Authors — Filmmaker Staff
-
Dispatches from Cannes and the Los Angeles Film Festival
Cannes by Aaron Hillis The same way New Yorkers love to bitch about living in what they also proclaim to be the world’s greatest city, the Cannes-accredited can spend nearly two weeks in the south of France watching nothing but prestigiously vetted films and have the nerve to call it a “so-so year.” But if that was a too-common sigh, it’s partly because the festival’s main competition had few unanimous hits, which is neither unusual nor taking stock of the parallel pleasures within the Un Certain Regard, Directors’ Fortnight and Critics’ Week sections, or out-of-competition premieres of innovative multiplex fare […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 23, 2015 -
Super 8: Toy Cars and Tomorrow’s Education
Dear Sugar Radio For those who worried that, after her Wild success, Cheryl Strayed’s lucid and literate advice column “Dear Sugar” was no more, fear not. “Dear Sugar” has been resurrected, this time as a podcast co-hosted by “Mr. Sugar,” the writer Steve Almond. The original “Sugar,” in fact, and Strayed’s recruiter, Almond adds a probing rhetorical counterpoint to Strayed’s personal counseling, making Sugar 2.0 a multilayered conversation about such topics as ditching friends, cheating and families good and bad. Produced by WBUR, Dear Sugar Radio can be found on iTunes. The Graduate School Mess On the heels of last […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 23, 2015 -
IFP Announces Selections for Project Forum at Independent Film Week 2015
The Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP) announced today the full slate of 140 projects selected for its esteemed Project Forum at the upcoming IFP Independent Film Week, running September 20-25, 2015 at Lincoln Center in New York City. Under the curatorial leadership of Deputy Director/Head of Programming Amy Dotson and Senior Director of Programming Milton Tabbot, IFP Project Forum is a meetings-driven forum connecting filmmakers who have new narrative and documentary projects in development, production, or post-production with key industry executives interested in identifying projects with which to become involved at the development, financing, or distribution stages. A primary outcome for […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 22, 2015 -
Trailer Watch: Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s The Revenant, Partially Shot with an ARRI Alexa 65
The first trailer for Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s The Revenant, an Alaskan-wilderness-survival saga, is here. The major point of interest for the technically inclined is that the film was the first to make use of the ARRI Alexa 65, which boasts a 65mm sensor. The footage looks accordingly/appropriately shiny; opens Christmas Day.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 17, 2015 -
Watch: It’s A Mad Mad Mad Max Fury Road
Shared title adjective aside, what do It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and Mad Max: Fury Road have in common? Ezequiel López’s video yokes the Fury Road trailer’s audio to selected mayhem from the 1963 super-comedy, finding lots of running, jumping, water-drinking and ladder-swinging similarities.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 16, 2015 -
Watch: Eye Contact in Satyajit Ray’s The Big City
In one of my favorite recent video essays, “Rohmer’s Guessing Games,” Kevin B. Lee explores the POV shots and blocking in A Summer’s Tale as a means of muddling character motivations. The above inquiry, from Joel Bocko, into eye contact throughout Satyajit Ray’s The Big City as a mode of character development, makes for a rather nice companion piece, and also a nice reminder of how storytelling is consistent in the finer details.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 8, 2015 -
RIP James Horner: The Late Composer on The Rocketeer
We’re saddened to learn of the death of composer James Horner, whose well-known film scores include the highest-selling orchestral score of all time (Titanic), and a bevy of other beloved titles. In this interesting clip, Horner talks about writing the score for The Rocketeer — some 100 minutes altogether — in just two and a half weeks’ time. As he discusses, the film was originally cut with temp music, leading executives to feel that certain scenes were too long and needed to be cut to shreds; with his score added, scenes played better and could be restored to their original, necessary […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jun 23, 2015 -
Watch: Shelley Duvall Talks Kubrick Using an 18mm Lens on The Shining
A while back we posted a vintage half-hour documentary about the great cinematographer John Alcott. For Kubrick fans reluctant to commit to that whole program, here’s an excerpt in which Shelley Duvall talks about the director’s use of the 18mm lens on The Shining. The lens is great for furniture but terrible for faces, she says, speculating that Kubrick was trying to make everybody look more frightening. In her telling, Alcott tried to get Kubrick to occasionally relent and use a 50 or 75mm lens, but with no success.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jun 16, 2015 -
Watch: An Exclusive Clip From Gabriel, the Rory Culkin-Starring Debut Feature by Lou Howe
Two years ago we profiled Lou Howe as one of our 25 New Faces of Film; this week, his debut feature Gabriel is seeing theatrical release. We have an exclusive excerpt from this drama, which stars Rory Culkin as the title character, a mentally ill young man on trial release from a hospital. In this clip, Gabriel rummages through the apartment of Alice (Emily Meade), a girl he knew in his childhood who he’s determined to track down. Gabriel opens in limited release this Friday; for more screening information, click here.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jun 15, 2015 -
Watch: DP Roger Deakins Talks LUTs, Sicario and the ALEXA
In this interview conducted by ARRI reps at Cannes, the great DP Roger Deakins talks about his work on Sicario, his (equally fantastic-looking) second collaboration with Denis Villeneuve after Prisoners. This is a fairly technical conversation, as Deakins talks about shooting with an open gate on the ALEXA for the first time, why he prefers to minimize his work with LUTs and his approach to storyboarding.
by Filmmaker Staff on Jun 15, 2015
