Authors — Scott Macaulay
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TAXI RIDERS: ALRICK BROWN
If you’ve taken a ride in the back of a New York City taxi cab these last two weeks, you may have heard the stories of seven of New York’s most distinctive independent filmmakers of the moment. In partnership with Royal Bank of Canada and the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the IFP has produced six spots that are playing not only in cabs but on NYC Life. Jamie Stuart directed, T. Griffin scored and I produced these pieces, and each one, in addition to profiling a person, highlights a different aspect of the independent filmmaker’s current creative, production […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 12, 2011 -
MIRANDA JULY’S FIVE FINGER DISCOUNT
Miranda July’s short recollection of being a teenage shoplifter is online at the New Yorker. She begins: I don’t remember the first time I did it, but I remember the first time I got caught. I was a freshman at U.C. Santa Cruz, the store was called Zanotto’s, the item was Neosporin. I took it out of its packaging, bent down as if to scratch my ankle, and then wedged the tube of triple-antibiotic ointment into my white ankle sock. When the guard grabbed my arm, I was so scared I peed on the floor. As we waited for the […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 12, 2011 -
“BOMBAY BEACH” OPENS RUN AT IFC CENTER
If you are a reader of our “25 New Faces” series, then you know that I am a huge fan of Alma Har’el and her debut feature Bombay Beach. I think she’s one of this year’s real discoveries, and the film I find inspiring and beautiful. Bombay Beach arrives in New York for a week run at the IFC Center beginning Friday, and I’ll be doing a Q&A with Alma at the 8:20 show on opening night. Before that, you’ll be hearing a lot more about the film on the site. I’ll post an interview with Alma in the next […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 12, 2011 -
STEVE MCQUEEN UP CLOSE
Via Nowness, here’s a video by Alison Chernick of Steve McQueen discussing his latest, Shame, appropriately (if you’ve seen the film) from the vantage point of a hotel balcony. The Confessions of Steve McQueen on Nowness.com.
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 11, 2011 -
TAXI RIDERS: DEE REES
If you’ve taken a ride in the back of a New York City taxi cab these last two weeks, you may have heard the stories of seven of New York’s most distinctive independent filmmakers of the moment. In partnership with Royal Bank of Canada and the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the IFP has produced six spots that are playing not only in cabs but on NYC Life. Jamie Stuart directed, T. Griffin scored and I produced these pieces, and each one, in addition to profiling a person, highlights a different aspect of the independent filmmaker’s current creative, production […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 11, 2011 -
FIRST-TIME DIRECTOR VS. SEASONED 1ST A.D.
There are tons of these Xtra Normal videos on YouTube detailing relationships between crew and various department heads. This one is pretty hilarious, and, like most of them, seems posted from the crew side. Where are the directors with theirs?
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 11, 2011 -
PLEASE COMMODIFY ME
In a Brooklyn Rail piece titled “We Are All Scabs: Some Contradictions in U.S. Independent Film Culture,” Donal Foreman visits the IFP’s Independent Film Week and questions the debates over sustainability, marketing and audience-building that are rampant in our community. As we pursue DIY strategies, are we just implicitly and uncritically accepting the logic of the marketplace instead of conceptualizing more empowering, liberating structures? The key grafs: Whereas in previous times films were offered up to the distribution circuit to be either rejected or accepted as viable commodities, their makers are now being asked to lead that process of commodification […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 11, 2011 -
AN EVENING AT OCCUPY WALL STREET
Last weekend I posted a great short video by Iva Radivojevic, “No One Can Predict the Moment of Revolution,” about the Occupy Wall Street protests. Radivojevic, along with her collaborator Martyna Starosta, returned to Liberty Plaza at night, and they have just posted “We the People Have Found our Voice,” which again captures the energy and political ambitions of the protestors. Visit the post on her site for her further thoughts, including a beautiful quote from an article about Alain Resnais’ Night and Fog.
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 10, 2011 -
TAXI RIDERS: JESSICA ORECK
If you’ve taken a ride in the back of a New York City taxi cab these last two weeks, you may have heard the stories of seven of New York’s most distinctive independent filmmakers of the moment. In partnership with Royal Bank of Canada and the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the IFP has produced six spots that are playing not only in cabs but on NYC Life. Jamie Stuart directed, T. Griffin scored and I produced these pieces, and each one, in addition to profiling a person, highlights a different aspect of the independent filmmaker’s current creative, production […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 10, 2011 -
ABEL FERRARA ON “KING OF NEW YORK” AND “4:44” AT THE NYFF
Perhaps the chilliest press conference I ever attended, one in which the conflicts of the movie seemed to drift right off the celluloid into the audience and then back onto the stage, occurred when Abel Ferrara’s The King of New York played the New York Film Festival in 1990. I was thrilled by the film, particularly its concluding adagio, in which Christopher Walken bleeds out in the back of a taxi cab stuck amidst the traffic of Times Square. The lights came up, and Ferrara, Walken, Wesley Snipes and some others from the cast walked onstage. The questions were contentious. […]
by Scott Macaulay on Oct 10, 2011
