James Gray: This system we’ve built…has not yet figured out how to monetize integrity
Whenever I read interviews with James Gray or watch him talk, I think to myself he’s good people, fighting the good fight for cinema.
On May 10, James Gray, a School of Cinematic Arts alumnus (1991) and recipient of the 2024 Mary Pickford Alumni Award, addressed the Class of 2024 with a heartfelt speech about why cinema matters now more than ever.
”There's a notion out there, a belief that everything including cinema, including the arts in general is an instrument of and for profit only. That's it. This system we’ve built—which has done many good things, let’s stipulate that--has not yet figured out how to monetize integrity.”
Please watch the video of the complete commencement speech below. You can also scroll down to read the transcribed version (from the 3rd minute of the speech).
I'm going to say some things about the world as I see its and if you get anything from it great, and if you don't, I'm sorry but you're not going to remember it anyway.
On the buildings out there that replaced mine, it says Cinematic Arts which it didn't used to say by the way. Arts. I love the fact that that word is used, and you are now like it or not officially artists. So I suggest humbly that you wear it because it's a badge of honour.
It's especially a badge of honour right now because as you enter what we call the real world, whatever that means, I'm going to be honest with you, I think we face a culture in some deep, deep trouble. Something is a miss out there, right? You can feel it. We don't seem to be connected to each other.
So as my wife and children will remind me all the time, I say it too much, I ask myself aloud and to myself, what's going on? Well there's probably a lot of reasons for it, but here's one thing I think that's especially important that maybe isn't mentioned enough.
There's a notion out there, a belief that everything including cinema, including the arts in general is an instrument of and for profit only. That's it. This system we’ve built—which has done many good things, let’s stipulate that--has not yet figured out how to monetize integrity.
Now maybe some of you want to go out and you want to make as much money as is humanly possible, "I'm going to go out there, I'm going to make a ton of money”. That's fine. It's great. I got no problem with that at all. Lord knows the folks at the Beverly Hills Land Rover dealership cannot wait for this ceremony to end and for you to get working.
But before you do I ask get a look around. Look at the world and ask yourself if just making a ton of money is the answer. How come we seem so lost? A small part of it might be that over the last three decades, so this is going to get pretty dark guys, our art form has pretty much given the audience nothing but chocolate cake. We kept pushing for that sugar high and now the audience has a kind of cultural diabetes. What's worse is that they might even know it. More and more I see people turning to cat videos on Instagram instead of wanting to take a trip to the local theater. And I've got to say in candour, my generation deserves some of the blame here.
Now we did try, we struggled to create beauty within corporate boxes called franchises - which was a word that we used to use by the way to describe McDonald's and Burger King when I was a kid. And these franchises are not even new, they were built for us - 1938, 1939, 1962, 1977 and so on. Now sometimes that work is beautiful. Hats off to the people who could achieve that. But more often we did not pursue personal work, and I'm not only pointing fingers, my own failings may be different but they're no less real.
I often worry that my own work has not been as expansive and open as it should have been. That I haven't been able to touch as many people as I should have or dreamed of. But it's the same difference. It's all led to where we are now, which is tired. So you got to clean up our mess guys. That's what you got to do.
Okay that's the bad stuff. That's the negative part of the speech.
Now here's the good news. The world's waiting for you. You can absolutely do it. It's not going to be easy. Nothing in life that's worthwhile ever is though. The artist in you will be under constant attack. In some quarters, you'll be called “content creator”, in other places you'll be told “respect boundaries and safe spaces”, I don't know who I'm imitating but you get the drift.
You'll be told not to tackle subjects that are too raw for the moment. You'll be told to worry about Twitter or X it’s called now I guess or Rotten Tomato Meters or whatever, and on and on. These are all weapons aimed at you by the system. The system that believes in profit, not integrity, not excellence. Okay.
Here's the thing guys, art resists the profit model, demands risk. Your creativity is not going to obey rules. Great thinking embraces contradiction, complexity, messiness, light and dark. So please I beg you don't be nice, don't be afraid to provoke and offend. Don't be afraid to be disliked. I swear to you if you get 100% on the Tomato Meter you're doing something so wrong, I can't even begin to tell you.
Because to be an artist means, in the words of the great Kurosawa, never to avert one's eyes. To see the world as honestly as you can, not to try and pretend the world as you wish that it were. Giving people only what they want rather than what they need is nice for the very brief moment but it doesn't last, I promise you that.
There's a reason that we still remember “Forget it Jake, it's Chinatown”. Now can you tell me the last line of Earthquake which came out that same year and grossed a lot more money? No you can't. What's the last line of earthquake? Well I remember that Lorne Green plays Ava Gardner's father, but other than that you know there's not much I can remember. That's for the eight people who remember who Lorne Green is. Some jokes are just for me.
Okay even though it sounds like highfalutin nonsense I swear it isn't, because when the sharks out there tell you such and such has got to be commercial, I suggest nod politely “Yes”, and then do exactly what you do, because actually they do need you to be you, in all your imperfections.
Imperfections make us who we are, they allow your art to breathe. If you use your artistry to convey to others your most intimate impressions, you extend our sympathies and our compassion, and maybe people might begin to feel a little less lost out there.
Okay I'm almost done don't worry.
But I want to try and leave you with one other thought. I read the other day somewhere, I can't remember where, that Jerry Seinfeld said “oh movies are all over, they’re dead” whatever. He said something like that. I understand what he meant. A lot of distractions out there, people on their screens all the time. I see it, even my own kids much as I try to take it from them and my wife takes it from them.
But think of this, the cave paintings of Lascaux, 38,000 years old. Perspective, the idea of perspective is 37,500 years later. Painting took a long time to be what it is.
Sound cinema, 1927. By 1932-33, you have five/six years later, you have an ocean of masterpieces.What does that tell you? It tells you that human beings have always needed the cinema. It was always in us. So we make the closest thing to dreams that has ever existed and it is absolutely brand new.
We are at the beginning not the end, you need to see it that way, it's the beginning. So today is your graduation day, it's very special. There's nothing silly or dopey or gloomy about it. You should be damn proud you made it, and we're here to celebrate the work you did to get to this point.
It's been a bit tougher for you I know that. I'm the only person you're going to hear from today in this kind of capacity. You've dealt with the covid lockdowns probably when you were a senior in high school. But it's okay, you know why, because you can use it. It makes you stronger because your job is to take what's wrong with the world and turn it into art.
Maybe your reference won't show up right away on a profit report, but in the end I promise you this, it's the only thing I know at the age of 55, this is the whole damn ball game
Congratulations on this beautiful day, thank you so much.