In the first post on this new Filmmaker blog, I wrote about how we’d use this space to break out of the quarterly confines of the magazine’s publication schedule. Well, that’s still the intention, but after a few days here at the Sundance Film Festival, this blog has been filling up with news items filed by the New York office while the Sundance-attending staff has been seeing the movies, going to the parties, but not quite figuring out how to get into the rhythm of daily online journalism. One of the good things about publishing quarterly is that it allows […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 22, 2004I ran into producer Mary Jane Skalski at the Salt Lake City airport this morning on the way into Park City, and she — along with an e-mail from director Jem Cohen — gave me material for an embarassing first post out of Sundance. In our new issue of Filmmaker, Anthony Kaufman writes in his “New York Scene” column about directors who choose, for whatever reason, not to make the festival and premiere their films in other venues. He writes about Michael Kang, whose Motel was unable to be finished in time, and also Jem Cohen, who is currently completing […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 16, 2004Every summer Filmmaker runs a feature entitled “25 New Faces of Independent Film” in which we try to apply our long-lead editorial approach to talent spotting. We identify promising new writers, directors and actors who are flying well below the industry radar, and several of our pics usually show up at Sundance each year. Here are Filmmaker‘s “25 New Faces” picks in this year’s festival. The advance industry buzz on The Clearing has been all over the map, but Justin Haythe’s screenplay was the best I read a couple of years ago. It’s a terse, emotionally rich drama about a […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 15, 2004There are frustrations in editing a published-quarterly magazine like Filmmaker. As media cycles accelerate around us, we still publish every ninety days, trying to write intelligently about the aesthetics, business, and reasons for making independent film while pretending not to care that, with our long-lead schedule, we can’t really comment on that day or week’s movie news. The current issue of Filmmaker, for example, went to bed in mid-December, will be first read at the Sundance Film Festival, and will linger on newsstands until early April or so. Which means that meaningful commentary on the latest breaking news is pretty […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 14, 2004