Authors — Scott Macaulay
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DON CORNELIUS, R.I.P.
Sad to hear this week of the death of Don Cornelius, whose Soul Train is burned into my adolescent TV memory. From Bruce Handy at Vanity Fair (who opens with a quote from “American Pie”). I know it’s corny quoting from “American Pie.” But it is February, and like a lot of people, I felt a genuine sense of loss and sadness at the news that Don Cornelius, the creator and host of Soul Train, died of gunshot wounds Wednesday morning in Los Angeles—a possible suicide at the age of 75. The show premiered in Chicago in 1970 and aired […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 4, 2012 -
BEN GAZARRA, R.I.P.
Ben Gazarra, 1930-2012. From my favorite movie of his, John Cassavete’s Killing of a Chinese Bookie.
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 4, 2012 -
ROTTERDAM PHOTOS AND NOTES
For almost two decades I’ve been traveling to the International Film Festival Rotterdam immediately following Sundance, struggling to keep my jet lag at bay while I attend a few Cinemart meetings, hit the informal but productive Cinemart cocktail hours, and delve into the fest’s always excellent and eclectic program. This year several fellower Sundancers made the trip as well, including sales agent Ryan Kampe, producer Adele Romanski, the IFP’s Amy Dotson, the Sundance Institute’s Anne Lai, and director Terrence Nance, whose An Oversimplification of Her Beauty was programmed here and was one of the Park City’s true discoveries. Above is […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 3, 2012 -
MIKE KELLEY, R.I.P.
Artist Mike Kelley, one of the most influential of his generation, died Tuesday at his home in Los Angeles. His provocative multi-media work mixed irony with sincerity, scatology with sentiment, and influenced not only other artists but filmmakers, musicians and writers. A founding member of the band Destroy All Monsters, he attended CalArts and collaborated with other artists like Tony Oursler, Jim Shaw and Sonic Youth. From Holland Cotter’s New York Times appreciation: He began creating multimedia installations that synthesized large-scale drawings and paintings, often incorporating his own writing, along with sculptures, videos (one was based on the television show […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 3, 2012 -
IFP INDEPENDENT FILMMAKER LABS OPEN FOR SUBMISSIONS
The IFP’s unique Independent Filmmaker Labs are now accepting applications for the 2012 programs. The Labs, which consist of year-round mentorship for first-time filmmakers along with focused seminar and instruction weeks, have recently seen alumni success at Sundance (Terrence Nance’s An Oversimplification of Her Beauty), Slamdance (Keith Miller’s Grand Prize winner Welcome to Pine Hill), in theaters (Dee Rees’s Pariah) and, upcoming, at Berlin (Lucy Mulloy’s Una Noche), SXSW (Matt Ruskin’s Competition title, Booster), and on TV (the POV screening of Michael Collins’ Give Up Tomorrow). From IFP: IFP’s unique year-long mentorship program supports first-time feature directors when they need […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 3, 2012 -
An Interview With The Invader Director Nicholas Provost
A sort of Taxi Driver set within the world of European immigrant culture, Nicolas Provost’s The Invader is one of the most intriguing and seductive films currently on the festival circuit. It premiered in Venice before screening in Toronto (where the below interview was conducted) and now Rotterdam, and it marks the feature debut of Provost (pictured above), a Belgian video and installation artist whose work has always taken as its subject the way cinema orders images into narrative. The story opens with the camera fixed on the vagina of a beautiful blonde woman, sunbathing nude on a Southern European […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 2, 2012 -
“ROOM 237” AND THE MUSIC OF “THE SHINING”
I’m leaving Sundance this year was the longest list of films I missed but really want to see then ever before. At the very top of is Room 237, Rodney Ascher’s treatise on the multiple meanings viewers have constructed from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. “Discover why many have been trapped in the Overlook Hotel for over 30 years,” is the film’s beguiling tagline. Here, via Lance Weiler’s Text of Light, is an excerpt about the music.
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 27, 2012 -
SUNDANCE SNOW DAZE
25 New Face composer and performer Gingger Shankar (right) with director Mridu Chandra outside the Main Street Transit Center. Shankar, Chandra and the Shanghai Restoration Project were part of Sundance’s New Frontiers with Himalaya Song, a New Frontiers multimedia performance piece that “explores this majestic mountain range and its interconnecting cultures as the region undergoes major environmental and ecological change. Featuring live narration by filmmaker Mridu Chandra and musical performances by musicians Gingger Shankar (vocals/double violin) and Dave Liang (piano/electronics), this live multimedia presentation combines modern sounds and ancient instruments with a cinematic journey through the Himalayan past and present, […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 27, 2012 -
SUNDANCE: PEJOT AND SWIRSKY’S “INDIE GAME”
Independent film, depending on how you define it, has had many births. But for the purposes of this blog post, let’s consider the one in the 1980s, just before the launch of this magazine. She’s Gotta Have It, Parting Glances, Poison, True Love — these were narrative features made by lone filmmakers with a mixture of private money and, sometimes, foreign TV deals, and they were released into the marketplace after being acquired by independent distributors who catered to arthouse audiences. More films followed — Clerks, El Mariachi, The Blair Witch Project — and the idea that one could possibly […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 27, 2012 -
RICKI STERN, ANNIE SUNDBERG MAKE SUNDANCE SHORT WITH KENNETH COLE FOUNDATION
If you’re attending Sundance, you undoubtedly have seen the orange jackets worn by the festival’s volunteers. They were designed by Kenneth Cole, the Sundance Institute board member who has been providing vests and jackets to the volunteers for eight years. In addition, Awearness, the Kenneth Cole Foundation, collaborated with Sundance on a comedic short written by Kenneth Cole Productions and produced and directed by Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg (Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work, The Devil Came on Horseback). QR codes at the festival are prompting fest goers to stream the short on their mobile devices, and it played […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 26, 2012
