We recently connected with Jaden Quan and have shared our conversation below.
Jaden, so great to have you with us and we want to jump right into a really important question. In recent years, it’s become so clear that we’re living through a time where so many folks are lacking self-confidence and self-esteem. So, we’d love to hear about your journey and how you developed your self-confidence and self-esteem.
Having creative ambitions, even at an early age, can be alienating. Growing up around rural Colorado, I found myself immersed in a community that valued life very differently than I did. I felt like everyone around me was grounded, and focused on the tactile challenges of life. Then there was me, stuck with my head in the clouds, dreaming up characters, stories, and worlds that I was too embarrassed to materialize. I cared so much about the ideas in my head, but could not rationalize why it would matter to anyone else. This way of thinking became a self-imposed barrier, obscuring my passion for storytelling for many years. It negatively effected my confidence, self-worth, and identity.
From then on, I spent a large amount of my upbringing chasing a persona that was not me. I was a terrible athlete, but I tried out for sports because that’s what boys do. I was a disinterested student, but I dialed in on my studies, because that’s what successful people do. I was an emotional person, but I had to bury my feelings away, because that’s what a man does.
It’s important to understand, Western Colorado is known for its serene, albeit desolate beauty. It’s chock full of honest, hard-working, and self reliant people. I love that about my community, but with that love also came fear. I was afraid of complacency and stagnation. The idea that I would be stuck in this small town forever, never having found my own identity, and becoming an element of the background, not meant to be perceived or valued.
What I failed to realize was that my story was still developing. My entire life would change on April 22nd, 2023. My best friend of 20 years died of an epileptic seizure. Two weeks before he passed, him and I went out on the town. We spent the night riffing back and forth, doing an impression of Jack Nicholson, aching our eyebrows and looking over a fake pair of sunglasses, neurotically repeating “Now, y’see, if you keep the camera rolling, you’d see me shoot the girl in the head, and remark that she fell down in a funny way. Now that’s a real sinister thing to say.”
This was not our most clever inside joke, but it would become the last one we would ever share. The day of my friend’s memorial. his mother gave me a letter that he wrote directly to me. It became clear that he knew his condition was going to kill him, and that letter became the last words he would ever say to me. The letter was short, simply saying that there wasn’t anything he could write to me that I didn’t already know. He was right. He knew he was my brother – that he was my family, and that I loved him. The last thing on the page was a plea to me, one that only I could ever understand. Intended to be read in the voice of Jack Nicholson: “Keep the camera rolling.”
It was his way of telling me to chase my dream. Let go of these limitations I’ve created for myself. Deny the notion that I cannot have what I want. He was telling me to do what I do best: Start telling stories.
Like that, my mindset completely changed. I’ve always known that the dream to be a filmmaker was, in essence, a delusion. But the nature of delusions is that they are lies that are nearly impossible to distinguish from the truth. So, my response is to steer into the skid. If I can validate my own delusions, then any story I tell can be just as valid. If I can sell myself on a story, then I can sell anyone on it. My imagination is not a burden, it’s my greatest asset. And I am lucky enough to exist in a time when the greatest artistic medium in history is more accessible than ever before. I live and breathe filmmaking, and I’m very good at it. And now more than ever, I see the power behind it. It’s given me goals to chase, skills to develop, and a community to embrace.
I still have so much to learn, but I know who I am now, and I’m right where I need to be. As long as we keep the camera rolling.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I’m a Filmmaker by trade, but at the root, the more apt description is that I am a storyteller. What I love about film is that story is key at every step. From writing, designing, shooting, editing, and selling. Each step requires me to infiltrate the mind of an audience and identify their values and sensibilities, and tailoring my approach to those concepts in order to yield the best results.
For the last year, my company Jhova Media has been laser focused on Documentary work. Our motto is to chase the “Untold Stories,” which has led us to working with both the highest level business leaders to the lowest, most underserved communities in the United States. These days, civil advocacy tends to appear trendy and hollow. I think Jhova is, in many ways, a rejection of that. We don’t shoot documentaries with the intent to capture content and leave our subjects in the dust. Our goal is always to pull as many strings as we can to get our films in front of the eyes of decision makers, and influence genuine change.
With that also comes our work with Non-Profits. We work with several organizations in the Eagle/Vail Valley, helping promote their work to reinforce community resilience, break down barriers, facilitate conversations, and tighten the network of hard working people. We want these organizations to grow and succeed, and because of this, our company policy is to offer all non-profits 15% off of full service production work. Filmmaking is not, by any stretch, a cheap investment. However, it’s important to us that we remain accessible to those who are underserved. It supports collaboration, creates new opportunities, and is creatively fulfilling. In my eyes, everybody wins.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Storytelling is, of course, the most important skill in filmmaking. However, in my career I’ve found that there are so many more facets to selling a story than simply knowing how to tell it.
First, you need to believe in it. You need to be unapologetically confident in your work, and value it so much that it becomes undeniable. In order to really do this, you need to value yourself. Sometimes this means nourishing your mind and body. Sometimes this means investing in new clothes or aesthetics. Sometimes, you just have to straight up lie to yourself until it becomes indistinguishable from the empirical truth.
Second, be open to everything. Inspiration comes sometimes from the strangest of places. If you’re a filmmaker, don’t seclude your pallet to classic cinema, Marvel movies, or YouTubers. Take it all in, and then after that, consume even more. Go to the museum and look at contemporary art. Read about history and connect with the poetry of the human experience. Watch Monday Night Football and pay attention to how effectively the broadcast crew cuts between cameras. Art is everywhere, organically or artificially. And it’s all there for you to collect, earn, and steal. Werner Herzog once said, “We are thieves. We get away with loot from the most beautiful or the most scary or the most spectacular. Places that you can ever find, just hit and run, and get away with film.”
Third, and finally, you must become intimately and overbearingly familiar with failure. Defeat can be the most suffocating sensation in the world. You will have points when you feel foolish, ashamed, and hopeless. Learn to carry this with you on your whole journey. Don’t embrace it, but expect it. Take failure and buckle it into your passenger seat, because it’s better to have it riding with you than to find it lurking on the road ahead.
One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?
In collaborative spaces, I find that the greatest value one can contribute is humor. I’m a huge comedy fan, with some of my idols being Bill Hader, Donald Glover, Norm Macdonald, Mitch Hedberg, Trey Parker, and Matt Stone. These individuals are more than just amusing, they are masters of deconstruction. Taking any idea and observing it from an angle that is irrational or misguided can lead to some of the funniest results you can imagine, and by attaching that emotion to it – that laughter – you gain a backroad into how to connect with an audience.
When I look for people to collaborate with, I often look for people who make me laugh. Because if they do, I know that they’re in a constant state of looking for an angle to execute a joke. The most sharp minded can find this within a fraction of a second after being introduced to a new idea, and that level of wit is a tried and true method of creating something meaningful.
This current documentary I am working on, titled “The Invisible Patient,” follows the state of the mental health industry, and the darkest side of mental illness. This has led us to speaking with people who suffer from delusions, addictions, and poverty like you’ve never seen. Nonetheless, every production meeting we have is always colored with laughter and levity. Not out of callousness or at the expense of others, but in the grand absurdity of a dysfunctional and malicious system that leaves the mentally ill banished and in peril. Having people around me who will smile and crack a joke while we take on a centuries old systematic failure is exactly what I need to tell this story, unravel the dark realities, and face the very real dangers that come with the territory.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.jhova.co
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jhovamedia/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/91470371/admin/dashboard/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@JhovaMedia
Image Credits
All photos/film stills were shot by myself, Jaden Quan.
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
