Authors — Scott Macaulay
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Remembering Roger Ebert, 1942 – 2013
“Most of our childhood is stored not in photos, but in certain biscuits, lights of day, smells, textures of carpet…” — Alain De Botton I hadn’t recalled my dank childhood basement in quite some time, but the room, with its wicker furniture, orange-ish carpet and large, wood-panelled Sony TV, came flooding back last week upon reading of the sad passing of film critic Roger Ebert, just one day after he posted a “leave of presence,” a slowing-down that was still more active than the combined work of two men these days. It was in that basement that I’d faithfully watch […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 11, 2013 -
Kathleen Hanna, Sini Anderson and Tamra Davis Talk The Punk Singer
Originally published following The Punk Singer‘s premiere at SXSW, this interview with director Sini Anderson, subject Kathleen Hanna and executive producer Tamra Davis is being rerun today as the documentary opens in New York at IFC Center. Hanna will be doing Q&A’s with Lizz Winstead of The Daily Show and signing copies of her new Julie Ruin record. Check the IFC page for times. In Greil Marcus’s punk-rock critical opus Lipstick Traces, the writer describes a kind of magic created by the sneering music of the Sex Pistols: “… the pop magic in which the connection of certain social facts […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 9, 2013 -
Big Shot Movie Club Launches a “How To” Series at Spectacle
Our friends at the Big Shot Movie Club are in the midst of a screening series close to our hearts at Spectacle in Williamsburg. Titled “How To,” it’s a series of “practical films…. Films that teach us skills and examine the process of how things are made. In this series, we learn how to make ends meet, how to feed ourselves, and how people persist, day in and day out, in this complex world.” The films include the Maysles Brothers’ Salesman (April 17 and 27); Agnes Varda’s Daguerreotypes (April 17); and Jiayin Liu’s Oxhide II (April 27). Check out the […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 8, 2013 -
Shane Carruth Explains Upstream Color in 528 Words
Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color opened this weekend, and it’s gotten great reviews as well as prompted a certain amount of head scratching. The film is the cover of our current issue, and in it I spend about 5,000 words talking with Carruth about the movie, his DIY distribution plan, what he’s up to next, and why he stepped out of the Hollywood development mill. For those who’ve seen the film and want to know a bit more, here’s Carruth’s answer to my question about the film’s inspirations. I was surprised at how voluble he was and interested in unpacking some […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 6, 2013 -
The New Digital Storytelling Series: Mark Harris
Mark Harris is a filmmaker and software architect. Mark writes software for gameplay, storytelling, and transmedia. Mark was a mentor at the first StoryCode StoryHack, and creative technologist on Lance Weiler’s Pandemic 1.0. Mark is also an alumnus of the IFP Narrative Lab. Mark’s transmedia project, The Lost Children, had its New York City premiere in Jan 2013 at Film Society of Lincoln Center, with a feature film and live immersive experience. In the Fall of 2012, Mark wrote his first immersive play for Epic Theater Ensemble, and in Spring 2013, Mark joins the hybrid studio/technology company Murmur. MIT Open Documentary Lab: How did you […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 4, 2013 -
Filmmaker Celebrates 20 Year Anniversary at MoMA, April 4 – 15
This is Filmmaker‘s 20th Anniversary Year, and I’m very honored to have curated a MoMA Carte Blanche series, opening tomorrow and running through April 15, of films from the magazine’s history. I’ve posted the complete schedule below, and will be on hand tomorrow night to introduce the series and its first film, Darren Aronofsky’s Pi. And each day for the duration of the series I’ll be posting on the site old interviews and articles from the magazine featuring the films and filmmakers presented. I’m showing 11 features in addition two programs highlighting short work from our “25 New Faces” series, […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 3, 2013 -
What’s In My Instapaper: Game of Thrones, Bitcoin, Video Game Death, Chloe Sevigny and More
Here are my weekly Sunday morning links. A sophisticated discussion of videogames and violence is contained in Adi Robertson’s “Death is Dead: How Modern Videogame Designers Killed Danger” at the Verge. The article quotes David Cage, whose Beyond: Two Souls is premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival this year, proclaiming, “If the character doesn’t hold a gun, designers don’t even know what to do.” That leads to a discussion about the relationship of death to videogame narrative: But unlike Cage, most of the writers giving talks at GDC don’t come into a game with complete control. They’re brought on to […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 31, 2013 -
Rodney Ascher on Room 237 and the Haunting of The Shining
A must-see for not just fans of The Shining but anyone who has been obsessed by a movie, Rodney Ascher’s Room 237, opening today, is a documentary about a group of online fans, scholars and theorists who have dedicated their lives — or at least their leisure hours — to unpacking bizarre, alternative interpretations about Stanley Kubrick’s horror classic. Above, recorded last year at the Cannes Film Festival, I discuss with Ascher the origins of his film, why you never see the faces of his interview subjects, and Fair Use. Ascher is interviewed in the latest issue of Filmmaker by […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 29, 2013 -
Hands on a Hard Body Director S.R. Bindler On His Documentary’s Unlikely Broadway Adaptation
An odd, homemade blend of Garrison Keillor and Jackass, as filtered through an early Errol Morris-like lens, S.R. Bindler’s 1997 documentary Hands on a Hard Body is now having one of the most unexpected independent film second lives ever. Hands on a Hard Body the film has led to Hands on a Hardbody the Broadway musical, starring Keith Carradine, directed by Neil Pepe, with a book by Pulitzer-Prize winner Doug Wright and a score by Phish’s Trey Anastasio and Amanda Green. It opened at the Brooks Atkinson Theater last week, and Charles Isherwood wrote in the New York Times, “…this […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 28, 2013 -
Jason Brush and Michel Reilhac Discuss the Second Screen and New Interactive Cinema at SXSW
Two of the events I was most looking forward to seeing this year at SXSW Interactive were Jason Brush’s talk, Filmmaking as User Experience and Michel Reilhac’s “Meet the Insiders” panel, “Storytelling + Interactive.” Brush teaches at UCLA’s Department of Film, Television and Visual Media and is Executive Vice President of Creative & UX at POSSIBLE. Reilhac, who I have written about before at Filmmaker, is an independent transmedia director, story writer and consultant, and one of the most passionate and eloquent voices for new forms of interactive storytelling. Unfortunately, as is often the case at SXSW, once I put […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 27, 2013
