Tribeca 2022 Women Directors: Meet Signe Baumane – “My Love Affair with Marriage”

Signe Baumane is a Latvian-born, Brooklyn-based independent filmmaker, artist, writer, and animator. She has made 17 award-winning animated shorts but is best known for her first animated feature, “Rocks in My Pockets.” The film covers a 100-year history of depression and suicide among the women in her family, including herself. It premiered at Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in 2014, went on to screen at over 130 international festivals, and opened theatrically in the U.S. through Zeitgeist Films. Baumane is a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow in Film for New York Foundation for the Arts.

“My Love Affair with Marriage” is screening at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival, which is taking place June 8-19.

W&H: Describe the film for us in your own words.

SB: At the center of the story, in the eye of the storm, is a young, spirited woman, Zelma, who is determined to find perfect love and lasting marriage no matter what. But she is not aware of what exactly makes her want love and marriage in the first place. And she is even less aware that her own biology is a powerful force to reckon with.

With the film, I am exploring what’s behind the most mythologized human emotion — romantic love — and counterbalancing it with biology. The animation allowed me to news complicated concepts and ideas in images. It also allowed me to incorporate humor in moments that otherwise would make you cry.

W&H: What drew you to this story?

SB: After I finished my first animated feature film, “Rocks in My Pockets,” I knew I wanted to make a film about my second marriage. I had been married to a gender-bending Swedish man and our love story was very dramatic. It unfolded against the backdrop of historic events, when the Soviet Union collapsed and the newly independent Latvia entered an entirely new system of values.

It could make a good film, I thought. East meets West and both are clueless about what the other is about. But once I sat down to write, my inner Sherlock Holmes woke up and asked, “Why did you want to marry him? Why did he want to marry you?” So, I had to dig a bit deeper to find where the impulse to marry was coming from. Which led to the question, “Why is the concept of marriage in our society, East or West, so entangled with concepts of love and gender?”

W&H: What do you want people to think about after they watch the film?

SB: First, I want them to walk out of the movie theater humming the end-credits song, “Lion,” which is sung by the amazing Storm Large, and feel hopeful that change towards equality and fairness can happen. 

I want them to think about the root of violence against women and feel inspired to start questioning existing paradigms in our society and our complicity in sustaining them even after it becomes obvious that they don’t work. I would like for people to recognize themselves in the film and say, “Ah! I see now why I stuck with that person for so long even though it was a toxic relationship.”

Sometimes it may feel that we are not entirely in control of our emotions, that feelings of love, anger, or fear carry us like helpless ducklings. But we are not helpless ducklings, we have powerful brains and can better deal with emotions than helpless ducklings. Ultimately, I want the audience to feel empowered. 

W&H: What was the biggest challenge in making the film?

SB: Sustaining the creative flow for six years while fundraising was the greatest challenge. 

Creative and financial challenges are tightly intertwined, as a tight budget can ground unrestrained creativity. But a tight budget can also inspire creativity: How can you make the story the best you can for the small amount of money you have?

This was the most ambitious project I have ever undertaken, with 30 singing and speaking characters and about 200 non-speaking characters. I think I was delusional when I started a project of this scale. Thankfully, we had great partners and collaborators.

W&H: How did you get your film funded? Share some insights into how you got the film made.

SB: To make a film you need relationships. You start with the relationships you already have and then expand further. When I started writing the script in 2015, I had one relationship that I knew could lift the project off the ground — with my life and business partner, Sturgis Warner. We formed a business entity, The Marriage Project LLC, so we could raise money and apply for grants as a partnership. Together, we ran a Kickstarter campaign in 2017 and with the help of 1,562 backers, raised $132,773 to record actors and hire an Italian composer, Kristian Sensini, to write 23 songs. 

Then Roberts Vinovskis, the Latvian co-producer of my previous film, “Rocks in My Pockets,” expressed interest in collaborating on my new project. We signed a partnership contract with his company, Studija Lokomotive, and Roberts submitted an application to Latvia’s Kino Center for support. The project received substantial support from Kino Center, but with the condition that all the money had to be spent in Latvia. We decided that the most expensive and time-consuming work — coloring and compositing — would be done in Latvia.

We had to keep fundraising in the United States to be able to continue building sets and animating in our Brooklyn studio. We applied for 35 grants and received six of them. Our fiscal sponsor, Filmmakers Collaborative, was key in fundraising from individual supporters and backers. 

At some point we realized we had no money to afford sound design, so we contacted a producer in Luxembourg, Paul Thiltges, whom I knew from years before. He introduced us to producer Raoul Nadalet, who agreed to be our partner and submitted the project’s pitch to FilmFund Luxembourg to cover post-production expenses. The FilmFund supported the project with the condition that the money had to be spent in Luxembourg. That’s how we got great sound design.

W&H: What inspired you to become a filmmaker?

SB: Since I could remember, I wanted to be a writer. But I was the kind of writer who, when stuck on a difficult page, would mindlessly doodle. One day a friend saw the doodles and said she wanted to see them move. I thought it was the best idea I ever heard — to make my doodles move. That’s how, by chance, I got into animation. Moving doodles and organizing them into stories turned out to be well suited to my obsessive-compulsive nature. With time my doodles got better and my stories got more complex and ambitious, but the original urge of the writer is still there — can I hold an audience with a meaningful story? Can I transport them into my world and make them care about characters and issues that I deeply care about?

To make a film is to connect with other people, be it your team or supporters while making it, or an audience when the film is finished.

W&H: What’s the best and worst advice you’ve received?

SB: The best advice was by someone — and I don’t remember who because it was in 1996, a long time ago — who, after hearing my reasons why I couldn’t make a film in New York (“I am too fresh off the boat, I don’t have support, I don’t have money, I don’t have equipment, etc.” — all valid reasons), said, “Those are not reasons, they are excuses. If you wanted to make a film you would make it.” That really stuck with me. I think of it every day. 

The worst advice that really burned me for several years was when I was in the process of making my first animated feature film, “Rocks in My Pockets.” Several animator friends whom I highly respected told me that making a voiceover-driven film with my own voice was a terrible mistake. They urged me to re-edit the film with less voiceover and to hire a professional actor.

It just threw oil onto the fire of my insecurities. For four years I thought, “I am making a horrible film that will make people puke.” Thankfully, my partner, Sturgis Warner, prevented me from even considering the suggested changes and it turned out that the film did work with audiences and the voiceover was a crucial part of it. 

“Rocks in My Pockets” was successful for a small budget film about the 100-year history of depression and suicides of the women of my family. But the four-year-long stress from that advice burned some holes in my Eternal Soul.

W&H: What advice do you have for other women directors?

SB: It never even occurred to me to do a feature film before my 40s, despite having more than a dozen shorts under my belt. My ambitions had always been tied to what is practically possible. As a woman growing up, I was discouraged of dreaming big. I thought that raising $100,000 for a feature film was impossible so I didn’t even consider it. It turned out that the greatest obstacle was in my head.

So, my advice would be: Dream bigger than what you think is practically possible, but not too far from the practically possible, so you don’t crash and burn.

W&H: Name your favorite woman-directed film and why.

SB: I can’t name one film, there are many. Here’s a list of four films by women directors that struck me like a lightning bolt when I saw them: “Wadjda” by Haifaa Al-Mansour, “Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi, “Mustang” by Deniz Gamze Ergüven, and “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” by Céline Sciamma. 

All four films have women at the center of their story in circumstances that work against them, and these women find the courage and will to defy them.

“The Diary of a Teenage Girl” by Marielle Heller is another amazing film that shook me to the core when I saw it. It is a complex look at a woman’s sexuality and her own agency. It is a controversial and courageous film. I wish I made it. 

W&H: How are you adjusting to life during the COVID-19 pandemic? Are you keeping creative, and if so, how? 

SB: It is easy for an animator to keep working during lockdowns. In fact, I have been more productive during the lockdowns than before, since there were no distractions and pressures to socialize. I just sit at my worktable and draw or write. Good for the project, and good for society, since I am not going out and possibly passing on infections.

W&H: The film industry has a long history of underrepresenting people of color onscreen and behind the scenes and reinforcing — and creating — negative stereotypes. What actions do you think need to be taken to make Hollywood and/or the doc world more inclusive?

SB: Give more opportunities to people of color.