At this year’s Femme Filmmakers Fest, Zita Short had the chance to speak with director Johanna Gustin and director of photography Jonathan Gustin about their short film Dicks That I Like (2024).
Zita Short: What do you think the unique potential of short-form cinema is when compared to long-form feature films?
Johanna Gustin: The typical process that a young filmmaker goes through when trying to break into the industry involves making one short and then several shorts and then a feature film. Leaving that aside, there is an accessibility to short-form productions that ensures that you can reach a wide audience. You put your video up online and everybody can watch it. I guess I didn’t make this film for everyone. I didn’t make it with a super broad audience in mind. You can make a short film with a very niche audience mind and avoid worrying about monetization. It’s always nice if you can monetize but you don’t have to. The bar for entry is very desirably low.
Zita Short: What was the development process for this short film like?
Johanna Gustin: One of the joys of short documentaries is that the journey from first conception to shooting can be very, very short. I had been peripherally aware of Daniella, the subject of the documentary, for a little while, because she was notorious in Berlin expat circles for holding these workshops. I called her up and she told me that she was holding a couple of sessions soon and would be open to us shooting them. Everything went by so quickly after that. We ended up renting 200 dollars worth of lights.
One of the things about shooting a documentary is that you have to be very open to the project completely changing once you get involved in the process. Initially I thought this documentary would be more focused around the workshops themselves, but I began to really connect with Daniella’s art and decided to incorporate more of her photography work into the short. I found her photographs so beautiful and I wanted to explore the female gaze on the male body. There were still a lot of the same interests in there but my focus shifted somewhat.
Jonathan Gustin: There were multiple workshops that we shot so the film really came together in the edit. We had a lot of footage and we had to cut a lot of it down to get to the point where we are now. We kind of stitched everything together to come out with the finished product.
Zita Short: With the increasing popularity of documentary films in the mainstream sphere, we see the line between scripted content and documentary filmmaking beginning to blur. Do you think this development is positive?
Johanna Gustin: I would love it if we saw more documentaries being financed. This is a very multifaceted question that requires a complicated answer. I think part of that is that YouTube and streaming have changed everything. Part of the problem is that television networks don’t want to finance anything anymore. Starting with the reality television shows of the 1990s, we saw this whole popular documentary renaissance emerge. A lot of that might look like fairly trivial content from the outside but I don’t really think you have to work that hard to go from something like “Teen Mom” to a more complex true crime documentary that asks thorny questions about ethics. I also think that there’s a path from consuming mainstream documentaries to consuming really weird, indie documentaries that are on Vimeo and YouTube. If you go down a weird YouTube algorithm, you have interesting documentary-based storytelling at your fingertips.
Jonathan Gustin: As a documentary filmmaker I feel like the last few years have seen a lot of development in terms of experimentation with the documentary form.
Johanna Gustin: I think that there’s a big concern about documentaries being authentic. There is this very postmodern concern with authenticity and we’ll see how that gets monetised by big studios. This has become a real point of difference for the documentary genre and I’ll be interested to see how it affects the industry. I am hopeful that it will create growth and allow people within the community to gain more opportunities.
Zita Short: You’re based in the Berlin expat community at a time when the city is making an active effort to attract creative types and intellectuals. Do you think it’s important for governments to provide financial support for the arts?
Johanna Gustin: I think that funding is hugely important. We recently attended another short film festival and kept noticing how every second filmmaker was Canadian. One of the reasons for this over-representation was that the Canadian government provides significant funding for locally produced short films. We have moved back to the United States after being based in Berlin and we are concerned about the struggles that you have to go through in securing funding here. Berlin is not perfect and presents its own problems but the attitude that people have is completely different. When you are surrounded by other artists in a big city you have the confidence to go out and shoot a film in a guerrilla fashion. It’s just not possible to have major artist communities in big American cities anymore for a variety of complex financial reasons. We think that Berlin might end up going the same way as so many American cities and become unaffordable for the average young artist. We even arrived in Berlin too late to experience the heyday of Berlin. It might as well be Paris or New York City at this point.
Jonathan Gustin: We are now based in the Bay Area so the rent is still high.
Johanna Gustin: It’s not easy.
Zita Short: The documentary engages with a lot of second-wave feminist theory about female solidarity and the power of collective action. Could you discuss how these workshops help women to achieve empowerment?
Johanna Gustin: All of the workshops that we focused on featured a diverse set of women. They had all come to this place, to sculpt a dick, for different reasons. There is something therapeutic about the sessions but they also avoid being overly prescriptive. Everyone wants and needs something different. They get into some intense conversations about being a woman in the arts. They didn’t necessarily anticipate that being the case. None of them were uncomfortable or appeared to regret it. It was an empowering experience for all of them.
Not that there aren’t things to criticize about second-wave feminism. I think this current wave that we are in is more intersectional and broad and group-focused. I think you see that in the documentary. Feminism is not just one thing.
Jonathan Gustin: We were also really moved by the female-only workshops. There was just something different about them. A specific energy in the room. In the edit Johanna picked the all-female workshop.
Johanna Gustin: I think it would have been a very different documentary if we had chosen footage from a different day. So much of modern-day feminism involves showing men all of the ways in which sexism is still present and pervasive. There was absolutely that tension present in the workshops that involved men.
Zita Short: What inspired you to go into filmmaking?
Jonathan Gustin: I get bored very easily and filmmaking gives you the chance to constantly try new things. I always feel as though something exciting will occur on the next project and I just can’t imagine doing anything else.
Johanna Gustin: I came to filmmaking later in life. Jonathan, as someone who grew up with German arts funding, had enough of a safety net to go into the entertainment industry from a young age. I kept trying to sideline my interests and go into something more practical. That’s a very American attitude. It wasn’t until I met Jonathan, who was already working in the industry, that I felt confident enough to follow my ambitions. I realized that the thing I thought I wasn’t very good at was something that I needed to pursue. It’s great that I was able to come at this with several decades of life experience behind me.
