(Upstream Color premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival in January. It opens theatrically in New York on Friday, April 5, and will roll out to other cities in April and May before becoming available on DVD, Blu-ray, and VOD on May 7. Visit the film’s official website to learn more.) Here’s the plot of Shane Carruth’s new film Upstream Color, for all the good it will do you: A young woman named Kris (Amy Seimetz) is kidnapped by a man named in the credits only as the Thief (Thiago Martins). The Thief has been conducting secret experiments in mind …

The day Sundance began, Daily Variety’s lead article kicked off with: “In this brave new indie world of VOD, shifting release windows, RED cameras [italics mine] and social media marketing…” I was struck by how little any of this has to do with indie filmmaking alone. As a token of digital revolution, RED cameras are so five years ago. It’s hard to storm the ramparts when last year’s #5 and #7 box office hits were shot with RED Epics (The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, The Amazing Spider-Man). In fact, not only were last year’s #1 and #4 hits filmed with …

Now that the 2013 Sundance Film Festival is underway, it’s an opportunity to remind indie filmmakers that, sadly, their future is on the web and not in movie theatres. Park City screenings, parties and other get-togethers are great fun and a good chance to meet other makers and distributors. However, don’t expect to make a deal! This year Sundance will screen 119 feature-length films from 32 countries, including works from 51 first-time directors. These works were selected from 12,146 submissions, including 4,044 feature-length films and 8,102 shorts.  One can only wonder if the odds for having one’s feature selected (2.9%) …

A rough road from the existential world to the sickie ward to the movie screen, dodging hungry demons and embracing cinematic gems, while maintaining a clear eye on the tall grass on the horizon.      For several years, my life revolved around attending film festivals and screening movies and writing reviews. Then the bomb dropped. The C-bomb! Now I’m fighting cancer and enduring chemotherapy and struggling as a whacked-out Chemo Head. Unlike Speed Heads and Flop Heads and Crack Heads, whose chem-soaked brains are tightly wrapped around a single heat-seeking obsession and whose emotions are riveted to one Pavlov …

(Beasts of the Southern Wild world premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Narrative Grand Jury Prize, as well as Best Cinematography for Ben Richardson. It also won the Camera d’Or at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. It is being distributed by Fox Searchlight and opened theatrically on June 27, 2012. Visit the film’s official website—as well as the virtual home base of the Court 13 collective—to learn more.) I want to make this immediately, abundantly clear. Perhaps more than any other review I’ve ever written, this one is coming from the pained perspective of a …

(The Invisible War world premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Documentary Audience Award. It is being distributed by Cinedigm and Docurama Films and opens theatrically on Friday, June 22, 2012. Visit the film’s official website to learn more.) There are “important” movies, and then there is The Invisible War. Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering’s investigative documentary about sexual abuse in the American military exposes a heretofore under-reported systematic horror show of unfathomable proportions. To watch it as an innocent civilian is to admit compliance in a crime that you didn’t even know had been committed …

Although Sundance is predominantly known for indie dramas and social issue documentaries, the New Frontiers section provides a loving home for particularly odd ducks. Unlike many projects in New Frontiers, which are presented as installations or other new media formats, Eve Sussman’s whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir was screened in a conventional theater. However, the film’s text, 300 bits of voiceover, 150 pieces of music, and 3,000 images are live-edited by an algorithmic computer dubbed the Serendipity Machine that creates a randomized sequence, meaning each screening is entirely unique. Not only does Sussman’s piece turn the idea of the mystery genre on its ear, …

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Wednesday, January 25 6:30 pm –Eccles Theatre, Park City] When you are in the film business, someone, let’s say your dentist, will inevitably tell you a story that they think is a great idea for a movie. But they don’t know how to write a script, they just know how to clean teeth, so they want you to write it for them. If I had an idea that I thought would make a good novel, I would tell it to the poor guy who made the mistake of telling me that he was a novelist, because I don’t …

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, January 24, 3:00 pm –Yarrow Hotel Theatre, Park City] I’m not an independent filmmaker; so-called independent filmmakers—all the more so documentarians—are some of the most dependent people around. We depend on funders and characters, on permission-givers and gatekeepers, on our own (free) will, determination and hubris—not to mention on the weather. A film teacher I once had gave me the one really truly valuable lesson in all my MFA: “You want to make a movie?” she asked us. Yes, we nodded. “Then go out and tell everyone you know that you’re going to make a movie.” Otherwise, she …