My Div 3 Committee is giving me some issues.  Specifically my chair Abraham Ravett. 
I feel like he is pressuring me to do abstract, "experimental" work for my Div 3.  He thinks that what I do, narrative work using the help and skills of other people, is too limiting.  He says he will support me in whatever I do, as a Div 3 chair should do, but I don't know if he will.
Abraham is an experienced filmmaker but I do not want to make what he considers an "art film". 
I have seen many, many abstract non-narrative films since I came to Hampshire.  I have learned to appreciate them for their form and themes but I very rarely like them. 
What drives me crazy these days is that there seems to be a disdain for the concept of narrative.  Abraham has an apparent disdain for the narrative.  I brought up in my final Div 2 meeting (he replaced my original Div 2 member) the filmmaker Georges Melies.  Melies was a magician who made films from the late 1890s to around 1910.  He made the first narratives and experimented with many special effects techniques that no one had thought of before.  All of his short movies I have seen are entertaining and tell clear, cute little stories.
Abraham cut me off, telling me that the narrative in Melies work had no importance; the French filmmaker was only interested in the "Magic of Cinema".  And apparently,  the "Magic of Cinema" has to be separate from story.  Bullshit.

So I guess if a "piece" has a story of any kind it is not art.  If it is entertaining it is not art. 
It seems as though he has been telling me that if your work can engage, interest and entertain the "common" person it is not worthwhile.  
That is an elitist and arrogant position that I have seen many "experimental" filmmakers and artists take.

I worked on a Div 3 movie this Janterm that can be called experimental.  But the project didn't have any of the pretentiousness that I too often see in "experimental" work.  I am sure that the end project will be intelligent, interesting and (dareIsayIt) entertaining.  I look forward to seeing it screened.  By no means is all experimental work detestable or un-enjoyable. 

But last week I had to watch a 37 minute film of a man lying in front of a camera lens.  He sprawled himself out, smoked cigarettes, leared at the camera talking to a woman he must have been stalking and playing random songs on a record player.  That's it.
And that kind of unimaginative, narcissistic bullshit is being called art.
(Outside of a gallery or classroom where else is anyone going to watch that man masturbate both metaphorically and literally?!  It's art, huh?  It's art because the self-proclaimed cultural & bohemian elite say it is art.  Just because something is shown in an art gallery does not make it art)

Often times with nonnarrative & non-actor films I feel a certain coldness and distance.  They are about form, separate from more human issues. 
A filmmaker named David Gatten came by and gave a presentation to my Film 2 class.  The man obviously loves his work, really lives for it.  He got us involved collaboratively as a class and we made a short film using his techniques. It was fun and interesting.

That night there was a screening of his work.  I have never been more dissapointed in my whole time at Hampshire.  His films were dull, totally form-based (as far as the viewer could tell).  None of the passion he showed as a teacher or a speaker was evident in them. 
I stayed for 3/4 of the presentation.  He would speak between each film.  Gatten talked about his inspirations and was very interesting.  But those inspirations were not visible at all in his movies.

I want my Div 3 to have some sense of passion and emotion to it.  If my inspirations and feelings are only evident to me, I don't think the film would be worth making.  If I cannot involve and engage my audience, I don't know if it would be worth making.
I'm not an artist.  I just want to the kind of movie that interests me.
I can respect "art cinema" but for the most part I don't like it and I don't want to make it. 

Collaboration is important to me.  That made working on Continuity Error enjoyable at all for me.  I guess I take that from the theater side of my personality.  To go out and make movies all by myself has always been depressing for me.  I like working with a group.  You can get more done.  Telling a comprehensible narrative and using the aid of a group of people in my Div 3 may take it down artistically to a commoner's level but its what I want to do.  Hell, it's what I need to do. 

I will do what I need to do in my Div 3 but I fear it will be a much more difficult journey than it needs to be.

P.S.-
On facebook I have a list of images from films.  The game is that people have to guess where they are from. 
In one part I had an image of from the movie Derek Jarman's Blue.  It is a feature length film made up of an unchanging blue screen.  There is also music, sound effects and audio performances.  I found the piece very dull and not to be a movie in the technical definition.  I include a pic of it.
http://hampshire.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=30242444&id=22700308&ref=mf
Asher, maker of the Div 3 I worked on over Janterm, posted a comment stating: "Why are you mocking my Div III."

I have no idea how I mocked his Div 3 in any way, so I posted this as a reponse:

I'm officially done with theater at Hampshire College. It's been fun but I really need to get working on my Div 3. I just do not have time to get involved with another play.

I wasn't involved with any plays my first year. I tried out for a lot but it was particularly difficult to get into shows back then. Although there definitely is a hierarchy in Hampshire theater now it is a lot less cliquey and uninviting then it used to be.
The first semester of my second year I auditioned and got into Russ Schwartz's Div 3 "Getting Through the Script Alive". That was my most personally difficult semester I've had at this college and being a part of that project really helped keep me sane. The next semester Russ wrote our improv sessions into a 2-act play called Subroutine and I got cast in that. I was really surprised by how well people responded to my performance as that neurotic little intern, Jonathan.
My third year I got cast as the lead in Humble Boy. The part was similar to the Jonathan character I played in Subroutine, but had some interesting quirks. I was really happy with how that show turned out, a really good experience.
Later that semester I got talked into being a member of the run crew for Passion. I hated that play. Mostly I thought it was poorly written, but I hate musicals so I'm biased. That wasn't such a great experience but I didn't mind it too bad. Got to meet Janet at least, by far the sweetest stage manager I've ever met. Later that semester I also played a small role in Nate Beckman's Tolkien play. I was a dead body and a monk. It was a neat show.
And now in my fourth year, after being on leave for one semester, I've done one show. I really liked playing Tiresias although I wish it had been a bigger part. He was totally the opposite of the neurotic nerdy guys I'd played in the past.
It's not that long of a list of theatrical endeavors I guess, but it felt pretty consuming at the time. I'll miss it acting on stage but I think I'm making the right decision for my studies.

But, damn, I can't help but want to audition for Hannah's Janterm play.