Meet Jordan Urgin | Filmmaker

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jordan Urgin and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jordan, we’d love to hear about how you approach risk and risk-taking
Risk is a two-edged sword. It’s impossible not to take any but taking too much can lead to failures none can overcome. I took many risks in my life, in order to be able to call myself an “artist” without blushing. I had to leave my country, my job and my family behind to start from scratch in a foreign land. To make my first feature I invested all my savings. When this movie got destroyed in the making process, I ended up with nothing. Not even a roof for the coming month. It would have been difficult to reach rock bottom harder than this, and yet, I found solutions. Today, the movie has been finished as my first feature film and is getting recognition all over the world. I wouldn’t advise anyone to take that many risks, and I honestly wasn’t considering going that far. When reading incredible stories on successful personalities, the way they “made it” against all odds, we tend to think one has to go through it too. But as compelling and hopeful these stories are, they hide a truth.
One can’t plan any success from such a chaotic path. Realistically, it’s the course of events that forces us to take drastic measures. During a rough creating process, one hard choice leads to a harder one and so on until the solutions to achieve the end goal keeps getting riskier. Going back quickly becomes impossible.
When taking on this type of adventure, one should be aware victory is just a stopover on an ocean of mistakes and failures. But as long as the boat keeps sailing, there will be another port called satisfaction, reward or success.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Having a creative career is often condensed into the idea of having a vocation. I’m skeptical about this. I believe any human being has a potential of creativity in all domains and which part of our creativity will be in use to achieve our destiny is up to what tools life gives us. My father is a painter, this gave me the sensibility of images. My mother is a bookworm and so words are my primary means to express an idea. Then came poetry to tell me how to see and position myself towards existence.

My artistic approach eventually comes from necessities. I can identify two of them right away. The one to repair what has been damaged and the one to escape a certain feeling of imprisonment.
Far be it from me to oversell the concept of “freedom” since it’s nothing of an eldorado journey. Like anything of value it comes with a price and challenges that can be very discouraging. But who better than artists can evaluate the risks of this ideal and its limits for others to use it judiciously?

In my work, my intention is often to depict with visual means the interior of a mind experiencing a crisis. I want to show what’s hidden behind the façade of the roles we play in our everyday life, especially when the psychological ground starts to crumble. My style to deliver this intention comes from another necessity to build bridges in between different cultures. I adapt the references that pushed me to write a story and that’s certainly why I tend to employ non conventional ways to film. I use all the diversity of arts combined and take advantage of any available support to communicate emotions.
This reminds me of the words the poet Arseni Tarkovski said after seeing the premiere of his son’s “The Mirror”: “Andrei, it’s not films you are making”.
In that sense, I can’t be certain it’s films I’m making, even though I’m using the tools of Cinema to create.

If I had to choose the last necessity that commands me, I would have to mention my feeling of being indebted for what art gave me. My work should be up to my masters and their masterpieces so that if someone sees what I have done and can retain anything that helps to find better solutions to live more joyfully, then I would have achieved my task positively.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’m mixed race. My father is black and my mother white. I grew up from an outcast point of view. This perspective teaches a unique vision of pretty much any life experience. To begin with, nothing is ever taken for granted and fighting for a result becomes second nature, which is a strength more than flaw in our world. Deprived of the comfort of belonging to a community allowed me to see the limitations of such appartenance and grow bigger outside the borders. I have seen my parents fighting their whole life to maintain balance and protection from the outside world and it’s thanks to them if I believed an “outcast” can be turned into an “outsider” everyone is curious about and believes in eventually.
But I owe my brothers as much. They shaked my bubble and being the elder gave me the opportunity to be stronger and the sense of responsibility for others’ wellness. Nowadays, I often take my strength just by hanging with them on the phone for a few hours.
That’s how I know how crucial it is to surround yourself with the right people to work on a project. No one can do miracles but the right person can do exactly the right thing you need for a specific task. Being the big brother taught me some leading qualities required for being a better filmmaker: anyone can ask too much from their employees and colleagues but only someone able to ask what can be reasonably delivered will be realistic enough to achieve his goal while giving the chance for the others to grow along. We might be heroes of our own story but it doesn’t mean we don’t owe our surroundings to win too.

Website: https://www.prelude-film.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/charlesthename/

Image Credits
Images were taken by Maxence Urgin and Adam Eskilsson