ABSTRACT
This chapter includes an interview with writer/director Lisa Cholodenko from 1998 originally published in The Independent Film & Video Monthly, along with an original interview with Cholodenko from 2018. Cholodenko was one of the original contributors to the low-budget independent film movement of the 1990s, thanks to the integrity and complexity of her first feature film, High Art, which centers on the messiness of a burgeoning relationship between two women. Cholodenko has continued to explore the emotional terrain of families in a series of powerful and innovative features films such as Laurel Canyon (2002) and The Kids Are All Right (2010), as well as in two feature-length television projects, Cavedweller (2004) and Olive Kitteridge (2014). In all of her work, Cholodenko brings together bracing candor and often ironic humor in a quest to fathom the intricacies of human interactions. In her 2018 interview, she describes the evolution of her screenwriting and filmmaking process while also considering the themes that interest her the most.
