How the futurist FM-2030 inspired my path into film-making. And why his vision still matters.
I met FM-2030 as a ten-year-old misfit. Growing up as a Jewish kid in London, I felt like an outsider in at least two ways. First and most obvious, I was one of the few Jewish boys in my social circle, and at least some of my peers were keen to remind me of that fact of life in unkind ways. Second, I possessed a wild and undisciplined nature, and the London class system and norms felt incredibly stifling to me. I spent those years searching for alternatives, for other visions of the world. Many of the alternatives I would find were temporary and inevitably lead me into trouble; but two of them have stuck with me over a lifetime. The first was cinema, and the second was the vision of FM-2030. Cinema came first, but only barely:
I love cinema; everything about it. A well-made film can transport you into worlds that can be both meaningful and fantastical, and occasionally both.
I had recently seen the 1930 film “All Quiet on the Western Front.” This incredible masterpiece of filmmaking made me re-evaluate my own prejudices. As a Jewish young boy living in London with a father who lost his house and nearly his mother during the blitz, it was fair to say that I wasn’t fond of Germans. The director Lewis Milestone not only brings you into the world of the young German…
