Filmmaker Q+A: Richard Millen

For his film Fragments 83 (right), Richard Millen (left) received the \aut\ FILM Award for Best LGBTQ Film at the 56th Ann Arbor Film Festival.

How did you come to know that film would be an important medium for you?

It was a visceral reaction from having spent hours at the movies as a small child with my grandmother.

Once you knew that, what did you do?

Although I took a screenwriting class and several Super 8 / 16 mm workshops, the real training was both years as an activist and as an actor in New York on stage and film.

Why film?

It feels like film is the only way I am able to tell the story.

Early influences?

Truffaut, Godard, Kazan, Mazursky, Minnelli, Cassavetes, Ophüls

Current sources of inspiration?

Chantal Akerman, Marguerite Duras, Chris Marker

What are you working on?

A new film script and ways to get Fragments 83 seen

What’s on your mind (and in your heart) these days?

A way through film to be able to look both back and ahead to understand where we are at and where to go and how to get there