Curiosity, Craftsmanship, and the Art of Seeing

A few years ago, someone asked me what camera I use. It's one of those questions filmmakers hear all the time, and I understand why. Cameras have become almost mythical objects. Every few months there's another model that's sharper, lighter, faster, or somehow promises to make us better storytellers simply because we own it.

I answered the question, of course. But afterward I realized I'd spent ten minutes talking about a piece of equipment that has very little to do with why I fell in love with filmmaking in the first place.

If you'd asked me what made me want to tell stories instead, I probably would have needed an hour. Because I don't think I became interested in filmmaking because of films. I became interested because I was endlessly fascinated by people... and by the world they moved through.

Long before I ever stood behind a camera, I found myself watching conversations unfold in cafés, train stations, airports and markets. I'd notice the person who smiled before they spoke, or the couple who somehow managed to have an entire argument without saying a word. But it wasn't only people that captured my attention.

I'd find myself studying the way afternoon light slipped across a café table. How an old doorway naturally framed someone walking through it. How taking two steps to the left completely transformed what I was seeing. I'd notice reflections in shop windows, long shadows stretching across cobblestones, or the way a staircase quietly pulled your eye toward a scene that most people walked past without ever noticing.

Most people tend to look at the main subject. I think I was becoming just as interested in everything surrounding it. Those small details—the light, the angles, the architecture, the rhythm of a place—often revealed just as much as the people themselves. Looking back, I realize I wasn't thinking like a filmmaker yet. I was simply paying attention.

Perhaps that's where every filmmaker begins. Not with cameras, but with curiosity.

That habit followed me into journalism. One of the first things I discovered as a reporter was that interviews rarely became interesting while people were answering your questions. They became interesting after they forgot they were being interviewed. You'd switch off the recorder, begin packing away your notebook, and then someone would suddenly say, "Actually..."

Those moments were gold. The rehearsed answers disappeared, and something more human took their place. I've carried that lesson into every film I've made since.

People often imagine filmmaking as an exercise in control. Storyboards, schedules, lighting diagrams, call sheets. And yes, all of those things matter. Anyone who's spent time on a film set knows that chaos is far less romantic than movies make it seem. But the paradox is that all of that preparation exists for one reason…to make room for the unexpected.

I still remember arriving in Los Angeles for the first time. Like many people outside America, I thought I already knew the city. I'd seen it in countless films. The palm trees, the wide boulevards, the Hollywood sign, the endless California sunshine—it all felt strangely familiar before I'd even stepped off the plane.

Then I started living here. That's when Los Angeles introduced itself properly. I quickly realized it wasn't interested in being glamorous all the time. It was much more interested in surprising me.

One morning I'd be drinking coffee in a neighborhood that felt almost European. By lunchtime I'd be wandering through Silverlake. Later I'd be scouting warehouses downtown that looked as though they'd barely changed since the 1940s, before finishing the day watching the city dissolve into that impossible golden California light from somewhere in the hills.

People often talk about Los Angeles as though it's one city. It isn't. It's dozens of cities stitched together by freeways, imagination, and an endless collection of personalities. Every neighborhood has its own rhythm. Its own architecture. Its own color palette. Even its own pace of conversation. As a filmmaker, it's impossible not to fall in love with that.

When I'm scouting locations, I'm rarely asking whether somewhere is beautiful. I'm asking whether there's a story hiding there. Where does the light fall at four o'clock in the afternoon? What happens if the camera moves six feet to the left? Does that window create a reflection no one noticed? Does that staircase suddenly become a leading line? Is there an angle that turns an ordinary building into something quietly cinematic?

Sometimes the most beautiful shot isn't where everyone points their camera. It's just around the corner. Or a few steps higher. Or waiting for the light to change. Those are the moments I love discovering.

People sometimes ask whether being French changes the way I make films. I usually hesitate before answering because it's difficult to separate who you are from where you came from. I don't wake up thinking, Today I'll direct this scene the French way. But culture has a curious way of staying with us.

Growing up in France, cinema occupied a different place in everyday life. Films weren't simply entertainment. They were part of conversation. Directors were debated in cafés. People argued about endings, performances, and whether a silence lasted too long—or not long enough.

I grew up believing audiences were intelligent. That they enjoyed connecting the dots for themselves. That not every emotion needed to be explained.

When I arrived in America, I discovered something equally inspiring. Optimism.

There's an extraordinary confidence here. An assumption that impossible things are worth attempting anyway. Hollywood, for all the clichés attached to it, remains one of the world's most ambitious creative ecosystems because people come here believing stories can change lives. It's difficult not to admire that.

These days I find myself somewhere between those two influences. I love restraint. I also love ambition. I love carefully composed images. I also love the beautifully imperfect moments that no storyboard could ever predict. Perhaps filmmaking is simply the lifelong attempt to balance those opposites.

When Noah and I founded O&N Films, we weren't really talking about creating another production company. There are already plenty of those. The world doesn't need another company capable of operating expensive cameras. What interested us was something much less tangible. We wanted to build a place where craftsmanship still mattered. That's a word I think about often. Craftsmanship, not perfection. There's a difference.

Perfection is impossible—and honestly, not especially interesting. The films that stay with us usually contain small imperfections that make them feel alive. A glance that wasn't planned. A laugh that arrived unexpectedly. A movement no one storyboarded that somehow became the emotional center of the scene.

Craftsmanship is something else entirely. It's caring enough to notice. Sometimes that means spending another hour refining a script. Sometimes it means waiting fifteen more minutes because the light is changing. Sometimes it means realizing the conversation happening while everyone thinks they're taking a break is more interesting than the interview you carefully prepared. And sometimes it means recognizing that moving the camera only a few feet completely changes the emotional weight of an image because you've noticed a reflection, a shadow, a line of architecture, or a simple perspective that everyone else overlooked. Those decisions rarely appear in the credits. But they're often the reason a film feels different.

One thing I've learned from working with brands over the years is that almost every company believes they're selling a product. They're usually wrong. The companies people remember aren't selling watches or hotels or restaurants or skincare or architecture. They're inviting people into a way of seeing the world. The product simply becomes the passport.

That's one of the reasons I enjoy directing commercial films just as much as documentaries. At first glance they seem completely different. One is marketing. The other is journalism. In reality, they both begin with exactly the same question. Why does this matter? If nobody on set can answer that honestly, no camera in the world is going to rescue the project.

I sometimes tell clients that audiences are remarkably generous. They'll forgive technical imperfections. What they won't forgive is indifference. People know when you don't mean it. Fortunately, they also know when you do.

I still become excited before every shoot. Not because I think everything will go according to plan. Usually it doesn't! The weather changes. Someone gets stuck in traffic. Equipment fails. A location suddenly becomes unavailable. Filmmaking has a wonderful way of reminding you that you're collaborating with reality, not controlling it. Oddly enough, those complications often become the best part of the day.

I've lost count of how many times an unexpected obstacle forced us to discover something better than the idea we'd originally planned. Perhaps that's why I still love this work after all these years.

Every project begins with a plan. The real story begins the moment you're observant enough to notice everything you never planned to see.