Isabelle Mecattaf
“ON YOUR RADAR” IS A WEEKLY GRAD FILM NEWS SEGMENT THAT FEATURES A STUDENT PICKED AT RANDOM.
ISABELLE IS CURRENTLY A 3RD YEAR STUDENT AT GRAD FILM. WE ASKED HER A FEW QUESTIONS, AND HERE’S WHAT SHE HAD TO SAY:
Where do you consider home and what is it like there?
I grew up in Beirut, Lebanon. But I left at 18 and so although I am from there, I don’t know that it’s necessarily home anymore.
I’ve been in NYC for 4 years now and although I love it here, It’s not home either. Home is an elusive concept for me. I know where I’m from, and what I’d like to say or explore in my movies, but home is a different beast altogether. I’m always on the move, looking for the next thing. I’m not looking to settle down yet and say yes, this is where I live. I just want to be wherever it makes sense for me to make my movies. Wherever that is will be home for a while until the next place makes more sense.
What is currently inspiring you as a filmmaker?
Anger. Is that bad?
I’m angry at a lot of things lately. Covid. The explosion in Lebanon this summer. Xenophobia and racism. I mean the list is endless. But really I’m angry at the lack of humanity. The lack of care for what happens to other people, as long as it doesn’t happen “to us”. And I’m trying to take that anger and make something productive out of it. But I’m not trying to make a documentary, so how do you take everything that’s happening around you (that perhaps makes you angry) and turn it into a story that’s compelling, and entertaining and enjoyable, but that also embodies all of the things that make you want to scream at the top of your lungs?
Most rewarding experience at NYU?
Meeting the people that I know I will work with for the rest of my career.