In the last couple of years, I have produced what I call "The Dead Mall Series," 32 short films and counting about dead malls. Now, for those of you who are not familiar with what a dead mall is, it's basically a shopping mall that has fallen into hard times. So it either has few shops and fewer shoppers, or it's abandoned and crumbling into ruin. No sale at Penny's.
Poslednjih par godina napravio sam ono što nazivam „Serijom o propalim tržnim centrima“, 32 kratka filma i neke koji će uslediti o propalim tržnim centrima. Za one među vama koji nisu upoznati sa time šta je propali tržni centar, to je u suštini tržni centar koji je zapao u tešku situaciju. Ima ili nekoliko radnji i još manje kupaca ili je napušten i prerasta u ruševinu. Nema rasprodaje kod „Peni“.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I started producing this series in early 2015 after going through kind of a dark period in my life where I just didn't want to create films anymore. I put my camera away and I just stopped. So in 2015, I decided to make a short film about the Owings Mills Mall. Owings Mills Mall opened in 1986. I should know because I was there on opening day. I was there with my family, along with every other family in Baltimore, and you had to drive around for 45 minutes just to find a parking spot. So if you can imagine, that's not happening at the malls today.
Počeo sam da pravim ovaj serijal početkom 2015. godine, nakon što sam prolazio kroz mračan životni period u kome jednostavno više nisam želeo da stvaram filmove. Sklonio sam kameru i jednostavno sam prestao. Tako sam 2015. godine rešio da napravim kratak film o tržnom centru „Ovings Mils“. Tržni centar „Ovings Mils“ otvoren je 1986. godine. To znam jer sam bio tamo na dan otvaranja. Bio sam tamo sa svojom porodicom, zajedno sa svim ostalim porodicama u Baltimoru, i morali smo da se vozimo okolo 45 minuta samo da bismo pronašli mesto za parkiranje. Pa, ako možete to da zamislite, to se danas ne dešava u tržnim centrima.
My first mall job that I had as a teenager was at a sporting goods store called Herman's World of Sports. Maybe you remember.
Prvi posao koji sam dobio u tržnom centru kao tinejdžer bio je u radnji sportske opreme zvane „Hermanov svet sporta“. Možda se sećate.
(Singing) Herman's World of Sports.
(Peva) Hermanov svet sporta.
You guys remember that?
Sećate se toga?
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Yeah, so I worked in a lady's shoe store. I worked in a leather goods store, and I also worked in a video store, and not being one who was very fond of the retail arts --
Radio sam u prodavnici cipela za žene. Radio sam u prodavnici kožne galanterije i takođe sam radio u videoteci, a kako nisam bio naročito naklonjen trgovačkim veštinama -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I got fired from every single job.
Otpustili su me sa svakog posla.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
In between these low-paying retail jobs, I did what any normal teenager did in the 1990s. I shoplifted. I'm just kidding. I hung out with my friends at the mall.
Između ovih loše plaćenih poslova u maloprodaji, radio sam isto što je radio svaki normalan tinejdžer '90-ih godina. Krao sam po prodavnicama. Samo se šalim. Družio sam se sa prijateljima u tržnom centru.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Everyone's like, "Oh my God, what kind of talk is this?"
Svi sad misle: „O, bože, kakav je ovo govor?“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Hanging out at the mall could be fun, but it could be really lame, too, like sharing a cigarette with a 40-year-old unemployed mall rat who has put on black lipstick for the night while you're on your break from your crappy minimum wage job.
Druženje u tržnom centru može biti zabavno, ali i jadno, kao deljenje cigarete sa nezaposlenom klošarkom od 40 godina koja je stavila crni karmin te večeri dok ste vi na pauzi na svom jadnom poslu sa minimalcem.
As I stand here today, Owings Mills has been gutted and it's ready for the wrecking ball. The last time I was there, it was in the evening, and it was about three days before they closed the mall for good. And you kind of felt -- they never announced the mall was closing, but you had this sort of feeling, this ominous feeling, that something big was going to happen, like it was the end of the road. It was a very creepy walk through the mall. Let me show you.
Dok danas stojim ovde, „Ovings Mils“ je opustošen i spreman je za rušenje. Poslednji put kada sam bio tamo bilo je veče i bilo je otprilike tri dana pre nego što su trajno zatvorili tržni centar. Nekako se osećalo - nisu najavili da se tržni centar zatvara, ali tu je bilo nekakvo osećanje, to zloslutno osećanje da će se dogoditi nešto veliko, kao da je tu kraj puta. Bila je to veoma jeziva šetnja kroz tržni centar. Da vam pokažem.
(Music)
(Muzika)
So when I started producing "The Dead Mall Series," I put the videos up onto YouTube, and while I thought they were interesting, frankly I didn't think others would share the enthusiasm for such a drab and depressing topic. But apparently I was wrong, because a lot of people started to comment. And at first the comments were like -- basically like, "Oh my God, that's the mall from my childhood. What happened?" And then I would get comments from people who were like, "There's a dead mall in my town. You should come and film it." So I started to travel around the mid-Atlantic region filming these dead malls. Some were open. Some were abandoned. It was kind of always hard to get into the ones that were abandoned, but I somehow always found a way in.
Kada sam počeo da pravim „Seriju o propalim tržnim centrima“, postavio sam snimke na Jutjub i, iako sam smatrao da su zanimljivi, iskreno nisam mislio da će drugi deliti entuzijazam u vezi sa tako jednoličnom i depresivnom temom. Ali očigledno je da nisam bio u pravu, jer je mnogo ljudi počelo da komentariše. U početku su komentari bili ovakvi: „O, bože, to je tržni centar iz mog detinjstva. Šta se dogodilo?“ A zatim bih dobio komentare od ljudi koji bi rekli: „U mom gradu se nalazi propali tržni centar. Trebalo bi da dođeš i da ga snimiš.“ Tako sam počeo da putujem srednjoatlantskom regijom, snimajući te propale tržne centre. Neki od njih su bili otvoreni. Neki su bili napušteni. Uvek je bilo teško ući u one koji su bili napušteni, ali sam nekako uvek pronalazio način.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
The malls that are still open, they always do this weird thing -- like the dead malls. They'll have three stores left, but they try to spruce it up to make it appear like things are on the up-and-up. For example, you'll have an empty store and they bring the gate down. So at Owings Mills, for example, they put this tarp over the gate. Right? And it's got a stock photo of a woman who is so happy and she's holding a blouse, and she's like --
Tržni centri koji su još uvek otvoreni uvek rade jednu čudnu stvar - kao propali tržni centri. Imaju tri preostale radnje, ali pokušavaju da doteraju tako da izgleda da su stvari kako treba. Na primer, imate praznu radnju i oni spuste vrata. Tako su u „Ovings Milsu“, na primer, stavili ceradu preko vrata. Na njoj je fotografija žene koja je veoma srećna i drži bluzu, ovako -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
And then there's a guy standing next to her, with, like, an espresso cup, and he's like --
Zatim, tu je tip koji stoji pored nje sa šoljicom espresa, ovako -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
And it says, "What brings you today?"
Piše: „Zašto ste došli danas?“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I wanted to be scared and depressed. Thank you.
Hteo sam da se uplašim i deprimiram. Hvala vam.
So the comments just kept pouring in on the videos, from all over the country, and then all over the world. And I started to think, this could really be something, but I had to get creative, because I'm like, how long are people going to sit and watch me waddling through an empty mall?
Tako su komentari na snimke nastavili da pristižu u vezi sa snimcima iz svih delova zemlje, a zatim i sa svih strana sveta. Počeo sam da pomišljam da od toga stvarno može biti nešto, ali sam morao da budem kreativan, jer sam pomislio: „Koliko dugo će ljudi da sede i da me gledaju kako se gegam
(Laughter)
po praznom tržnom centru?“
(Smeh)
So the original episodes I filmed with an iPhone. So I'd walk through the mall with an iPhone, and, you know. Like that.
Prvobitnu epizodu sam snimio pomoću Ajfona. Šetao sam kroz tržni centar sa Ajfonom i, znate. Tako.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
And security -- because malls, they don't like photography -- so the security would come up and be like, "Put that away," and I'm like, "OK." So I had to get creative and sneaky, so I started using a hidden camera and different techniques to get the footage that I needed, and basically what I wanted to do was make the video like it was a first-person experience, like you are sitting -- put your headphones on watching the screen -- it's like, you're there in the video, like a video game, basically.
A obezbeđenje - pošto u tržnim centrima ne vole fotografisanje - prišli bi i rekli: „Skloni to“, a ja bih odgovorio: „U redu.“ Tako da sam morao da postanem kreativan i lukav, pa sam počeo da koristim skrivenu kameru i različite tehnike da bih dobio snimak koji mi je trebao, a u suštini sam hteo da napravim snimak kao da je iskustvo iz prve ruke, kao da sedite - stavite svoje slušalice dok gledate ekran - i kao da ste tamo u snimku, kao video igrica, u suštini.
I also started to use music, collaborating with artists who create music called vaporwave. And vaporwave is a music genre that emerged in the early 2010s among internet communities. Here's an example.
Takođe sam počeo da koristim muziku, u saradnji sa umetnicima koji su stvarali muziku zvanu vejporvejv. Vejporvejv je muzički žanr koji se pojavio početkom 2010-ih godina među internet zajednicama. Evo primera.
(Music)
(Muzika)
That's by an artist named Disconscious from an album he did called "Hologram Plaza." So if you look that up, you can hear more of those tunes. Vaporwave is more than an art form. It's like a movement. It's nihilistic, it's angsty, but it's somehow comforting. The whole aesthetic is a way of dealing with things you can't do anything about, like no jobs, or sitting in your parents' basement eating ramen noodles. Vaporwave came out of this generation's desire to express their hopelessness, the same way that the pre-internet generation did sitting around in the food court.
To je delo umetnika po imenu Disconscious, sa njegovog albuma pod nazivom „Hologram Plaza“. Ako to potražite, možete čuti više tih melodija. Vejporvejv je više od umetničkog izraza. On je poput nekog pokreta. Nihilistički je i ljutit, ali je nekako utešan. Cela estetika je način suočavanja sa stvarima u vezi sa kojima ne možete ništa da učinite, kao što je nedostatak poslova ili sedenje u podrumu svojih roditelja dok jedete nudle. Vejporvejv je proizašao iz želje ove generacije da izrazi svoje beznađe, isto kao što su generacije pre nego što je postojao internet sedele u odeljku sa restoranima.
One of my favorite malls I've been to is in Corpus Christi, and it's called the Sunrise Mall. When I was a kid, my favorite thing to do was watch movies, and I used to watch movies over and over and over again. And one of my favorite films was "The Legend of Billie Jean." Now, for those of you who have seen "The Legend of Billie Jean," you'll know that it's a great film. I love it. And Helen Slater and Christian Slater -- and if you didn't know, they are not related. Many people thought that they were brother and sister. They're not. But anyway, Sunrise Mall was used in the film as a filming location. The mall is exactly the same as it was in 1984. We're talking 32 years later. Let me show you.
Jedan od mojih omiljenih tržnih centara u kojima sam bio je u Korpus Kristiju i zove se tržni centar „Sanrajz“. Kada sam bio dete, omiljena razonoda mi je bila gledanje filmova i stalno sam gledao filmove iznova. Jedan od mojih omiljenih filmova bio je „Legenda o Bili Džin“. Za one od vas koji su gledali „Legendu o Bili Džin“, znate da je to odličan film. Ja ga obožavam. A Helen Slejter i Kristijan Slejter - ako niste znali, nisu u srodstvu. Mnogi su mislili da su brat i sestra. Nisu. U svakom slučaju, tržni centar „Sanrajz“ je u filmu korišćen kao lokacija za snimanje. Tržni centar je potpuno isti kakav je bio i 1984. godine. Govorimo o 32 godine kasnije. Dozvolite da vam pokažem.
(Video) Dan Bell: And here's Billie Jean running across the fountain, being chased by Hubie Pyatt's friends. And she jumps over here. And you can see the shot right here is what it looks like today. It's pretty incredible. I mean, honestly, it's exactly the same. And there they are falling in the fountain, and she runs up the stairs. This is a nice shot of the whole thing here.
(Video) Den Bel: Ovde Bili Džin trči preko fontane dok je jure prijatelji Hjubija Pajata. Ona preskače ovde. Možete videti ovde na snimku kako to izgleda danas. Prilično je neverovatno. Mislim, iskreno, potpuno je isto. Evo ih kako upadaju u fontanu, a ona trči uz stepenice. Ovo je fini snimak celokupnog prostora.
Dan Bell: I love that so much.
Den Bel: Toliko mi se to dopada.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I always think in my head, if I owned a dead mall -- why don't they embrace their vintage look? Put in a bar, like, put vegan food in the food court and invite millennials and hipsters to come and drink and eat, and I guarantee you within three weeks H&M and Levi's will be banging on the door trying to get space. I don't know why they don't do this, but apparently, it's only in my mind, it goes all day.
Uvek sam mislio u sebi, kad bih bio vlasnik propalog tržnog centra - zašto se ne priklone retro izgledu? Postavite kafić, ubacite vegansku hranu u restorane i pozovite milenijalce i hipstere da dođu da piju i jedu, i garantujem da će u roku od tri nedelje H&M i Levi's zakucati na vrata pokušavajući da dobiju prostor. Ne znam zašto to ne rade, ali očigledno, to je samo u mojoj glavi, tako radi po ceo dan.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Anyway, in closing --
U svakom slučaju, za kraj -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
When they first asked me to do this talk, I said, "Do you have the right person?"
Kada su me pitali da održim ovaj govor, rekao sam: „Da li ste se obratili pravoj osobi?“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
These talks are supposed to be kind of inspiring and --
Ovi govori treba da budu inspirativni i -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I remembered something, though. I put my camera down three or four years ago, and it took going to these malls for me to be inspired again. And to see my audience and people from all over the world writing me and saying, "God, I love your videos," is incredible. I don't know how to even explain it, as an artist, how fulfilling that is. If you would have told me a year ago that I would be standing on this stage talking to all of you wonderful people, I would have never believed it. I am humbled and so appreciative.
Setio sam se nečega, doduše. Ostavio sam kameru pre tri ili četiri godine, i bilo je potrebno da odem u ove tržne centre da ponovo dobijem inspiraciju. A kada vidim svoju publiku i ljude sa svih strana sveta koji mi pišu i kažu: „Bože, obožavam tvoje snimke“, to je neverovatno. Ne znam ni kako da to objasnim, kao umetnik, koliko to ispunjava. Da ste mi rekli pre godinu dana da ću stajati na ovoj pozornici i govoriti pred svima vama, divnim ljudima, nikada ne bih poverovao. Ponizan sam i veoma zahvalan.
Thank you very much.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)