The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed: An Interview with Joanna Arnow (Web Exclusive)
by Diana Drumm

In her feature debut, filmmaker Joanna Arnow manages to do the near-impossible: invigorating new life into the oh-so-familiar subgenre of being thirtysomething in New York City. She takes the usual and seemingly mundane aspects (nondescript corporate job, disappointing romantic entanglements, etc.) and cuts them into sharp-edged vignettes indirectly reflecting the farce that is time, existence, and purpose. Arnow’s cinematic voice stems from a pointedly personal autofiction process infused with a startling, firmly deadpan sense of humor that echoes from page to screen edited with comedy-led precision. This voice, arguably one of the most refreshing new cinematic voices in recent memory, was developed through Arnow’s string of critically acclaimed short films and general observations from her day-to-day life. 

Arnow’s The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed follows thirtysomething Ann (Arnow), a passive employee at a corporate entity, navigating an existence fraught with dysfunction, edged with malaise, and tinged with dissatisfaction. The film starts with her as a submissive participant in a BDSM relationship with an older man (Scott Cohen), and as a disappointing daughter whose parents (Arnow cast her own parents) and sister (Alysia Reiner) seem forever irked by her existence. As the story unravels, in chapters we discover are titled by the names of the protagonist’s “sex friends,” Ann casts out onto the Brooklyn dating scene while the rest of her life maintains a muted, comically astute ebb and flow, including the weekday pouring out of a globby lentil soup to be heated in the microwave (a comic motif in the film, with writer-director-editor-actress Arnow leaning into the awkwardness, sprawling out the timing of that slight, specific, everyday task). Things change and develop, but also stay the same, like life, and a reheated, globby lentil soup. Think The Worst Person in the World but acerbic, and in Brooklyn.

Arnow’s film premiered at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival and has played at multiple film festivals, including the Toronto International Film Festival and New York Film Festival last fall, receiving a smattering of positive reviews along the way. Cineaste spoke with Arnow via Zoom earlier this year about her process in making the film and constructing its voice, the themes of time passing and everyday humor, showing vulnerability on screen, and presenting a nonsensationalized portrayal of BDSM.—Diana Drumm 

Cineaste: Should we begin at the beginning, with the title of your new film? 

Joanna Arnow: The title refers to a scene toward the end of the film. I got the idea for the scene at the same time I knew that I wanted it to be the title of the film. It just felt kind of appropriate for a film that reflects on the way that time passes in our lives. And the length of it seemed kind of a wink to the film’s humorous angstyness, and also serves as a title that doesn’t take itself too seriously. 

Cineaste: Speaking of your tone, it’s one that feels like a text that speaks to the subtext but that then makes that the actual text. Your style of writing speaks to the truth of the scene, but also has such a distinct sense of humor. Would you talk about developing that tone?

Arnow: Part of the idea of writing this was just kind of a curiosity and excitement about everyday situations and how there’s just so much art and comedy all around us as we go through our days and navigate our rhythms. So, in writing this film, I was particularly listening to how people talk and observing how everyday moments can become humorous when you see them from a distance. 

Cineaste: Your film speaks so much to being in your thirties in Brooklyn, trying to date, although that sounds too much like a Sex in the City logline. In terms of the creative process, since you were the director, writer, and editor, you qualify as the true auteur of this film. Would you discuss having that much control over your creative vision? 

Arnow: Because the project draws on personal experience, I hope that I can mine that specificity in a way that connects with others and that portraying my vulnerability and the specific way I see the world also connects with others. I made the film with a lot of collaborators who shaped it as well. Even performing my various creative roles, I feel lucky to have made the film with them. It wasn’t one person. 

Cineaste: In terms of the levels of vulnerability of your character, it feels like the more classically intimate moments—romantic moments and sexual encounters—are on the same level of vulnerability as singing the “Prisoner of Azkaban” song [written by Arnow] and talking passionately about show tunes, showing both emotional and physical vulnerability. How do you feel about showing that level of vulnerability on screen, especially with you as the lead in your own work? 

Arnow: I think it’s really exciting to be able to mine that as an artist because I hope my stories show the full experience of humanity. When people are outside of their comfort zones, being challenged to see the world in different ways, dealing with the process of figuring things out, wrestling with relationships, sexuality, and how to be a person, all those things tap one’s sense of vulnerability. It’s exciting to be able to draw on my experience in some ways to tell that story in the best way that I know how. 

Cineaste: Drawing from your personal experience, I want to circle back to collaborators and casting. Specifically, I’m thinking of how you cast your own parents as your characters’ parents. That’s a very bold move. In terms of the background actors and small roles, there are many performers from the NY film scene [including MUBI’s Chris Wells, Film at Lincoln Center’s Maddie Whittle, film critic Charles Bramesco, and others]. In terms of that sort of casting and community and collaboration, what were you looking for in the decisions of not only having your own parents play your parents but having notable “film people” in the film? 

Arnow: I hope that certain aspects of the casting—like having me playing this fictionalized version of myself and my parents playing fictionalized versions of themselves—adds to the authenticity of the story. But I also wanted to tell the story in a very complex way that showed this woman’s life with a very multifaceted kind of mosaic quality. I felt, for example, that all these vignette scenes that show different neighborhoods and her meetings with different people, involving both music and politics, revealed the fullness of this person’s life. I also thought that working with both professional actors as well as first-time actors—I always like to call them first-time actors as opposed to non-actors—and having different textures, performance-wise, also added to that.

Cineaste: Speaking of professional actors, the casting of Scott Cohen, aka Max Medina from Gilmore Girls, was a great choice as Ann’s older BDSM partner. How did you cast him?

Arnow: Well, I was very lucky that one of my producers, Pierces Varous, had worked with him before and suggested him as someone who would be right for the role. I looked into his work, and thought that he is such an amazing actor, with a very interesting presence, that he could really play with the comedy of the role while also adding complexity. He was a wonderful collaborator. 

Cineaste: The film is structured in chapters, each one with the name of a “sex friend,” which is such a great phrase because it nicely sums up so much about casual relationships. How did you come up with this narrative structure to break up the film? 

Arnow: Although the story incorporates work, family life, and friendships, as all parts of this protagonist’s life, since the focus is on romantic or sexual relationships, it seemed appropriate to give the film shape and a place for the audience to kind of take a breath in between these unorthodoxly structured chapters. They’re not like perfectly divided chapter headings because the film is kind of exploding outside of those chapters. In our rough-cut screenings, sometimes people would say, “It’s not about men, so why do you have to have such chapter headings?” But it seemed right to me. I feel it’s a film that’s supposed to reflect the messiness of this woman’s life and its imperfections, and I like that the film’s structure isn’t so neat, either. 

Cineaste: It captures the sense that things are going to be messy. 

Joanna Arnow: I also wanted each of those chapters to reflect the different way the character experiences time in her life. Each of those sections has its own set of formal rules—some have more ellipses, some have less ellipses, some withhold certain plot lines. I wanted to reflect that variation of experience as years pass. 

Cineaste: I’m going to ask the most basic question. Who are your key filmmaker influences? 

Arnow: [Malaysian, Taiwan-based filmmaker] Tsai Ming-liang is a main influence of mine, and I always like how his minimalist style places audiences in these absurd, often sexual situations, which give people space to take them in on their own terms. 

Cineaste: The film score is a thread of discussion throughout the film. What would you say about the relationship of music in this film? 

Arnow: I thought it was important for the film to not be scored because the humor is so deadpan and minimalist, and sometimes adding even a minimal, diegetic score in the background undercuts the bluntness and impact of the comedy that we were shaping through the dialogue and its rhythm of the dialogue. For instance, there’s a yoga scene where it would have been nice in some ways to have some yoga-ish music playing in the background, but I really enjoyed not having music there.

Cineaste: As the editor of the film, which is full of such well-timed, deadpan humor, what are your views on comedic timing, on how long to hold for the joke?

Arnow: I usually try to follow my instincts as an editor and do what each scene calls for. You don’t want to waste time or stay on anything that is no longer funny. Generally, you want to cut after the joke but sometimes, if you stay longer with something, it becomes even funnier because you’ve just held on it. You have to try to gauge that. I like to have rough-cut screenings to see how the humor is playing for other people. I know some filmmakers think that contaminates the process. But I always like to see how scenes are working for people, to get the most data possible, even if I don’t always follow their feedback. 

Cineaste: The way that you portrayed the corporate atmosphere is spot-on, without being too specific on what Ann’s job is at the company. One line in particular—“When this job is finished, you’ll have made your own job obsolete”—speaks to so much.

Arnow: Some of the discussion of the character’s role as a clinical e-learning media specialist is based on my experience as one for six and a half years. In some ways, I felt I was just taking in the space and the people there. I took a lot of pictures and put them on Instagram. Some of those feelings and visuals worked their way into the film. The series of plants that we scrolled through [Arnow’s character Ann shoots a series of photos of office plants] were those that I took at that job. I also recorded some sounds from my upstairs neighbors, like playing the piano, that are in the film as well. I hope that using tiny touches of real things like that make it a richer film. 

Cineaste: This feels like such a possibly pointed question, but by showing types of BDSM dynamics on screen, your film offers such an authentic representation of contemporary, real-life BDSM.

Arnow: I feel there are a lot of misconceptions about BDSM and what it means to be submissive. So, it was particularly important to show Ann as an active participant in the planning of the sessions. In my experience, I think people in the BDSM community must be particularly communicative and respectful, and I wanted the film to reflect that. Sometimes films portray BDSM in a way that glosses over some of the communication around it. I was hoping to portray it in a nonsensational, nonjudgmental, but also comedic fashion. 

Cineaste: Honestly, it’s really refreshing. While not laughing at it, the film senses the humor innate in some of it.

Arnow: Exactly. A lot of people who are involved have a sense of humor because ultimately it is kind of a game, it’s role play.

Cineaste: An exchange that stuck out as a great example of your film’s overall tone and sensibility was one of the sex friends asking, “What have you been fantasizing about lately?” with Ann answering, “I’ve been tired lately.” 

Arnow: I appreciate you mentioning that exchange because I particularly had fun with what I saw as a kind of comedic poetry of “lately” being repeated in both a question and an answer. I enjoy writing dialogue and I try to lead the process with the dialogue scenes and let the script unfold from writing the things that most excite me, and that informs the whole project. 

Cineaste: How was your experience with festival audiences? What was it like being at Cannes, for instance? 

Arnow: It was very exciting to be at Cannes. It’s a very small film, so we never expected that invitation. It’s been interesting to screen it with audiences and hear people’s questions and get their feedback. Besides, I’d never even been to France, so it was all pretty new for me. 

Cineaste: How are you anticipating the film’s theatrical release here in the United States, which is scheduled for April 26?

Arnow: I’m very excited for the release. I’ve never worked with a distributor on a theatrical release before, so I feel lucky to have a partner like Magnolia. 

Cineaste: What’s next for you in terms of upcoming projects?

Arnow: I have a few dark comedies in development.

Diana Drumm is an assistant editor at Cineaste and freelance film journalist whose bylines include ELLE, IndieWire, No Film School, and RogerEbert.com. She is also the Director of Marketing & Communications at Quad Cinema in New York City. She can be followed at @dianaddrumm.

The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed is distributed in the United States by Magnolia Pictures. It opens theatrically on April 26, 2024.

Copyright © 2024 by Cineaste, Inc.

Cineaste, Vol. XLIX, No. 2