"Finished"

Every time I finish a film, it never feels quite real.  One becomes so accustomed to never quite being there, to always finding something to revise, that it's nearly inconceivable that this last adjustment might actually be the last time you alter the film.  But with "Backroads," I can honestly say that I felt the genuine excitement of feeling that the end was near.  I had gone back and made adjustments so many times, but I finally began to reach a point that I felt satisfied with the product and that there was nothing left to change.  Sure, I had disected every second and found places to shift, remove, or raise the volume of individual piano notes and rustles in the wind, but I began to find fewer and fewer such tweaks that needed to be made.  Perhaps it's the shorter running time that allowed me to feel comfortable with the entire film, but it was nevertheless very satisfying to reach a point where I felt comfortable calling the film complete.  Indeed, I never found such a point with "Swerve," and most of my other projects in the past ended due ot exhaustion or a deadline.  "Backroads" was a joy to direct.  I learned a lot about myself as a director, about telling a story, about adapting someone else's material, and about collaboration throughout the process.  I'm particularly proud of the incorporation of sound design and the surreal aspects of the film, and on how Mark and I were able to adapt the vision of the film in order to create the best piece possible out of the material we had.  Such a strange feeling: to be done.  But of course... getting the film seen can be the most difficult task of all.