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(such as at the treehouse on the island when you see me in the bunk bed). It seems to me that these things are absolutely necessary to make the film work.
It's true that I'm not explicit about my sexual involvement with the women in the film, some of whom I slept with, some of whom I didn't. It seemed to me not the point of the film to graphically render that dimension of things, even if it had been possible to do so. I think that by being respectful of the women involved in the film vis-à-vis my sexual involvement with them, the film gains more than it loses. To have been more explicit would have pushed the film into sensationalism and solipsism that ultimately would have been alienating. Also, we have to keep in mind that this is a film about real people and real events. It's a documentary, not a fiction, and there are certain issues of privacy one simply has to respect. But the sexuality being alluded to and yet not directly revealed adds a subtle tension to the film that I hope works in its best interests.
It's also true that the Ross McElwee who's presented in the film is not a completely rendered Ross McElwee. I don't say everything about myself that I could be saying. I don't tell you everything that's on my mind. I am creating a deadpan persona. Perhaps I create a heightened sense of depression, heightened in an attempt to attain some sort of comic level. I'm creating a persona for the film that's based upon who I am, but it isn't exactly me. Of course, it's hard to make the judgment myself. It's like the problem Wittgenstein describes when he talks about how the eye can see the world but can't see itself. It's difficult to know yourself and to know how you're presenting yourself to the world.