“My Old Friend”
Cinema has always been a medium of self-expression that always interested me. It's been a love of mine for so many years that it's difficult to remember the beginnings of this hobby of mine. Thinking back, I still remember standing in the hall of my middle school, where it all began. I still remember being that little 13 year-old middle school kid staring out the wide window, waiting for summer. My brother’s friend, Hunter, came down from the high school across the street. Summer wasn’t over for him either, but he had the time. He must have saw me staring out into nothing, because his next thoughts lead him to say hello to me. It did. He had been attending the school High Tech High Media Arts, so naturally I asked him how the ‘movies’ was going. He said it was going well, to my surprise, I had no idea. Two hours later I was at my house, quickly jotting down ideas for films, somehow he had inspired me to get into filmmaking, without me knowing.
I’ve never considered anyone my ‘idol’ before; I never have really seen the point. But when I stopped looking for one, my greatest idol appeared before my mind. It wasn’t Barack Obama, it wasn’t John Lennon, and it wasn’t Al Gore. No, it was that kid who talked to me in middle school, and he wasn’t a celebrity. He is a personal inspiration; it was that high school kid, that friend of my brothers, that friend of mine, Hunter Moskowitz.
Almost everything about Hunter was, and is, a constant source of inspiration to me. Everything, even down to the way he dealt with people; it was all his own way. And I’m not even talking about his filmmaking skills, which were at a level that an 18-year old high school student usually doesn’t attain, but it was his opinion of things, his way of expressing himself in all mediums of art. His films, even his filmmaking style, still remain constant sources of inspiration to my life and my choices. He would randomly call me up about something he had thought up of, something of which myself or anyone else would never come up with. But even past the ideas, past the amazingly odd stories and scripts, he was even good at executing them in the line of production. He would make short films, which housed such ideas so funny, so sad, or sad happy, things so out there that they would make you think, no matter what they were, and no matter who you are. Even his finished films are so out there they let you to crawl into his mind for a second; they make you to see what he was thinking. The amazing thing about him was that he was able to do all of this without loosing any artistic qualities by making his films into artsy pieces of trash. And in many respects, he was immortalized inside his own films.
You may be asking yourself why this is important, why you care, why you are reading this. I can't exactly tell you why, but I can tell you what I consider important. And what I consider important in all this is how important all this is, to me at least.. My only true American Icon or American Idol or American influence, was a personal inspiration, it was that high school kid, that friend of my brothers, that friend of mine, Hunter Moskowitz. Even though Hunter passed away last June, to me, he’ll always be that high school kid who changed my life.
Sources Cited:
David Krause, Chris Moskowitz “Interview With His Mom”
(September 11, 2009)
Hunter Moskowitz, “All Alone” (2008)
Hunter Moskowitz, David Krause. Personal Emails,
(April 2006-Febuary 2009)
Hunter Moskowitz “The End of The World” Film Script.
(Unknown Date of Completion)
A lovely tribute to Hunter, David.
ReplyDeleteThat was powerful writing. I think you did a good job weaving in personal feelings with emotions.
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