Buffalo is full of people helping to cultivate cinema and we want to celebrate those involved. The Cultivators is a new monthly feature in which we highlight individuals who are integral to the presentation, promotion and production of film here in the queen city.

Photo by Sarah Jane Barry.

THE CULTIVATORS #001

JORDAN M. SMITH

Director at Cultivate Cinema Circle | Film Critic at IONCINEMA, Influence Film Club, and Stranger Than Fiction | Social Media Coordinator for DOC NYC | Librarian at Buffalo and Erie County Public Library System
Twitter: @Rectangular_Eye

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

What got you interested in movies?

I grew up in Salamanca, NY, a small town in the southern tier where there was a two screen theater that I hazily remember catching mainstream blockbusters like Titanic and Liar Liar at before it closed and was converted into a section of what is now an antique mall. The only other big screen option was to drive 20 miles to the nearest multiplex. Thankfully, we lived three doors down from a Movie World rental shop. Anytime I found myself looking for something to do, I’d wander over and scan the shelves for something that looked out of the ordinary or had a cover plastered in festival leaves. I can’t tell you how many times I rented Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, Aronofsky’s Requiem For A Dream and Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke before I bought my own copies.

Growing up I was always swimming in music—playing in bands, DJing events, releasing LPs of bands I loved—so it wasn’t until grad school that I really fell hard for cinema. I found myself watching at least a single film each day, sometimes more, and found that I needed to find a way to make mental use of this sedentary activity. So I started writing down my thoughts as a way to process and deepen the experience. It’s only grown from there.

What is your favorite movie related memory?

I could list so many, but I’ll give two.

The first time I saw a film in a theater by myself is not necessarily my favorite, but certainly one of the most memorable. After I dropped my wife (then girlfriend) off at the airport for her first trip abroad, I went to see No Country For Old Men, which was not playing anywhere near where I lived at the time. The only other people in the theater were three older couples. I was devastated by the film and was completely weirded out by the whole experience. I drove the long ride home in a daze only to arrive to surrealistically find my father throwing my brother out of the house, literally standing on the roof throwing his belongings into the front lawn.

Second: Convincing my very disgruntled wife (still, then girlfriend) to spend one of our first trips to Toronto in the dark of the Toronto International Film Festival’s Lightbox to see Olivier Assayas’ six-hour terrorist epic Carlos only to have her admit that it was a great film which she highly enjoyed. A couple years later, I had the opportunity to sit down with Assayas to discuss his new film Clouds of Sils Maria, just after having interviewed his wife Mia Hansen-Løve about her own highly personal film Eden, about her DJ brother. Later that day, we all danced (my wife included) in the shut down streets of Toronto as her brother spun mid-90s French EDM (not normally my jam) in celebration of the film’s release.

How did you end up in Buffalo?

Back at the start of 2009, a good childhood friend and I packed up an overstuffed moving truck full of both of our belongings and jammed it into a beautiful little restored apartment on Chenango along with an acquaintance we’d met at college in Fredonia. I’d just been accepted into UB’s Library Science program with the intention of becoming a public librarian (which I have since) and was lucky enough to get a job working at the Lexington Co-op as well as a gig writing about film for IONCINEMA. Seven years later my wife and I are still here and have absolutely no intention of leaving any time soon!

What do you want to see more of in Buffalo?

Movies: preferably downtown; preferably on 35mm; preferably retro, world, and indie cinema. Where did all the art houses go? Where did all the changeover 35mm projectors go? Who wants to invest in bringing these back to Buffalo? Let’s make this a reality.

What are your essential film books?

I’m a slow reader, so my to-read pile is towering much, much higher than my read pile. That said, reading about movies is an essential facet of my overall cinema experience. What better way to unpack the films you love, learn about the historical context of when the films were made, and discover new films to watch and read about at the same time?