{"id":22774,"date":"2017-10-13T18:39:41","date_gmt":"2017-10-14T01:39:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qgp.ykq.mybluehost.me\/cinephiled\/?p=22774"},"modified":"2017-10-13T18:41:58","modified_gmt":"2017-10-14T01:41:58","slug":"interview-unconventional-romance-blossoms-heartwarming-sundance-winner-dina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/interview-unconventional-romance-blossoms-heartwarming-sundance-winner-dina\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview: An Unconventional Romance Blossoms in Heartwarming Sundance Winner \u2018Dina\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"dina-poster\"Dina\u2019s getting married in a few weeks and there\u2019s still so much to do. She has to move her boyfriend, Scott, from his parents\u2019 house to her apartment, and settle him in to only the second home he\u2019s ever had, all while juggling his schedule as an early morning Wal-Mart door greeter. She has to get her dress, confirm arrangements with the venue, and make peace with her family, who remain nervous for their beloved Dina after the death of her first husband and the string of troubled relationships that followed. Throughout it all, in the face of obstacles large and small, Dina remains indomitable. She\u2019s overcome tragedy and found the man she wants and, at age 48, is bent on building the life for herself that she believes she deserves. Dina is unstoppable, a force of nature, and as the star of her own life story, she\u2019s an unconventional neuro-divergent movie protagonist the likes of which hasn\u2019t been seen before.<\/p>\n

I\u00a0spoke with directors Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles about their moving, unusual, and terrifically entertaining film Dina<\/em> which won the Grand Jury Prize for documentaries at this year\u2019s Sundance Film Festival.<\/p>\n

Danny Miller: It\u2019s so great to get to spend time with someone like Dina in a film like this since neurologically diverse people are so rarely seen in films just living their regular lives. And they need more exposure, just like, for example, more depictions of LGTBQ people has helped change public perspectives about them. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"dan-antonio-2\"Dan Sickles:<\/strong> I completely agree. When you do see depictions of people who are neuro-diverse, nine times out of ten they\u2019re pretty flat \u2014 they\u2019re almost used as props.<\/p>\n

And often way worse than \u201cflat\u201d \u2014 they\u2019re\u00a0depicted as adorable mascots, innocent little chidren, or crazy sociopaths. What I love about your\u00a0approach to Dina\u2019s story is that we feel we really get to know her and can relate to her joys and struggles. Still, with any film that showcases people dealing with such issues, I\u2019m sure you knew you\u2019d be open to criticism that you\u2019re somehow \u201cexploiting\u201d your subects. How do you grapple with that?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Antonio Santini:<\/strong> In one of our first visits with Dina when we were thinking about doing this film, the first thing she showed us was a manuscript for a\u00a0memoir she was writing about her life called I Was Born on the Wrong Planet<\/em>. And in that memoir she told the story of how unwelcoming many people have been to her since she was born, how she came to an understanding of herself from the all the things she lacked or was doing wrong according to other people. Year after year as she grew up, she began to understand that she was different based on those reactions. Dan and I were knew that most of the documentaries about people who are neuro-diverse usually have other people speaking on their behalf \u2014 their parents will talk for them, they\u2019ll have their doctors explaining\u00a0their condition, while\u00a0the actual individuals are almost used as B-roll in the background as other people are speaking for them. We had no interest in making\u00a0a film like that. Dina was our true collaborator and she was bursting at the seams to speak up for herself. She was approaching 50 and she spent a long period of her life wanting to prove to her community and to herself that she was capable of doing things that she was always told she couldn\u2019t do such as being in love, getting married, having a job, having kids, being social, having sexual desire \u2014 all these things that were important to her.<\/p>\n

Boy, I hope a publisher grabs up I Was Born on the Wrong Planet<\/em>. After seeing this film, I\u2019d love to hear more about her childhood experiences. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Dan:<\/strong> I hope so, too, she\u2019s been writing a lot. The film focuses on a certain part of her life and a specific\u00a0part of her history but Dina has plenty of other stories, too. She\u2019s someone who has really persevered through so much more than is discussed in the film and those are things she still wants to talk about.<\/p>\n

She seems like a documentarian\u2019s dream subject. Were there any topics that were off-limits?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The way we approached shooting was more like a conversation, it\u2019s not like we would open the front door to her apartment and start recording without speaking to one another. The film is very collaborative. You don\u2019t hear Antonio or my voice in the film or see our faces but we were very much in the room talking about what was going on and what she wanted to do that day.<\/p>\n

I can only imagine the ratio of film you shot to how much ended up in the film, but it\u2019s so masterfully edited and cinematic. Going through all that material, did you ever leave anything out because you worried it would give audiences the wrong impression of Dina?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We had around 550 hours of footage, so it was a lot to condense down into 100 minutes! You know, I\u2019ve known Dina for my entire life, my Dad was one of her high school teachers and our families remained very close. So it\u2019s always been part of my life to be concerned with Dina\u2019s well being. And that\u2019s very reciprocated \u2014 she calls me all the time to ask how I\u2019m doing. So we\u2019ve been in this relationship together for about 29 years now which started long before I ever picked up a camera and that relationship will continue until I die \u2014 because Dina will probably live to be 120. So it was always a conversation. We discussed each scene. And there was a lot of talk in our editing room about what to include and not to include and how to frame certain things.<\/p>\n

Of course, Dina\u2019s boyfriend, Scott, is very, very different from Dina, much less transparent emotionally. As filmmakers, did you worry about how the camera present during fairly intimate conversations might be affecting him? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Antonio:<\/strong> Well, with Scott, it started when we were filming Dina and he would just naturally be in the background of the shots, he would just walk in. We\u2019d say, \u201cHey, Scott, you know you\u2019re in the frame right now, right? Do you feel comfortable with that? \u201c And little by little, he became an important a part of the movie. Dina had always wanted a movie made about her, so we started to see Dina as the protagonist, she has really good comedic timing, but what was cool about Scott was that he was so vulnerable and showed his affection in such a refreshing way that you don\u2019t typically see depicted in the male partner in romantic stories. So it was really sweet to see Scott be the vulnerable one and have Dina be the teacher who\u2019s kind of showing him all the stuff that she\u2019s learned.<\/p>\n

\"Dina2\"<\/p>\n

Have both of them been involved in promoting the film and going to screenings?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dan:<\/strong> Dina has always been very proud of the film and she\u2019s an amazing promoter. Scott has seen what it\u2019s become and it\u2019s definitely something he\u2019s proud of as well. Both of them are going to be running around with us for our premieres and Scott is really excited to show it to everyone from his Wal-Mart in Philadelphia \u2014 they’re\u00a0going to be at our Philadelphia premiere. He sees this film as a way of communicating what\u2019s going on with him internally much better than he\u2019d ever be able to articulate using words. He\u2019s really happy about that.<\/p>\n

One of the most poignant parts of the film is the way you show how Dina and Scott deal with their very different sex drives. Again, as you said earlier, it\u2019s refreshing to see someone like Dina talking so unabashedly about her sex drive but I think it\u2019s also great that we don\u2019t see a compete resolution to this issue during the course of the film. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Antonio:<\/strong> What\u2019s really cool is that when we premiered at Sundance, we knew, of course, that we were telling this specific real-life story but I guess we hadn\u2019t thought that a lot of people would see the film as a kind of romantic comedy. A lot of people who came up to us after the screenings were around Dina\u2019s age and would say things like \u201cOh, that\u2019s just like me and my husband,\u201d or, \u201cGod, I still don\u2019t know how to say that to my partner.\u201d Dina is really speaking to a certain demographic and she represents a lot of desires that many people have .<\/p>\n

I found her inspiring on so many levels \u2014 someone who is not afraid to bring up something in the moment even if its socially uncomfortable to do so; someone who has survived a horribly traumatic incident and has resumed living her life. These are things many of us\u00a0can all relate to and learn from. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Dan:<\/strong> Something that I hope comes across in the film is how we can all aspire to be more like Dina and Scott. So often in this world, people are not appreciated for their eccentricities, but everyone has special skills and insights. Sometimes people say \u201cOh, wow, they\u2019re just like us,\u201d and that\u2019s great, I want to say, \u201cYeah, absolutely!\u201d But I also want to point out that they have some very special qualities that we don\u2019t have. Did you notice how at one point Scott rattled off the names of three operatic tenors in a kind of offhand way? He could have gone on and on, his knowledge of that world is incredible. But unfortunately he is rarely appreciated for possessing that knowledge and having that specific kind of intelligence.<\/p>\n