Yorgos Lanthimos is questioning what comes next: “I need to find again the joy in making films”
Yorgos Lanthimos announced his break from filmmaking seven months ago; now, he’s not so sure he will ever return to the medium
The 52-year-old filmmaker recently wrapped up a generational run of movies, releasing three films, Poor Things, Kinds of Kindness and Bugonia, in as many years.
Last October, the director revealed that he had stepped away from the director’s seat, as he was churning out content at an unsustainable pace.
At the time, he admitted, “Well, I can’t keep doing that anymore. That’s what I’m certain of right now. It’s a big mistake. I think I need a break. I’ve said that before in between the other three, but I’m serious now.”
Now, Lanthimos has promoted a new photography exhibition with the Financial Times, where he gushed about the “freeing” nature of the new medium.
Compared to the stress of movie-making, he mused, photography means, “You can just walk around with a camera, it is a solitary thing, and kind of meditative in a way. You don’t have to have a concept, you don’t have to have an end goal. You don’t have to find financing.”
These are the words of a man charred by the content machine. When asked by the interviewer whether he will make another film, Lanthimos seemed agreeable at first: “Yes, I think I will make more films.”
However, The Lobster mastermind then added, “But at this point I am saying, ‘I don’t know, we will see.’ I need to find again the joy in making films. I want to let it come naturally, instead of pushing myself.”
Despite these comments, it has been reported elsewhere that Lanthimos is rumoured to have two more projects up his sleeve: one is an adaptation of Ottessa Moshfegh’s provocative novel My Year of Rest and Relaxation, and the other an adaptation of Jean-Patrick Manchette’s short novel Fatale, about a female assassin.
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