Comedian and Islander Amy Schumer arrived at the 7 pm screening of ‘Fire of Love’ at the Grange Hall during a misty July night in West Tisbury, wearing a long sleeve floral dress and L.L. Bean duck boots. Her husband, Chris Fischer, brought a bottle of wine and snacks to the community-style movie night, hosted by Circuit Arts.
Executive Director of Circuit Arts Brian Ditchfield told the Times that when putting together their program for the summer, the organization reaches out to influential community members to see if there is a film they would like to support and present. Schumer had expressed an interest in ‘Fire and Love.’
“Amy and Chris just loved the film,” Ditchfield said. “In many ways she was part of the programming team.”
The “Inside Amy Schumer” star was there to introduce writer/director/producer Sara Dosa and producer Shane Boris, the filmmakers responsible for the documentary.
‘Fire of Love,’ an award winning National Geographic Documentary Film, composed largely of archival footage, chronicles the explorations of Maurice and Katia Kraft, a married French volcanologist couple who shared a passion for studying and documenting active volcanoes around the world.
Transfixed by the “creative and destructive” power of nature, as the filmmakers put it during a question and answer period, the Krafts ultimately lost their lives in a “pyroclastic flow” while in close range of a volcanic eruption, while doing what they loved, and together. The filmmakers wanted to make clear their love for both one another and the experience in the field, but that if Maurice were to die, she wanted to die with him.
The film is available to stream now on Disney Plus.
Ditchfield welcomed the audience before introducing Schumer, who was sitting with her husband in the front row in one of the theater’s signature couches.
“When we formed this organization and began renovating this space a year ago, this is exactly the kind of intimate program that we imagined in this space, this community living room where we’re all cozied up, 4 to a couch. I’m really glad that you are all joining us tonight,” Ditchfield greeted the audience.
Then he handed off the mic to “a guest that needs no introduction,” Schumer. The audience applauded as the comedian stood and put her hands together in thanks.
“Thank you so much, I deserve that,” she said, garnering a wave of laughter.
“Another person who needs no introduction is my husband, who likes attention and wants to be up here,” she said. Fischer stood up beside her to greet the audience.
“We love this film,” said Schumer. “We want to introduce you to the filmmaker and director Sara Dosa, and Shane Borris, the producer. Will you guys please come up? And then we’re going to do some questions after.”
Dosa thanked Schumer, Fischer, Ditchfield, and Circuit Arts. “Amy has been a hero of mine for a myriad of reasons,” said Dosa. “And this film is really a love letter to nature, as you’ll soon see. Our few days here on Martha’s Vineyard, we have been so profoundly moved by the power of nature here, and we can so palpably feel how much people love the water, love the landscape, and love the community. So I hope you might be able to see that and feel that resonating through our film.”
As the lights dimmed, Fischer bit loudly into an apple he brought as a snack, the bite heard around the theater. “Shhh!” Schumer said dramatically, inciting more laughs from the audience.
Running 93 minutes and featuring raw, dramatic close-up footage of active volcanoes and eruptions, the film has been nominated thirty times at film festivals around the world since its 2022 release, and has won awards for best documentary feature and outstanding editing and directing.
In the Q & A following the screening, filmmakers Dosa and Boris discussed the writing process, which involved writing treatments and writing the narration for the film. The filmmakers drew from 200 hours of archival 1600 mm footage filmed by the French couple, as well as still photos, broadcast television interviews and appearances, and other materials.
“It was a really hard process of whittling down their archive. We were working on 200 hours of footage they shot, but there’s an additional 50 hours of them appearing on the news, variety programs, on the radio, and that was really instructive for us because their own footage was silent, we could never hear them talk,” said Dosa. Knowing this fact makes the film’s audio editing all the more impressive, which utilizes radio and television interview clips as voiceover, or the grotesque crackling sound of flowing lava, edited to accompany the original silent footage, or the roar of an erupting volcano.
The film also featured animation and lyrical voiceover, performed by Miranda July, both of which lend the film an existential and distinctly French quality.
“Our hope was to portray their life as fully and deeply as possible. And for us, life doesn’t exist in a hyper real way. Life is whimsical,” said Boris. “We feel an animated quality to life sometimes, for us, anyway.”
Dosa discussed having an interest in the “human relationship with nonhuman nature,” and acknowledged her films “tend to have a mythic or allegorical quality. She attributed her storytelling to listening deeply, and looking for meaning.
“When you encounter someone who is so connected to what is most meaningful to them, it is a kind of transcendent experience, it feels like it’s sacred in a way,” she said. “And to get to honor that through the process of listening and storytelling is what connects me deeply to not just making films, but also to being human.”
Boris also weighed in on storytelling. “Story itself is such a powerful medium. We all were brought up on it. That’s how we like to receive information. That’s how we experience emotion,” said Boris. As a filmmaker he said he aspires “to continue to receive inspiration in new ways, and ways that are in accordance with the changing earth and times.”
“Let’s see AI do that!” said Schumer, which earned a hearty round of applause.
Schumer’s comment highlights the voice of human storytelling in the face of fears of an ensuing wave of AI-generated content. Writers Guild of America writers are currently striking for renegotiations with America’s biggest television networks, with one of the points being protection for writers against AI-generated competition.
“You’re both masterful filmmakers, and anyone who has you to tell their story, they are so safe in your hands,” said Schumer.
Ditchfield closed the night by thanking the Martha’s Vineyard Preservation Trust, “for being stewards of this amazing building.”
Circuit Arts is the umbrella organization for the Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival, the Drive-In at the YMCA, Cinema Circus family programming, music events, a documentary production company Circuit Films, and several community arts initiatives, including the Martha’s Vineyard Children’s Theater Camp, starting Monday July 9th, and an island school-wide filmmaking project. Upcoming events include Cinema Circus on July 12th, a screening of the film ‘Waiting to Continue: The Venezuelan Asylum Seekers on Martha’s Vineyard’ on July 13th, ‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’ on July 14th at the Drive-In at the YMCA, and more. All screenings are pay-what-you-can.