Producer Spotlight
Katherine Makinney
(Postmodern Parables and Damah)

This month WorshipHouse Media interviews one of our Independent Producers, Katherine Makinney.
Katherine is single and lives with her two cats Sabine and Lewis.  Katherine lives in Culver City and is involved with Mosaic Church.  Katherine is the President of Postmodern Parables and Executive Director of the Damah Film Festival. (Check out the Damah videos here) A fun fact about Katherine:  She loves speaking in foreign accents.

WHM: Today I’m talking with Katherine Makinney. Katherine, please tell us about your background and how you got into video.

Katherine: Well I felt called to the film industry several years ago but didn’t want to do the starving artist thing in my twenties, so I did what any self respecting Stanford grad would do and went back to Silicon Valley.  I worked for a start up, made a little money and headed back to L.A.  I attended the UCLA Screenwriting program, wrote a bunch of scripts and then realized I didn’t want to write for Hollywood. So, I wrote and directed three shorts, all of which did the festival circuit and won several awards. I think it’s easier with spiritually themed work to make it as a writer/director rather than just a writer.

WHM: I know you’ve been highly involved with the Damah Film Festival, both as a filmmaker and now as the Executive Director. Give us a little overview of the whole the festival.

Katherine:  Sure, Damah is a “spiritual” film festival.  The problem with Christian films and hence, film festivals, have been that they tend to preach to the choir.  Damah opens it up a little and allows different expressions of spirituality in the hopes that discussions about faith can occur in the context of art. 

WHM: How does someone get involved? Who can participate and how would someone submit a film?

Katherine:  We have our “Call For Entries” in the fall.  Anyone can participate.  Just check our website; www.damah.com next October and submit.  Or, better yet, come and check it out here in Los Angeles in May (May 19-21).

WHM: I’ll be there and am looking forward to it! Tell us about your role with the Damah Film Festival and how that came about.

Katherine:  I won “Best of Show” a few years ago.  We discovered our visions of reaching the world were similar and they asked me to be on the board.  I was too involved with making movies and touring film festivals at the time, but last year I was writing the feature I hope to direct and was home more so I came on board.  They had just moved to Los Angeles and made some decisions I didn’t agree with as a filmmaker, so the challenge was there.  I said I’d take it on for a year to find a permanent location, develop a sustainable business model, and integrate in the best practices I’d observed at other festivals.  The hope is that in so doing, move it from being cool to great .J

WHM: Around the office, many of us have a favorite Damah film; that being “The Limited”, which you did. Well done! As an artist and filmmaker, what inspired you? Where do you get the idea?

Katherine:   The genesis of “The Limited” was a Carl Sandburg poem called “The Limited Express” and essentially it was about how we’re all on a gray train to nowhere.  One man asks another where he’s going and he replies, “Omaha”.  We are all going into the Nothing of Nothingness…Omaha (no offense to Nebraskans out there).  That struck me as sad and empty and yet the worldview of most secularists, so it started me thinking.  I thought a train was a great metaphor for life and if our life flashes before us as we die, might it be like a train ride in which we learn something?  The protagonist believes he had lived a “good” life, he doesn’t need forgiveness.  He has an epiphany at the end which I won’t ruin for those who haven’t seen it.  The interesting thing about the film is that I thought some about who was the least of these in our society.  Because Jesus tells us in Matthew 25 that somehow he has a presence in the least of these.  So I decided women (Paul seemed to agree) were weaker in our society than men, certainly the poor are lesser than the rich, and that those that are fat are probably universally discriminated against.  So for the least of these I chose a poor, fat woman.  Well then some people interpret that as saying God is a woman!!  I realized that is the nature of parables, they are not literal and therefore can confuse and confound some.

WHM: Who do you respect as an artist or filmmaker?

Katherine:   Gosh, so many.  I love Krystof Kieslowski for his creativity in interpreting the relevancy of the Ten Commandments in the modern world (The Decaloque).  I loved Steven Soderburgh for how he made a low budget and very simple film, (Sex Lies and Videotape) say something very complex and profound.  I love Peter Weir for his use of symbolism in nature for the divine in almost every film he’s made including “Witness” and “Dead Poets Society.”.  I appreciate Stanley Kubrick for using every filmmaking tool available but dialogue to make very compelling and prophetic statements in all of his films. 

WHM: I mentioned that you are one of our producers. What films have you done?

Katherine:  I have a volume called "Trilogy of Parables" which features “The Limited” about Matthew 25, “Destiny” about the lie of abortion, and “Lost” about the nature of faith.  I found that youth pastors appreciated my films because they were short and could be discussed endlessly, bringing up topics germane to teens today.  That’s what prompted me to cull together a few other great films and put them together on a website: postmodernparables.com.

WHM: Anything coming up in the future?

Katherine:   I am writing a second feature script which is more saleable (darn those commercial concerns).  My first was a drama about a young pastor who learns about the meaning of suffering and being broken through the church gardener.  Obviously, it’s a drama.  They are hard to sell and raise money for so I’m expanding a short script that I’d written.  It’s about what happens when a suicide bomber hits eternity.  It’s more sci-fi/horror which as Scott Derrickson has illustrated, sells!  I know you’re dying to know—suffice it to say he doesn’t meet a fat woman on a train