The D-Word's life is one of glamour and riches, as only a documentary filmmaker can live it

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So reads the header of the recent press release for the HBO Signature broadcast (coming in July to a tv set and computer near u!).

That’s right, faithful readers, Home Page is no longer just a film anymore, but rather one component of an interactive multimedia storytelling extravaganza. Little did the D-Word know way back when…

The HBO publicity folks have at least 50 productions a year to promote and aren’t given to excessive hyperbole. When we first sat down with this, they needed some convincing that this is truly groundbreaking.

I tried to keep the zeal out of my voice, lest they think me just another producer trying to snow them, and stick to the facts.

“For the first time ever, viewers can go to their computers after seeing a film and follow the continuing stories of all of the people they’ve just seen onscreen, and even interact with them. Only now the viewer is, in a sense, the director of the narrative, able to come at it from different angles and chronology and points-of-view by choosing which links to hit. It’s like Organic Internet Theater.”

Okay, okay, it’s hard for me to keep a lid on it once I get going.

“Let’s say the film makes you curious about Justin’s relationship with Howard Rheingold,” I continued, “which is fascinating and complicated and something we couldn’t dig into as deeply as I would have liked. Well, Justin has written about it at length on his site. Howard’s written about it on his. I’ve written about it on mine. Maybe it makes you curious about Howard’s work. His book, The Virtual Community, is considered the classic work on the subject and is published in its entirety (with hypertext links included!) at Rheingold.com. And that’s just one small aspect of what the film touches on. I mean, once you get started with this, you could be on here forever! ”

They seemed impressed, even a little revved. But big corporations are ever-cautious. Could I prove that this is the first time ever?

“It has to be,” I responded, fervently. “There basically haven't been any other serious films made yet about the Web, much less one featuring some of its’ foremost personalities, who've written some of its'most influential sites.

All of the big media players are throwing tons of time and money and brainpower trying to come up with interactive storylines, and creating these huge, elaborate websites to fill in the backstories of their fictional characters.

Well, guess what? We’ve already done it, and with real-life people whose lives are far stranger and more interesting than anything you could make up, who are into this for the fun of it, and have years and years of amazing content to bring to the table. Not to mention, with a Sundance-selected, Ebert-championed, HBO documentary as its centerpiece. Everyone else out there is trying to figure out convergence and interactivity and HBO has gotten there first. Congratulations! You have a landmark television event on your hands!”

Ultimately, we compromised on the word "Groundbreaking.” I can deal.

It's all very exciting. It’s certainly attention-getting.

And it’s, well, never ending...

The dreary flip side to this giddy joyride is that ever since we began to prepare for Sundance, The D-Word's been in a constant tizzy, twice as busy as during the two-and-a-half year period when I was simultaneously making the film and creating the web site.

A dozen international film festivals. Press kits. Press releases. Interviews. Seeking out sponsors for the broadcast. Finding a distributor. Working out home video sales off the web site. Signing with a foreign sales agent. Delivering to HBO. Transcript. Music cue sheet. Errors & Omissions insurance. Planning a D-Word site overhaul.

Oh yeah. Freelance work (to stay afloat, sort of). Proposal and budget for the next film. Looking for a new office. Taxes. An occasional nod to the wife and kiddy.

For some crazy reason, I thought this would be the easy part, the relaxing part, the sit-back-and-bask-in-the-glory part of the filmmaking process. I should know better by now. I should know the distribution phase is always the manic-depressive part.

And never-ending, even without the prospect of being a human guinea pig in a perpetual interactive experiment.

But I do know from experience that just when I most feel like a hormone-raging, post-partum mama, wondering why on God's earth I ever decided to go through this agony again, something truly magical comes along to ground me in my purpose and remind me of Why We Create:

Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 14:18:06 +0200
From: Klaus Rosenfeld
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: "Home Page" on German TV

Hi Doug,
yesterday night "Home Page" was on "Arte" - a German TV channel. It started at 0:05 right in the middle of the night. I was a bit sceptical and thought "Hmmm... another of these boring stories about how the internet made teenage nerds to (Yahoo! millionaires). I even was very tired from my day in my web design company and was almost falling asleep when your documentary started. But then this! WOW! Tiredness was forgotten! I loved your film. Especially the honesty of the whole thing. I just wanted to let you know. Thanks for that work of yours!


From: Knut Meinke
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: feedback for your film "Home Page"
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 02:09:07 +0200

Hello Doug,
I am Knut. I have see your film "Home Page" in the german TV. Just the film end and I write my feedback to you. Woww. The film have move me. I think about my relationship to the humans around me.
...Oh, fuck my english is too bad to tell you what I feel. I stop here cause I did not want somethink wrong.


From: Tiffany Assouline
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: hey u!
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 03:05:31 +0200

Hello Doug,
I just watch ur doc about Justin... and I found it totally amazing...
Just wanted to first touch u and after see what could happens next...
I live in France and I do work as a "internet animator". the relationship u describes in ur film were talking to me even if i am not totally net addicted..
I've been graduated in sociology applied to culture and so I am passionated by what happens around internet and people using or not using it.
Hope to hear from u soon...


From: Mathias Fuhge
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: Your docu about justin is GREAT
Date: Sat, 24 Apr 1999 12:47:17 +-200

Hello,
I'm from germany and I've seen your film on Arte. It was VERY great and I want to show it to all my friends. Where can I buy it? I'm just a pupil and I'm haven't got too much money ;) .
My homepage isn't up right now and I don't want to make this mail too large. But when I say that I love my computer, I think you'll know why I want to show this film to my friends. It was better than "Mean Guns", better than "Apocalypse Now". I NEED THIS VIDEO!!!


From: "Netpower"
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: i love your spirit
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 13:17:25 +0200

last night I looked at television on an
emission makes by Justin with a camera. He there questions all his friends and gives the fine words on Web..
This emission was fabulous!!
Justin and you are fabulous !!
I love you, your spirit!!
I surf on the web since 3 years now and it is true that it is a revolution!!
continue like that!!
At this time I finish my homepage in french and english and sorry for my bad english.
thanks


Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 16:53:19 +0200
From: Florent Faivre
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: Home Page

Hi Doug,
I'm french netsurfer...
Last night, April 21 99, i met u and Justin by chance on Arte (french/deutsch channel tv). It was midnight, and i was subjugated by your movie.
What great people, what crazy people in it!
I was fascinating by all these people i can met on the net if i want...
We're all a little voyeur i think, and your movie allows to feel better after our own voyeurism.
I'd like to live like all these "specimen" you filmed!
Thanks for a such beautiful movie !
And maybe see u on the net when my home page will be finished...


From: "Andureu"
To: dbblock@el.net
Subject: you have a new fan !
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 16:54:59 +0200

hello !
my name is richard and your documentary about homepages revealed human aspects I had not realized. i send you this email to ask you if you continued in your investigation of discovering humankind. i hope you have found yourself and that everything works fine for you.


From: CYBERFANTASMic@t-online.de
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 12:51:53 +0200
To: Doug Block
Subject: Re: Hello my friend

Wow. You got to love it. I am a:) lucky enough to see a movie in english on arte b:) lucky enough to find its actually worth watching and more c:) able to express some thanks and tell the guy that made its a really great film and d:) get a response the next day....

I'll bet you probably got flooded with email after your film..... I can count the amount of films I've seen like your own that revolve around the net in a non sold-out way on one finger.... The ones that actually share the same ideals that have been flowing from my pores since I found the net in 95. Its great to know that all the other people now finally have a good film to relate to...

And after being in old east Germany for like a year and 8 months, its been like being thrown into 93 or 94 pre-net explosion in the US. My wife's village didn't even have phones ten years ago, and now I found my self preaching the same sermons I had used in 95-97 to an audience of communist turned capitalists who can not yet afford to use the internet.

Ah the net is coming to Germany fast and commercially diluted a little from the west, but until your film came I have to admit, though my feelings, inspiration and awe were still the same as in the US, my sermons became both quieter and more few.

Your film was there for me at the right time and the right place. Just like the internet used to be for me, in a place where I could afford to pillage it, hook into it, at want to be part of it.

I still want to...

Thank you again for the help with my revival. I guess your film's that pill I needed for now, and by the time it wears off, hopefully I can catch a rerun.

If you are still in contact with Justin, or anyone else in your film, and feel the urge, say hello from the unknown, let them know that it's good to know I'm not alone...

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