I use the title, Zen Filmmaking: Truly Calculated as a bit or an oxymoron. Why? Because in the truth of Zen Filmmaking, there is no calculation. There is one elemental principal and that is to allow the essence of Zen to truly exist. Meaning, whatever happens, happens.
 
Whenever I read or hear people describing Zen Filmmaking, they often state, as a means of taking a shot, that the method uses no scripts in the creation of a film. Okay… That’s just the means to the method. It is what it is. And, as it is what it is, that is the true definition of a Zen Film.
 
That’s where it seems so many of the people out there who talk about the philosophy seem to completely misunderstand the concept. They want Zen Filmmaking to be something it is not. They what it to be defined by the accepted norms, techniques, and methods from the past. But, that’s exactly what Zen Filmmaking is not; i.e., something defined by the past. It is a whole and complete entity onto itself. An entity that holds no definition.
 
Now, you can love or hate a Zen Film. That’s fine. That’s hardly the issue. But, to define your distaste of a Zen Film by the attempting to define and nitpick the method, that is really a misunderstanding of the entire essence of Zen Filmmaking.
 
Once upon a time, maybe twenty-five years ago or so, when the term Zen Filmmaking seemed to be on the lips of a lot of people, in and around the film and journalistic industries, it was simply an expressed understanding of a method of Cinematic Art. And, that’s the way it should be. Again, Zen Filmmaking and a Zen Film should simply be allowed to be what it is; nothing less and nothing more.
 
More than fifteen years ago, I stopped making story-driven films. …If you could ever call a Zen Film truly story-driven. Or, maybe better put, character-driven. It’s been a lot of time since I’ve done one of those.
 
I get a lot of question, from a lot of people, will I even do another one. Maybe? I don’t know???
 
What I do know is, that since that point in time, I have made tons of Zen Films that intentionally involve no character-study. But, it seems that the people who wish to voice their opinions so loudly about what I do, describe why they believe why I do what I do, and to misrepresent and misunderstand what I do, have never moved on from that long ago and that far-far away.  Why, do I not know? Ask them.
 
In truth, the truth of Zen Filmmaking, (as I am Zen Filmmaking, I can categorically make this statement), what I have been creating for the time since the way back when is, what I believe to be a much more pure example of Cinematic Art than what I once created at the point I stepped into the ring of the film game so many years ago.
 
Artists change. Artists evolve. That’s just the way it is.  
 
So, what am I saying? Answer: Sure, I made character-driven films a long-long time ago. That’s how I imagined the art form to be expressed back then. For a million reasons untold, that changed. What I do now, (and I do a lot of it), is to make my vision of Cinematic Zen Art in the way I envision the final evolution of Zen Filmmaking to be expressed. To just BE.
 
So, for all of you Zen Filmmaking lovers and haters out there, remember, Zen Filmmaking is never defined by a formal structure, just the opposite. It is constantly changing, forever evolving. And, for everyone who picks up the torch and makes their own Zen Film, that is Zen the way they see it, feel it, and express it. Thus, Zen Filmmaking is only as pure as the filmmaker themselves who creates it while embracing their own vision of what they understand Zen to be.