1. What motivated you to make this film? Honestly? Boredom. I’m firmly convinced that boredom is humanity’s greatest mother of invention. History makes it abundantly clear just how much civilization has been advanced by people with too much time on their hands.

2. From the idea to the finished product, how long did it take? I don’t particularly believe in the concept of “completion.” Every work is only truly finished the moment its creator dies. Which means this one remains, technically, unfinished.

3. How would you describe your film in two words? “Misdelivered. Welcome.” I believe a film functions at its most beautiful when it arrives in the hands of someone it was never intended to reach.

4. What was the biggest obstacle you faced in completing this film? Myself. Nothing more, nothing less. External obstacles can be overcome or circumvented. But the obstacle called “oneself” is always there, without exception.

5. What is your favorite stage of the filmmaking process? Pre-production. That blissful window before anything has gone wrong yet. When I say a film is most interesting before it’s shot — I’m half joking. But only half.

6. When did you realize you wanted to make films? When I first saw Tarkovsky’s The Mirror, I thought: “This isn’t a film. It’s something merely pretending to be one.” And I wanted to make that something for myself. The exact age escapes me now.

7. What film have you seen the most times in your life? I’m almost embarrassed to admit it — Billy Wilder’s The Apartment. A perfect comedy is harder to pull off than a perfect tragedy. This film keeps proving that, every single time.

8. Who would you like to collaborate with? Federico Fellini. The fact that he’s dead presents a certain logistical problem, but given that the question specifies “a perfect world,” I’ll allow it. Collaboration with the living, after all, is an unending series of compromises.

9. How has your experience been with FilmFreeway? It’s convenient. And complaining about something convenient is, itself, a kind of luxury. That said, when things become too seamless, I can’t help feeling that something of the tension — the ritual gravity of submitting a film — quietly slips away. That is, I admit, entirely my own sentimentality.

10. What is your favorite meal? Eel. Expensive, endangered, and guilt-inducing with every bite. And yet I keep eating it. I can think of no food that more eloquently represents the fundamental folly of being human.

11. What is next for you? A new film? I’m not particularly fond of the concept of “next.” Whatever I’m making now is always the next thing — and simultaneously, the present one. I have no intention of setting down the camera anytime soon. That much, at least, is certain.