My friend Lorien Eck and her students at West Adams Prep on Vermont in Los Angeles went through a pretty elaborate and interesting process to create their West Adams Prep Labyrinth. You can read all about it here...and you can see some great photos of the thing taking shape.
I am a gardener myself (I do most of my best writing out there), and when I heard there would be a ribbon cutting I jumped at the chance to attend. Just as she was heading to the front of the crowd with the scissors I asked Lorien who was shooting video and she said, "Aren't you?" Which is true--I had said I would, but didn't have a camera aside from my marathon-proof Olympus. I'd brought it to shoot panoramas. I rolled with it and... "that's the way it fell off the truck."
This is a very static film, but I love that it has beginning-middle-end anyways. I walked around the outside and then I followed the crowd into the labyrinth: all the way in and all the way out again. There is a narrative to the order in which the people go through: I love the little kid in red, and then all the students who built it, followed by the guys from Inner Gardens, West Adams staff, friends and family, etc. I love Noh plays, and this reminds me of Noh...there is a theatrical convention in Noh (and also Peking Opera) where a character indicates a journey by walking in a small circle onstage. There are many people on a journey in this one: the little boy in red, the students, younger and older folks, couples, a pregnant woman...seeing them looping back and forth...well, there's a story in there somewhere.
The music is from a site called http://www.inbflat.net/, which must be seen to be understood. It's a mashup I created myself on the fly...loads of fun.
Through the Labyrinth from John Flynn on Vimeo.
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