Fascinating People: Jason Kohn

Jason Kohn is a documentary maker and director, interviewed most recently by Pure Nonfiction for his more recent release Love Means Zero, about the superstar tennis coach Nick Bollettieri https://purenonfiction.net/83-jason-kohn-love-means-zero/ . The first half of the interview is Kohn’s origin story and explores his relationship to film making and directing. The second half about his new movie. Kohn comes across as someone captivated by people he perceives as marching to the beat of their own drum (and perhaps even unaware that they are doing so). He discusses his first movie, Manda Bala (Send a Bullet), made ten years ago and based on his observations when living in Brazil. He notes that his movies are about narratives, as all movies, and anyone looking to be informed or educated about, say, world events will be disappointed. He also tells a story about how he became a film director: a childhood friend and business partner printed up business cards for them with the moniker when they were starting out. Kohn wonders where his friend got the chutzpah to do that but he accepted the label, even though growing up in middle class Long Island his sense was that becoming a film maker was limited to either the privileged or the genius, of which he considered himself neither. I’m not so sure about the latter, and recommend this interview and his films if you haven’t seen them.