5 Questions with James J. Robinson
James J. Robinson is a 29-year-old Filipino/Australian artist based in Los Angeles. With a successful career in photography and filmmaking, he is published regularly by the likes of the New York Times and Vogue, while directing campaigns for brands like Apple and Maison Valentino.
Despite a successful career, James chooses to keep his work rooted in what matters to him most: using the skills he’s developed in this sector to advocate for the deconstruction of oppressive power structures. In 2021 he became one of the first Filipino artists to be exhibited in Australia’s National Portrait Gallery, the same year his protest piece ‘Burn the Blazer’ ignited a national discussion on toxic masculinity and led to his consulting with Australian Parliament members on the conservative Religious Discrimination Bill.
His 35mm short documentary Inang Maynila detailed a personal investigation into his mother’s youth under martial law in the Philippines. The film screened at a number of festivals and galleries across the globe, taking out myriad Best Cinematography awards along the way (including one from the Australian Cinematographer’s Society) before being acquired by prestigious auteurist distributor NOWNESS.
Aside from his creative career, Robinson is also a disability support worker with a particular focus on helping young men with autism develop skills towards independence.
First Light is James J Robinson’s debut feature film.
(Still from First Light / supplied)
No.1
James, you’ve been an acclaimed photographer for many years, having shot celebrities for Vogue, New York Times, Oyster and many more. How was First Light conceptualised, and what did the process look like along the way?
First Light was born initially out of fury for the Catholic Church. Catholicism has been a theme in my work before: I did a satirical fashion shoot in a church with Weyes Blood in New York, and a political protest piece with Camp Cope lead singer Georgia Maq outside George Pell’s old office in Melbourne. But I suppose the spark for First Light came around the time of the Religious Discrimination Bill in Australia. Therapy over the years has rendered me lucid to the ways Catholic teachings have endowed me with existential guilt and shame for being queer—something I’m bound to reckon with for the rest of my life. You teach a child that the universe works and exists in a certain way, and that way is a complete antithesis to who you are as a person. On reflection, this fury softened, and I realised there was a difference between the very kind, almost socialist, core teachings of Catholicism and the corrupt institution that tries to lay claim to it. I wanted to make a film that walked the line between these two things: a reverence for the spirituality but critique of the way the religion is co-opted by politics and capitalism. Naturally, being set in the Philippines, the story ended up extending to a larger question on decolonisation and a return to the Indigenous thought that runs deeper in my blood.
No.2
You also wrote the screenplay for First Light. Can you tell us a little bit more about that experience?
I’ve been writing screenplays since I was a teenager; I suppose it was the first artform that really spoke to me. While I loved writing in school, it was the Tumblr era, so I look back at the screenplays and shudder at how blatantly Skins-meets-French-New-Wave they were, where theere was a shallow sense of character and a penchant for film stills over depth.
[It was] maybe around 20 [when] I realised that I lacked the life experience and deeper understanding of myself to be able to write to the standard I wanted—I still didn’t know what I wanted to say, and how could I when I didn’t know who I was? I was looking for my voice, [so to speak]. And so I’ve been chipping away on screenplays in the background the past 10 years, when finally something clicked with this one and I felt ready to speak out loud.
No.3
On that note, how does your creative process work when you’re writing a film versus when you’re directing a film?
They’re so wildly different. I can only write in total solitude without distraction; I’ve tried writing in periods where I’m working on other things and being social in a city and it just doesn’t flow. I need to be in isolation in the country, reading books and watching as many things as I can. I need to be sleeping every night when the sun goes down and eating well right as the sun comes back up in order to unblock the creative flow.
Directing, on the other hand, I’m leading cast and crews of over a hundred people some days and I need to always be accessible. I want to be ready to take on feedback and give people insight at any given point, [which means] I never want to switch off my brain or disassociate. I’ve been photographing long enough to know what makes a set fun, and the energy is always set by the people steering the ship. If I set people at ease and help them understand that their wellbeing is more important to me than whatever we’re trying make, everything flows. I suppose both writing and directing are connected in that way, trying to find flow, but through directly opposite ways: one entirely internal and the other entirely external.
No.4
The moving image is, of course, a different beast than the still image even if there are similarities such as composition. How did you direct First Light such that it was true to your vision via your photographer’s gaze?
The most important thing was to find a cinematographer I could trust. As much as I wish that I could give full attention to the camera, on a set I’m rehearsing with my actors, overseeing sets come together, rewriting scripts around the logistical problems that inevitably arise.
Luckily, Amy Dellar is a cinematographer I’ve been working with since I was studying—she’s always been a go-to cinematographer for me. I remember when she shot my graduate film: plans would be crumbling before my eyes, but I’d turn to the camera department and she’d be there with a smile making everyone around her laugh. I knew that was what I needed on my first film, to have my port in the storm. Amy is my port. She has an eye that complements mine so perfectly, and has been around to see my voice develop across my whole professional career. We were totally aligned from our first meetings on how we wanted to approach things: wide angles, deep focus, long takes—inspired more by Taiwanese New Cinema than contemporary references, and from there she took the reigns and always knew how to achieve what I wanted, even when I couldn’t come up with the words. Amy is a pioneer in her field (that’s been a universal response to the film)—I was so lucky she said yes.
No.5
Unlike writing a book for example, making a film is almost always a group effort. When setting out to create First Light, how did you determine who you wanted to collaborate with, whether that be the cast, editor, cinematographer, etc? What makes an ideal collaborator in your eyes?
What makes a set a well-oiled machine for me is when everyone feels comfortable collaborating with each other. I’ve been on sets with some of the biggest photographers you can think of, [where I was] in the background doing little BTS videos—[this was where I realised that] no level of experience can make up for what happens when sets are run on bullying and ego. I don’t think it’s worth making something beautiful at the expense of people’s wellbeing, and therefore building the team meant I was looking for people who possess certain morals over their level of experience.
As much as I was pushed by funding bodies to have seasoned people around me for my first film, I knew I wanted people on my set who were mature enough to deal with confrontation and conflict, who have a strong sense of character and integrity. And so each person on set, [whether that was] my costume designer, my editor, my production designer—everyone was carefully chosen for what they bring to set as a person. Problems are inevitably going to arise when you’re working for a project this long, and I needed to trust I had people around who could ride the waves with me. That was the guiding ethos. We have a pretty incredible number of first-time-feature heads of department on this film, and the outcome is just as great as if I had hired people solely based off an incredible body of work. If anything, the film could serve as a conduit to bring up some kind people in the industry.
Find Out More
A nun encounters a lethal criminal conspiracy and begins to question her beliefs in this poetic, sensory meditation on faith, power and corruption.
A gentle and mild-mannered middle-aged nun living in a neglected centuries-old convent, Sister Yolanda sees her mission in life as giving spiritual guidance to the people of her community and, particularly, young novice Sister Arlene. Her conscience is left shaken, however, when she bears witness to a strange and distressing sequence of events in a hospital room. At first puzzled, she soon realises that the incident may have more sinister and far-reaching implications – and that high-ranking figures are determined to stop her, or anyone else, from finding out the truth.
Shot in a verdant mountainous landscape in northern Luzon, this MIFF Premiere Fund–supported feature debut by celebrated Filipino-Australian photographer James J. Robinson evokes Ingmar Bergman’s Winter Light and Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s Black Narcissus in its masterfully composed images and thought-provoking interrogation of faith. Starring veteran Filipina actor Ruby Ruiz and industry legend Maricel Soriano, First Light is a slow-burn crime drama that you won’t be able to tear your eyes from.
First Light premieres at Melbourne International Film Festival from 10 Aug to 23 Aug.
More info here.