Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival 2022 Interviews – ROOTS OF FIRE & FINDING HER BEAT
Roots of Fire & Finding Her Beat interviews at Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival 2022
Beyond the usual reveal of the facts we uncover and discuss, like the reality that these documentary filmmakers had to whittle down 40 terabytes of footage into an hour and a half film that included everything they needed to tell the stories they set out to put up on the big screen, these first two interviews out of the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival have a central theme.
That theme is one of “family” that runs through both of them.
Dawn Mikkelson and Keri Pickett’s Finding Her Beat, and Abby Berendt Lavoi and Jeremey Lavoi’s Roots of Fire have the obvious familial ties front and center:
Finding Her Beat has Jennifer Weir and Megan Chao Smith (and heir daughter Josie) as the beating heart in its dynamic look at the women who have essentially unapologetically staked out their place in the world of Taiko drumming, and the husband and wife filmmaking team of Jeremey and Abby Berendt Lavoi successfully embedded themselves in the very tight kit “family” that makes up the insular Louisiana community that revolves around and feeds off their French music and culture.
for that reason, both films transcend the basic facts and reveals and fly on the wall aspects that are often a part of great documentaries, and dig deeper into us as we view them, inspiring us, touching us personally, and delivering us into a world we just may want to seek out and experience in person after we walk out of the theater.
FINDING HER BEAT
Keri Pickett (Co-DIR/DP/ED), Dawn Mikkelson (Co-DIR/PROD), Jennifer Weir (PROD/Participant), Megan Chao Smith (ASSOC PROD/Participant)
What’s the film about?
For thousands of years women have been locked out of Taiko drumming. Not anymore.
In the dead of a Minnesota winter, Asian drumming divas smash gender roles and redefine power on their own terms. Finding Her Beat dives into the rhythms and struggles that lead to an electrifying historic performance that changes everything.
What do we talk about?
Finding Her Beat is both an informational doc, a relationship study, and a galvanizing performance doc, but we discuss the fact that it also, surprisingly to me somewhat, is a “Call to Action” documentary. The filmmakers and participants discuss the myriad of obstacles that were faced and overcome to both produce the Taiko drumming super concert that was documented as well as the filmmaking challenges themselves.
Jennifer and Megan, who are both in the film, talk about the comfort level of opening your life up to the cameras’ scrutiny and then the comfort level of seeing the results of that on the big screen. All four women talk about the galvanizing force this film via its appearances on the regional film festival circuit has already become and how that developed to this point.
A key point made is how valuable they have found that support structure to be giving each member others to lean on through this journey.
ROOTS OF FIRE
Abby Berendt Lavoi (Co-DIR), Jeremey Lavoi (Co-DIR)
What’s the film about?
Roots of Fire explores the world of Louisiana French music and introduces us to the people and culture behind it. Amidst shuttered rural dance clubs and encroaching globalization, five award-winning musicians push against stereotypes of the American South and move the music of their ancestors forward. But their fans are getting older and the language is fading away. Will their efforts be enough to save a dying community?
What do we talk about?
Abby and Jeremey talk about how a central driving theme throughout the film revealed itself to them over the course of acquiring the footage and conducting the interviews for it. They both discuss the specific challenges of embedding themselves within this community (Note: if a certain group tells you everyone must wear a costume to get in, then you’re wearing a costume regardless of the fact you’re also carrying a camera) and gaining acceptance so the participants would let their guard down enough to tell their stories. Frequently, I ask about that moment where the film reveals itself to the filmmakers, sometimes surprising them – in this case, they talk about a key participant in the film who they hadn’t planned on being such a huge part, but changed everything for them during something that happened on what they thought would be their last day of filming.
Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival 2022 Interviews – ROOTS OF FIRE & FINDING HER BEAT