Hartley: I’ve always been terrified that the film I’m making will be my last film. [Even] when I was making my very first film, there was kind of fanatical energy which I’m glad I had because I was making a very small film, and it had some success. I wanted it to earn back its money and pay everybody, and make another film possible — that was really as far as I looked. It’s only in recent years, now that I’m into my 50s, that I really have relaxed.

I do want my films to be shown, but it’s always been very important to me to make a living. I come from a working class background and I wanted to be an artist. I never lied about that to anybody; I really did want to support myself. One of the things that I’m proud about in my life is that I have been able to support myself through my work. It’s as simple as that. That’s kind of my ideal of success at the moment. If I can take care of the old films, people can see them, and some income comes in from that, that’s all right.

You’ve both had long careers. Is there a piece of advice that’s been really valuable to you, and who gave it to you?

Hartley: [Filmmaker Michael Roemer] spent a day with us when I was at SUNY Purchase in the film department. He said, “In life, no matter what you do, you have to make lots of compromises for everybody else. But just know when you’re doing something for yourself, and don’t mess with that, don’t compromise with that.”

He was a professional for hire, director often, and he brought his skills and his talents to it. But sometimes there was something that he really felt it was his, [and] he wouldn’t compromise on that. That struck me and I’ve held on to that all my life.

Rockwell on the set of “Sweet Thing”

Rockwell: My grandfather was a Russian artist, and I was lucky enough to know him a little bit. He said to me that a piece of art and a piece of industry are two different things; that a piece of art is judged for its presence of qualities, whereas a piece of industry is judged for its lack of defects.

There are these moments in films that are just pure, and they last. I think that is a good thing for a young person to think about: don’t always try to remove what’s wrong in your film. Celebrate what you are excited about, fascinated by, and want to get better at, and focus on that, because that will really be what lasts. It’s not removing all the bumps and imperfections and having a committee decide what’s the best way to promote it. It’s going to end up diluting the vision of it. And that piece of advice kind of always stuck with me.

Hartley: Someone said, the difference between craft and art is that a craftsperson knows what they’re making. They’re making a chair, they make a good chair. Whereas art goes further because you have to allow yourself to aim for something you don’t know. You’re searching rather than carrying something out.

Rockwell: I have to say that that’s what’s really wonderful about Kickstarter for me — I am searching. I would never take a journey that I already know the end of. Kickstarter allows me experiment as I go through post production. I even grab shots I need at my own leisure, and it really aids me in that process of discovery and I really appreciate that opportunity.

Let’s talk about failure, which is something everyone has experienced at some point. Can you share a time you failed, what you learned from it, and how you kept going afterwards?

Hartley: There are lots of little failures that the outside world won’t even clock, and I have them all the time, day to day, week to week. The way I deal is to just move on, don’t dwell. Just admit like, “Alright, that’s a very poorly shot scene. What are we going to do?” There’s always a solution.

Rockwell: I invite failure in my world. I actually don’t even mind busting out laughing and saying, “That’s the most horrible scene I’ve ever shot!” Because then I’ll get better and I’ll learn.

Failure in my life has been painful to talk about, but I’m getting wiser about it. I’ve seen failures in terms of not getting my film distributed or almost having a film financed after two years and having it fall through. That’s painful and it’s personally horrific. What Hal said applies to it though, which is to learn from it, it gets you strong. I mean, it’s a cliche, but it really is true.

Don’t be afraid of failure. Just bring it right in the goddamn house and let it beat the shit out of you, but then get up and do what Hal said: just get up and do it again.