Authors — Scott Macaulay
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“Send Me Your Sexts” is Strange and Provocative New Pay-for-Film Service
“Send Me Your Sexts” is a just-launched, strange new pay-for-film service from director Eileen Yaghoobian (Died Young Stay Pretty). (Video above is NSFW.) Inspired, she says, by The Act of Killing (!) and its use of reenactments, and drawing on her own background in documentary and theater, “Send Me Your Sexts” is both a service and an online video platform featuring original short reenactments of user-submitted sexts. Viewers can check out the steamy videos while sexters can pay Yaghoobian to turn their own digital missives into soft-core online entertainment. From the website: I’m Eileen, a filmmaker and artist who’s convinced […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 3, 2013 -
Inside Llewyn Davis, Fruitvale Station Take Top Prizes at the Gotham Awards
Inside Llewyn Davis, the Coen Brothers’ sly fable of the artist’s life set in the ’60s Greenwich Village folk scene, was awarded the Best Feature prize at last night’s IFP Gotham Awards, held at Cipriani Wall Street. The film was something of a surprise winner, with many predicting Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave to take the top prize. Also scoring at the Gothams was Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station, which won the Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director and Breakthrough Actor for Coogler and Michael B. Jordan, respectively. The Best Documentary Award went to Joshua Oppenheimer, Christine Cynn and Anonymous’s The Act […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 3, 2013 -
How Much Can Your Film Make From Festival Screening Fees?
Film festival screening fee revenue is often a contentious topic, with festivals arguing the value of community and exposure while filmmakers point to the fact that the regional festival circuit is, for many, taking the place of traditional theatrical distribution. But what kind of numbers are being argued over? The Film Collaborative sends out a regular e-blast, and the most recent tackles just this topic. Gathering data from the films they’ve been involved with over the past several years, The Film Collaborative has determined screening fee revenue ranges based on films’ niches and premiere venues. Yes, where a film premieres […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 2, 2013 -
Using Influences to Promote Your Film
When discussing your forthcoming film, citing influences can be a double-edged sword. We are all influenced by other works, and it’s expected that when pitching, or showing a look book, these influences be acknowledged. But you don’t want to seem like you’re relying too much on other filmmakers’ visions, or pretend that you can easily reach the same level of achievement. One filmmaker who I think is revealing his interests in an edifying, engaging way is William Speruzzi, who is in the midst of a Kickstarter campaign for “The 3×3 Project.” The project consists of three shorts by three directors […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 1, 2013 -
Shocking Video: Celebrities are Ugly!
Here’s a fascinating optical illusion based on the “Flashed Face Distortion Effect.” Simply put, two faces will appear grotesque when the viewer focuses on a cross between them. This discovery won the second prize in the Vision Science Society’s Best Illusion of the Year Contest of 2012, and this video by Matthew B. Thompson using celebrities to illustrate the effect went viral. I’m just catching up with it now, though (courtesy, by the way, of Unscathed Corpse) and am posting it because it truly is a trippy effect. Watch the video above while focusing on the cross in the center.
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 1, 2013 -
Filmmaker‘s Top 10 Posts of November, 2013
Here, via Google Analytics, are Filmmaker‘s top ten posts of November, 2013. 1. Number one, by a long shot, is a post that both fascinated and struck fear in filmmakers everywhere: Kaleem Aftab’s “Introducing 8K: The Final Frontier?” Reporting from the Tokyo International Film Festival, where Japanese broadcaster NHK commissioned filmmakers to make shorts in 8K, Aftab sat down with the channel’s engineers to hear plans for introducing the high-resolution images to sporting events as well as cinema. 2. Reporting from Poland’s American Film Festival in Wroclaw, Ashley Clark wrote our second highest-trafficked post of the month, an account of […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 30, 2013 -
Holiday Friends-and-Family Fundraising Tips for Hustling Independent Filmmakers
The Thanksgiving tryptophan haze has worn off, your relatives are sprawled on the sofa, exhausted from their Black Friday marathons, and football blares on the flat-screen… is this a good time to hit them up for an investment in your independent film? Independent filmmakers seeking private equity in their films most often start by looking towards friends and family, and holidays do provide that necessary one-on-one face time. But, raising money from friends and family can be perilous at any time of year, with the holiday season offering its own particular dangers. Over at PandoDaily, Michael Carney has posted a […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 29, 2013 -
Shored Up, Opening Today in N.Y., Tackles Rising Tides and Coastal Development
Opening today at Cinema Village in New York is Ben Kalina’s Shored Up, a documentary tackling the issue of rising tides and coastal development. From the film’s website: Our beaches and coastline are a national treasure, a shared resource, a beacon of sanity in a world of constant change…and they’re disappearing in front of us. Shored Up is a documentary that asks tough questions about our coastal communities and our relationship to the land. What will a rising sea do to our homes, our businesses, and the survival of our communities? Can we afford to pile enough sand on our […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 29, 2013 -
Cinematography, Transmedia Classes at the Made in NY Media Center
The new Made in NY Media Center by IFP has announced a round of classes and presentations for December and is offering Filmmaker subscribers a discount for the two involving transmedia. On December 7, one of today’s great cinematographers, Declan Quinn, will present a five-hour master class in the shooting of Mike Figgis’s Leaving Las Vegas. “In this Master Class, Quinn will deconstruct Leaving Las Vegas, scene-by- scene, while discussing his process, choices, obstacles, challenges – what worked and what didn’t,” reads the promo copy. Presented in partnership with Local 600, the day begins at 10:00 AM with a screening […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 29, 2013 -
Hal Hartley Offers Ned Rifle Distribution Rights as Kickstarter Rewards
Please see important update at the bottom of this post. Plenty of tech vendors use Kickstarter as a pre-sale market, so why not filmmakers? In a letter to backers of his film Ned Rifle — reprinted here with permission — director Hal Hartley announces the inclusion of territorial theatrical rights as Kickstarter rewards. Pledge $3,000 and take Hungary. $5,000 gets you Finland. And a cool $9,000 gets you Spanish-speaking Latin America. Of course, these numbers are for theatrical only. Hartley is retaining home video and electronic distribution. But, as he notes in his letter, the asking prices are low, enabling […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 25, 2013
