Upon the recent success of their jointly directed feature Failed State, I spoke with U.S. based filmmakers Christopher Jason Bell & Mitch Blummer about the political and material reality of their film, shaping a fiction out of documentary footage and what can be done to improve the lives of the working class in an increasingly financialized, top down society, a sentiment made even more urgent upon recent events of the past week here in the good 'ol US of A.
Enjoy our conversation exchanged via email from August - October 2024.
D: Your film FAILED STATE depicts a myriad of people co-existing at a place in time with individual labor conditions. Dale, who leads the film, appears to work for a lowly delivery service operation that sees him completing a multitude of varied tasks on foot with major physical and scheduling demands. In choosing to cover this extreme segment of the gig economy, what informed your approach in chronicling this specific form of labor? And as a non New Yorker, I must ask, does this job Dale and his co-worker Carl work actually exist?
CB: Initially I was supposed to do another feature and then Covid hit. Mitch was mostly out of work and shooting for fun, and Dale -- doing the job you see him doing in the movie -- was still delivering. I asked if each of them were down to do a project, so we shot some pure doc footage and we started writing around that. It was a way to make a movie at a time when nothing else was really possible to do, and it was also a way to look at a very specific form of work, which is one of the largest in the current American economy -- the service industry, and all that's wrapped up in it: the way people perceive it (some see it as beneath them and, in turn, condescend to those that do it), the large aspect of it that is "care" work (being pleasant with everyone all the time or, in a more draining way, being an ear for them -- a therapist of some sort, or just a friend), the toll it takes on the body, how it's one of the few remaining ways to earn a wage but it is also low paid, etc. Through this we can see a character interacting with other characters and trying to carve out a social life in the few ways they can. It offered a lot of opportunity to talk about a lot of different things.
MB: The job that Dale and Rich (among others in the film) carry out day to do certainly exist - one only needs to look as far as TaskRabbit or Craigslist to find quite wild requests for odd jobs and other forms of non conventional labor. The fact that Dale has worked his way into a “Boss’s” network of messengers is also super realistic. Of course the deliveries get more absurd as the film goes on but if you asked Dale, he’d tell you that everything in the film is absolutely real.
D: Did any of the initial non-fiction documentation make it into the final cut? There's one notable interaction Dale has with another bus commuter a third into the film, the gentleman dressed in white with the black snapback, that comes across as notably more fly on the wall and guerilla compared to everything else in the movie. And with this also comes a very seamless "performance" by Dale, whose responses and mannerisms seem anything but performed. To what extent is the Dale we see in the film fictionalized from the real person?
CB: A good amount of that "following around Dale on a real job" ended up in the final film actually. Indeed, that interaction is one of them including a few others. Otherwise they are either in interstitial "b-roll" moments or part of his labor nightmares, so on. Dale is Dale -- much of the difference comes in how he fits into a movie as a character in a dramatic story. He's very open and talkative and social, and his inclination is to always respond. Well, dramatically you can't really do that, so that's when there was much heavier blocking/direction from us. That's still a part of Dale though -- he can be quiet, moody, whatever you want to say that may look like the opposite of how he is when interacting with other people -- it's just a matter of him tapping into that and us figuring out when and where to place that type of energy.
MB: In my mind this film is just as much a documentary as it is a narrative scripted film - even the constructed and written narrative parts of the film are pulled from details from Dale’s life and people in his orbit. Of course actors and performers come in to give him something reliable and predictable to work against but again - Dale would be the first to tell you that what you see on screen is very representative of his real life. More that you might think of the footage in the film is “documentary or verite” style capture. There may be times I’d ask Dale to repeat something (much to his dismay or annoyance) but a lot of what made it in is raw reality. This is a fact I’m fairly proud of - when many think of documentary filming they think of moments like those on the train where we’re capturing a real person’s audio on Dale’s mic or the more frenetic handheld moments, but we were very intentional with some of our longer shots or locked off compositions, even in a verite mode of filming.
D: Touching on those "labor nightmares" Dale experiences during his fleeting moments of rest, your film manages to depict a very specific sensory experience I've had from time to time, one I'm sure most of us have, but one I've still to see evoked in another film like this does exactly, which are the flashes of random memory we process and reflect upon, that may or may not hold a more defined meaning for rumination. They just invade your mind. Sometimes you can piece them together. Sometimes not.
Some of these flashes include interior episodes from his laboring and others include exchanges and encounters with many different people. It's during these sequences where FAILED STATE morphs from a somewhat objective document to something more expressionistic & abstract (this of course ramps up as dramatic setups unfurl). When and where exactly in the process did these flourishes make their way into the work?
CB: Oh that's a good question. I know we had written scenes in his apartment pretty early on, and him having trouble sleeping. I also remember toying with an idea from video games where he would be at "full health" after sleeping, but we couldn't get it to work and I know Mitch was a little wary of that idea, hahaha. For good reason! Though it'd be cool to figure out a way to incorporate those kinds of ideas somehow...
Mitch, do you remember about the nightmare scenes? I know the editing at the end in the school was your idea and I think the nightmares were the same. I want to say that they really took shape in post, especially in sound design and color.
MB: Chris of course really led the edit and I gave him small feedback throughout the process as his instincts are largely right, but that’s the best thing about working with Chris. He’s able to maintain his original vision very precisely while also giving Dale a huge sandbox to express whatever he wants to, simultaneously giving me a ton of freedom with the visuals and camera work while honing me in on what he is most strongly reacting to.
I do feel that I contributed to the editing largely in the sculpting of the nightmare sequences and the quicker pace of cuts towards the end during Dale’s descent into losing himself. I felt that these parts of the film are really reflective of mine and Chris’s styles fusing. Where Chris loves sitting on the wide and holding shots and making our audience experience the reality of what he’s expressing, I like to experiment with cuts which actually can be intentionally jarring or call attention to themselves as a contrast to the rest of the film. It’s like taking the pacing of a Tarkovsky film and sprinkling in the sensory moments from a Kelly Reichardt film.
D: I've gathered from the film a potent Leftist critique of modern labor conditions and our current technocratic capitalism at large. The title, FAILED STATE, is at once both potentially declarative of the film's central thesis but also is evocative of something more abstract. The "failing state" of Dale's physical & mental capacities or in a more cynical and meaner reading, the "failed state" of how one may reach such a strained & difficult point in their life (opposite what I think the title is really getting at, which is the failure of the American economic model & safety net).
In the past couple of decades, we've seen an increasing proliferation of films with a faux progressive abstract or phony liberalism. Both in the American cinema but in other national cinemas as well. One that takes excessive pride or credit in a vague championing or attention to a number of ideals - personal identity, civil rights or class & labor. Films like Nomadland (2020) & Green Book (2018) are examples of this.
Compared to this strain of filmmaking, FAILED STATE is a tonic for how it chronicles the thorough details of hard laboring and its correlated effects on one's social life and health ramifications. Beyond your own politics that shaped the film as is, to what extent, if any at all, did you find yourselves consciously reacting to or *against* this mainstream of politically "conscious" cinema?
CB: That's a really funny note to bring up re: Nomadland because the film was coming out around the time we were shooting, and I saw it and I contacted Mitch (who had probably seen it before me -- I am very late to most things) and I was like oh no, we have to make sure we are not doing this. It did a lot of things I couldn't stand, and one is that it seemed to (in theory) shine a light on labor conditions, but at the same time seemed hugely dismissive of them. The Amazon warehouse portions were probably the most egregious and the most critiqued -- this is a job where people are peeing in bottles because they can't take breaks and taking painkillers daily for the wear and tear on their body -- but you wouldn't know that from the clean, commercial-doc way that the entire movie is shot in. The Bear (2022) is not a subtle show by any means but it is a lot more realistic to working in a kitchen than the brief stint Fern is able to get at a restaurant. Nothing about working with other people barely able to keep their head afloat, nasty managers trying to make you do more with less, the general condescension one gets for working in the food industry by both customers and owners, etc. What's funny is that I am talking about these from a labor-Left stance but also as a filmmaker -- guys, there is drama here. Comedy, conflict, etc. And none of it is touched upon, so you get a sanitized thing that is really surface level. We didn't want to do any of that and best we could we avoided it.
MB: We spoke about Nomadland A LOT - Chris, correct me if I’m wrong on any of this but I think we were both very disappointed with that film as it was so close to being one which could have meant a lot and related to many of the themes we were trying to get at in Failed State but then missed by a mile.
In Nomadland we see brief glimpses of the service work and labor that Frances McDormand’s character has to undertake to survive and maintain her bohemian “van-life” lifestyle but the film never lingers on it for more than a moment. The emphasis of that film, to me, was to romanticize the aesthetic and beautiful aspects of her journey. There is one part of the film where she is digging in a mine? We see 5 seconds of that, then it’s on to the next.
We wanted to do the opposite of that - put the emphasis of the film on Dale’s work and find opportunities for storytelling where he is carving out time and energy for a social life and a sense of self beyond his occupation in the nooks and crannies of his schedule where he can fit it.
I think it’s rare to see films that deal with the work and labor or regular people in mainstream cinema because it’s not pretty. I think in Failed State, we may stylize Dale’s struggles but we were careful not to romanticize them.
*(I'd like to note that Chris & Mitch sent their replies to my bringing up Nomadland within mere minutes of each other. Chris mentioned this to me and found it hilarious. lol)
D: Count myself in on the Nomadland pile up as well. But I wouldn't expect much genuine labor consciousness anyways from the daughter of a supposed billionaire.
Mitch, on that point of Dale having to carve out his time and energy for social participation, I want to talk about perhaps the most quietly upsetting scene to me in your film which is when Dale arrives to the airport for lunch with Carl & Melissa only to be left dry & hanging and alone without company. It's suggested earlier when the plan is being made that Dale must sacrifice precious work time in order to simply socialize, so the weight of what may otherwise be a mild inconvenience to the more economically advantaged is a devastating blow to this poor guy. I'm fortunate to have been raised with modest middle class support most of my life, but I've too experienced episodes of being destitute financially, and in those moments, you are truly locked into a raised survival mode, where every dollar that exits your hands and every little thing that accosts your financial standing feels much more like a personal attack. How exactly did a scene with this much personal implication and quite frankly, consciousness for the weight of this situation, come to be in the film?
CB: For most locations we try and figure out what locations we can get away with shooting in. Are they interesting locations? Do they have some sort of innate potent energy? Do they exude "production value"? An airport is a strange place because it is a huge place of transport and transmission, so for a messenger to be there... well, that says enough. Also there's something strange about an airport -- the point of no return through security where you are just surrounded by a completely strange, sanitized area that is full of shops with many that have nothing to do with your trip (luxury apparel stores?)
Anyway, since a large portion of the movie has to do with creating and sustaining friendships during moments of work, I think we knew the story was going to have a few bumps here and there. And I personally would take blow-offs pretty hard, but I would also find myself on the other end of things just not having the energy to go out, or hyping it up a bit. I used to work overnights on the weekends, or live states away and have various family commitments that made me feel like I couldn't go out, etc. For awhile I was making very little but having to pay back student loans and then also living with family that were not super happy that I was staying with them. So I just kind of channeled this energy into something with even more weight, just to show how all of these things can coalesce and dampen a thing of beauty (friendships continuing to blossom, etc). What could've been a very nice day ends up being something profoundly sad. And Dale's reaction to that, of just being super bummed and thinking that nobody wants to be friends with him, is absolutely something I've been through, even if his reaction (like meeting with Melissa in order to say goodbye) is over-the-top for what happened and clearly not a sentiment shared by her. But, emotions are really difficult! And illogical, not 1:1, etc.
MB: I think that almost everyone has had the experience of being "stood up" in some capacity. It's a terrible feeling but it's also a fairly common and normal occurrence.
Dale was excited at the opportunity to hang with a few friends and getting to JFK from pretty much anywhere in NYC is a serious investment of time so he's thoroughly disappointed when he discovers he was basically blown off.
This is one of the scenes that a lot of people react to in the film and I think it's because it's such a universal thing that is so within the realm of normal human experience that it affects much of the audience. Whenever I've been blown off, its not like I just pack it up and head out to wherever else I am going. I tend to linger, mosey around, kill time and consider my next move. Seeing Dale displaced in this very public place surrounded by strangers adds to the increasing feeling of alienation he is going through during this section of the film.
D: Airports are places I've grown up fixating over for their liminal, and sometimes even dreamlike, function in our world. They are of course places of transit, but arrive exorbitantly early or god forbid be delayed and they transform into a vacuous open space cocooned away from the beats of normal life. Depending on the architecture and amenities of the airport, that seclusion from the outside world can manifest in even more surreal ways. It's like a living purgatory of sorts.
In a past talk I had with the filmmaker Paige Smith, she brought up the study of Psychogeography, which explores how psychology and geography interact. Essentially how someone can process and attribute meanings to the places they inhabit and the things and other beings they encounter. Discussing this in relation to an installation piece she was working on which involved the active psychogeographical rumination of walking around by sidewalk, I want to propose this to how you both came to sculpt the reality of Dale's work routine to the more personally etched rendering in the film. One can sense a true native's view of New York City. How much of Dale's personal attachment to his environment informed the fiction you built around him and how much of your own attachments did you ultimately weave into the film as well?
CB: In the more pure doc moments contained in the film -- we were merely following Dale on whatever job he was tasked with. I think a lot of times these are places he had been to before... generally the same people / companies continue to contract the delivery he works for. He generally has the route mapped out, then, the fastest he can get to somewhere on foot and what subway or bus he needs to take, if needed. In that sense, Dale would see these streets in terms of that -- how quickly can he achieve the package delivery so he can then get another package delivery going? When he is forced to look around -- waiting for a job or on a bus where he can look out the window -- in those moments there are times of peace, wonder, and so on. Keeping with these two modes was crucial to the construction of the film.
As for me -- I haven't lived in NYC in awhile though I frequently visit -- I have great fun memories of it, but a lot of my time was spent working night shifts or overnight shifts during the weekend in order to afford rent and pay off student loan debt. I'd pass by cafes with people writing or chatting with friends, and on Friday night I would be passing by the full bars... life was happening elsewhere! Those feels of anxiety and depression certainly fed into the film.
MB: I’d mostly echo what Chris said about locations and it being a combination of the normal spots Dale would go with places we’d pick out based on logistics or a specific image we had in mind. Often, we'd go to an area or address where Dale would normally go to make a regular pickup or dropoff, but then we would explore that area deeper than his usual route. When we went to City Island I kind of forced Dale to go down to the waterfront where he usually doesn't go and it ended up being interesting and somewhere he never would have gone normally which added to the whimsy of it for him. Exploring the city or whatever area I'm in has always been a regular hobby of mine, whether on skateboard, bicycle or foot and this story spanning a lot of space and aspects of the city was certainly one of the aspects of this story which drew me to it and kept me excited to stay shooting on it over the course of two plus years. There were certainly times we would select locations close to a home base, like where I was living in Crown Heights at the time as there is always a need to be practical and strategic and efficient on a project like this.
There are times in the film when Dale's environment feels very oppressive. These massive reflective structures surely contain a cold beauty, but they are also walls obscuring the horizon. New York provides opportunity and an anonymity to Dale but there is some visual distinction between hard urban moments and the more idyllic suburban scenes sprinkled throughout the film... I personally love NYC but it can wear on you... I have the privilege of being able to get out quite often, but for many it can feel like the whole world.
D: That feeling of captivity, of being held back from partaking from the 'fun' or whatever it is other people may be doing that you aren't is dreadful. During my last period of unemployment, which stretched too long for comfort and I guess is an opposite, but nevertheless super dispiriting scenario, that strain of being unable to just enjoy life unburdened by an economic stress just ate me up. I'm from Vegas, and I've grown up and lived here most of my life. Either when you're too caught up in working or desperately looking for it, it's tragic just how much your environment changes in the midst of it all. When Dale is riding on the Ellis Island Ferry where he meets Melissa, both of you employ a rather melancholic montage of New York during sunset. It's a familiar view, canonized in the portrayal of the city over many decades of cinema, but in that moment, the heft of Dale's daily survival informs it differently. What some may perceive as romantic or a city rife with opportunity is perhaps very different for Dale.
Beyond FAILED STATE's gestures towards the gig economy and the form of capitalism our country practices, what are both of your thoughts on where capital and labor stand now and ideally what you think are some core policies or systemic shifts that should be implemented or changed in our system so that the types of pitfalls and traps like we see in the film are remedied or dissolved altogether?
MB: As for policy - I wouldn't be one to presume to give advice to society. But I think we just wanted to have a conversation about the state of the labor in these days. The pandemic really caused a lot of people to question the nature and process and system which is in place which propels the state of work. I am a local 600 member and this international health event sparked a lot of questions as to where our healthcare should come from as well as general labor conditions, hours and norms on the sets of movies and TV shows. People were sharing many stories and the conversation was gaining steam going into a negotiation period for the union's contract. Ultimately the change was marginal and while I understand that gains are made over time and we can't expect a total reversion of labor norms, I think many people were disappointed in the outcome of the negotiations after the advent of covid.
I personally think that in a world and country as advanced and prosperous as ours that everyone should have access to professional healthcare and that it should be a right which benefits all of society. The employer as a provider of benefits model is clearly less and less applicable to many as time goes on and because of advancements in communication capabilities, many are electing (or being forced) to work for themselves (with an algorithmic overlord) on the gig economy. I don't see this mode of work evil in itself, and I don't necessarily think it should be on employers to provide healthcare to all employees as that allows for people still to slip through the cracks. If we can achieve healthcare for all on a sociopolitial level as a human right I think it would be better for everyone. I also think that workers like Dale should be paid way more. Again, I couldn't articulate policy to achieve this, but whether it's raising the minimum wage significantly or a profit sharing system, we need to invest in the everyday person providing any kind of service.
CB: Yeah in terms of a solution… not to be too evasive, but it’s something that needs to be decided democratically instead of the top down system we have now. The composition and placement of a union in regards to capital make sense... neighborhood councils (then town, county, state, etc) would be a good way to start steering things in the right direction as well. De-commodify things that are necessary for living (food, housing, and yes probably healthcare). This would require people getting together, dreaming together, seeing what they can do together with what they have, and then doing it. At the very least it would be nice for our country to be working towards something. At best we are not, and at worst, we are and there are no words to describe how grotesque it is.
D: With this blog being a forum for cinephilia, and really of all arts, it’s a must for me to ask about your own experience with films, albums, & other artistic projects - new and old - that mean something to you. What are some works you consider your all-time faves and what have you been enjoying recently?
MB: I have a soft spot for weird mid 90s indies. Everything from Buffalo 66 (1998) to Gummo (1997).
For Failed State I was drawing largely on the work of Sean Baker and Kelly Reichardt.
Baker is an obvious reference, his use of non actors and documentary/narrative hybrid approach. I feel that he starts with character and branches out from there, pulling details for the story out of the performers life which we were certainly doing.
Reichardt is my favorite current working director. I have a tendency to cut like a maniac and keep everything moving really fast, but for a Christopher Bell film I knew I wanted to slow things down and give him shots to hold on. Reichardt isn’t afraid to embrace a long quiet moment and her films exist in the emotional realm firstly.
I’m also a big fan recently of (Ryusuke) Hamaguchi and Todd Haynes… on the more commercial end I love (Denis) Villeneuve’s films.
Chris and I also draw a lot of inspiration from anime and there is at least one direct reference to Dragon Ball in Failed State. Maybe he can speak more about that or just leave it mysterious.
CB: Some of my all time favorites are really formative. Generally Andrei Tarkovsky stuff, like Mirror (1975), Chantal Akerman, like Rendezvous of Anna (1978), Nagisa Oshima - Sing a Song Of Sex (1967), Three Resurrected Drunkards (1968)... The Up Series... Little Fugitive (1953), Symbiopsychotaxiplasm (1968). Stuff that uses doc elements in interesting ways like Iranian new-wave stuff, Allan King. Peter Watkins stuff especially La Commune (2000). Kelly Reichardt, Bill Douglas' stuff. Donnie Darko (2001) was huge for me in high school and I just rewatched it earlier this year and it held up better than I ever thought it could. Horror favorites are The Exorcist (1973) & The Exorcist 3 (1990), Anguish (1987), Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Kiyoshi Kurosawa's run with Pulse (2001), Cure (1997), and so on. Weirdo maximalist studio movies that are "bad" like Toys (1992). We may go on forever, I'm not sure -- I am always watching very random things and barely keeping up with new stuff, but I'd say in general at the moment aside from random discoveries, I tend to be most excited by any form of documentary work, and with that I include neo-realist kinda stuff, meta stuff, etc. Anything that even alludes to life outside the film or a blending between the fiction and non-fiction kind of thing. And then on the other side, rigorous formal maximalism can be really fun, especially because it's not something you see much anymore to any degree -- much modern "content" has very little concern or interest in the image itself, it seems to be a vehicle for telling a story through acting. I feel like there's more to cinema and television than that and a lot of stuff I watch seems to be in disagreement with me.
As far as streaming content I'm having a lot of fun diving into Japanese comedy -- shows like Gaki no Tsukai. My wife and I just watched Fantasmas (2024) by Julio Torres and it was fantastic and he's really amazing. There's so much in that show that looked better than anything I have seen in a long time.
I do like anime and grew up really only having access to Dragon Ball so I have a big heart for it and am pleased to be watching a new Dragon Ball series and all the frustrations that will inevitably come with that. Shonen in general is very satisfying so I stick with that and try to do artier stuff in general, for lack of better words. Serial Experiments Lain (1998) was something I knew about forever and only watched in the last few years and I'll never forget it. Getting back into rock music while still dabbling in hip hop/rap (Ghais Guevera, Denzel Curry mostly). For rock it's mostly new shoegaze (blue smiley, julie, tanukichan) though many of those bands tend to blend genres which I find really exciting.
*FAILED STATE is currently touring film festivals and will next be showing at the Ocean City Film Festival in Maryland in March 2025.
