Joanna Arnow about „I hate myself :)“

You had sex on camera. Did you have a line for not filming?
If someone else asks me not to film them then I won’t. But I wouldn’t put limits on myself. If I was uncomfortable or taking a risk while filming, it usually meant I was getting interesting footage and I didn’t want to restrict my options in the edit process.

Which situations were most uncomfortable for you?
For one, I initially felt uncomfortable talking about my lack of previous sexual/romantic experience – and partly because it was uncomfortable, I knew it was a subject that I should pursue further.

The film is about James Kepple but it also shows a lot about yourself and your relationship to yourself. In which way did the film influence you in your personal development?
Over the course of making this film, I came to be more honest with myself about aspects of my identity that I previously found shameful. In being more open about these parts of myself, I realized they were not a big deal at all, and even funny – I called the film „I hate myself : )“ because it reflects this trajectory.

How hard was it to persuade James Kepple to release the movie? He is not really portrayed in the best light.
At the beginning of making this documentary, James agreed to be in the film and signed a release form – so that wasn’t an issue. And I think because James is a poet himself and a particularly vocal proponent of free speech, he also isn’t one to ask someone to alter their work.

You put the audience right into your life and let them participate in very personal and uncomfortable situations, for example when you show your parents your sex scenes. Why did you confront the audience with scenes like the „rebound sex“ that usually remain private?
For me, one of the beautiful aspects of documentary films is they can give a very close view of another person, and you can get a sense of what their life is like. In books and movies, I often look for some insight into how other people are that I don’t normally have access to. Because it’s usually the shameful parts of people’s lives that we keep hidden, that’s what I especially think it’s valuable to see – these aspects are part of what makes us human too. Sex is an important part of relationships and shows a lot about them, and so to leave it out of my film would have been an omission.
I also just enjoy sex scenes in films – if you told me nothing about a documentary except one had a sex scene, and one didn’t, I would go to the documentary with the sex scene without question. As a filmmaker, I hope to make films that challenge and excite – strong emotions like this often come from discomfort. A theater teacher once told me that an audience should be either leaning in towards the action or pushing themselves back in their seat, and that’s a philosophy I very much agree with.
On another note, my parents did not actually watch the sex scene – I told them it was coming up so that they would have the choice not to watch, and they opted not to.

The question why you were in a relationship with him at all appears a lot in the movie. Do you have an answer for the question now?
I also speak to some of the reasons I was attracted to James in the film, and my answer is pretty much the same now – that he was an outgoing, charismatic, performer – qualities that I would like to have more of myself. In the film, I also talk about how some of the problems were some of the attractions of the relationship. I feel like that’s sometimes the case with relationships, and hoped this would be an idea to which others could relate.

Interview: Laura Varriale