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The 60 Year Detour began with a simple question: What is the difference between simply existing and truly being alive?
The film follows Luke across six decades as he searches for fulfillment in all the places we’re told to look—success, money, status, relationships, technology, and self-improvement. What interested me wasn’t the idea that Luke had wasted those years, but that perhaps the ambition, love, loss, mistakes, and wrong turns were all necessary. Sometimes what looks like a detour is the journey itself.
That idea shaped the film visually. Luke’s path takes him from the beauty and desire of Italy to the ambition of New York, the wellness culture of Los Angeles, a reckoning in Atlanta, and finally the natural landscape of New Zealand. As Luke’s life becomes quieter, so does the film. The landscapes grow larger while his need for possessions, technology, and status grows smaller.
The production became its own kind of journey. I wrote the role of Luke specifically for my friend Jon Hayden and, working with limited resources, built the film around filmmaker friends across the world. Giacomo Arrigoni joined us in Italy, Kat Hawkes in New Zealand, and Craig Tollis in Los Angeles, while I handled New York and Atlanta. What began as an ambitious idea became an international collaboration made possible by friendship and trust.
Although the film explores spiritual questions, I never wanted it to become overly solemn. There is humor in our belief that the next possession, promotion, device, relationship, or philosophy will finally make us whole.
Ultimately, The 60 Year Detour isn’t about rejecting the modern world. It’s about learning the difference between the things that fill our lives and the things that give our lives meaning.
Luke’s final destination isn’t really New Zealand. It is presence.
Directed by Ken Feinberg, Giacomo Arrigoni, Kat Hawkes, and Craig D.. Tollis (USA)