206 Moving Images: Making Movies, Understanding Media

David Riker

Close-Up

Q

In what ways did you first become involved in making movies?

A

I began taking photographs as a young teenager and remember building

my fi rst darkroom in the boiler room of our house, and standing there,

sweating, as I tried to teach myself how to wind my negative fi lm into a

Patterson developing tank. By my senior year at university I had assembled

a large portfolio of images and was dreaming of one day joining the

Magnum Photo Agency, home to so many of the great documentary

photographers. But then I had a strange epiphany. Looking through

my portfolio one day I realized that I didn’t know the names of most

of the people I had photographed. I realized I knew next to nothing

about the subjects of my photos. Th e photographs had visual integrity,

and some of the images were quite strong, but I couldn’t help feeling

that they were lacking in some fundamental way. I wanted the people

in my photos to speak, and I felt that I had somehow rendered them

mute. In what was one of the most painful experiences of my life, I put

my camera down and stopped taking photographs. Th en, aft er some

delay, I realized that if I wanted the subjects to speak I would have to

begin making fi lms.

Th e fi rst footage I ever shot was on a hand-cranked 16mm Bolex; the

longest shot limited to about twenty-fi ve seconds. But I was still using

the camera as I had my still cameras – I fi lmed footage of Puerto Rican

children breakdancing, of women trying to shut down the Wall Street

Stock Exchange, demonstrators protesting the U.S. war in El Salvador.

But I still didn’t know the names of the people I was fi lming, and the

Bolex was silent.

A few years later, Sony introduced the Hi-8mm Handycam and I rushed

to make a documentary – for the fi rst time with sound. Over the next

few years I made a number of documentary videos, teaching myself

along the way, but realized that I needed to deepen my understanding

of fi lm. I knew that great fi lms were capable of stirring the deepest

feelings, but I didn’t know what the secret was to their power. I was

twenty-seven when I enrolled in graduate fi lm school.

Behind the Scenes with Director

David Riker, at right,

directing on the set of

La Ciudad. Riker also

co-scripted the award-

winning screenplay of

Sleep Dealer and is the

director of The Girl.

(Courtesy of David Riker)

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