Filmmaker Spotlight with Aaron Davidman

April 30, 2026

Filmmaker Spotlight

 

Curious about the artists behind the films?  GIFFSD is asking a few of our 2026 filmmakers about their work, inspiration and more.  In this edition of our filmmaker spotlight series, we hear from Aaron Davidman, director of AMERICAN SOLITAIRE.

What is your first movie memory?

I have two memories of films that I saw when I was maybe 10 years old. One is Rocky and the other is Star Wars. I remember Rocky being very emotional. And I remember waiting in line down the street at the Coronet Theater in San Francisco with my Dad for hours to get into a screening of Star Wars. It was the cultural event of the moment. And the movie itself completely blew my 10-year-old mind. It was another universe. I went back 3 times.

How did you get started?

I started as an actor in Jr. High School in a production of Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory. The next year we did Thorton Wilder’s Our Town and I was hooked. I was so into it, and responsible I guess, that they gave this 13-year-old kid the keys to the theater so I could work on the production during lunch. A successful high school acting career followed, which led to conservatory training at Carnegie Mellon University. But it was at the University of Michigan, where I transferred to finished my BA, that I directed my first play. It was a production of Alice in Wonderful, the text, a very experimental form, by André Gregory and the Manhattan Theater project. I cast a young first-time actress, and fellow classmate, named Lucy Liu, in the role of Alice. It was a campus hit. She went on to become a movie star. And I went on to become an actor, director, playwright, and more recently, filmmaker. My first feature film project came a few years later, an indie feature I made with director Paul Budnitz, called 93 Million Miles from the Sun. It was shot on 16mm at night in the Mission District of San Francisco on a shoestring budget and lots of coffee and donuts. You can find it on YouTube. It’s a time capsule of the early 90’s in the City. 

What is your guilty pleasure film?

My guilty pleasure is more in television than film and it’s Battlestar Galactica, the remake, staring Edward James Olmos. There are so many episodes it takes quite an investment of time to get through the whole series. But I LOVED this show.

Popcorn or Candy?

Popcorn, all day chief.

What do you want audiences to know about your film?

AMERICAN SOLITAIRE is a labor of love. It’s a mission-driven project that emerged out of my curiosity to try to understand what lies beneath the polarizing issue of gun violence in America. My research led me to a story of a veteran on a journey to heal, and into a deeper consideration about the way we pass violence on from generation to generation. It’s a quiet film that asks us to consider veterans reintegration after service, mental health, firearm safety, loneliness, masculinity and the importance of community connection. I kept a directors journal of the filmmaking process I call Notes from Hollywood, about the making of the film. You can read it at https://medium.com/@aarondavidman.

Why do you think films are important?

Films offer us the opportunity to enter into the lives of others that we might become larger in our own humanity.