom in the Kitchen” introduced the audience to that fact immediately, this short has a slightly reflexive or autobiographical mode (any story about my mom is also a story about me). However, since reflexive mode is typically more postmodern and includes the discussion of filmmaking, the relationship of the filmmaker with the viewer – my short has little of that. The relationship I have within the film is not so much with my audience but with my subject, my mother. At one point in the short, my hand reaches out and grabs a tuft of shredded cheese; reminding the audience that I am there, perhaps as a filmmaker or perhaps, simply as another observer just like them (truthfully I was both). My hand reminds the audience that someone is responsible for sharing the images they are seeing, if it weren’t for the someone of that hand, they wouldn’t be able to watch my mother in her kitchen, and that’s reflexivity; making the audience think, reminding them of the process it took to film moments in life, even if it is just a lazy morning, watching the process of breakfast before enjoying tasting it.
You can view the short here: