Authors — Scott Macaulay
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“If Something Looks ‘Lit’ My Skin Crawls”: Free in Deed D.P. Ava Berkofsky
After shooting a number of well-regarded shorts, including former SXSW selection Sequin Raze and Picturing Barbara Kruger, Ava Berkofsky makes her impressive dramatic feature cinematography debut with one of the most bracing movies on this year’s independent circuit, Free in Deed. The third feature from 2005 Filmmaker 25 New Face Jake Mahaffy, it’s a probing and at times assaultive story inspired by a real-life tragedy: the death of a young boy at the hands of a religious faith healer. Berkofsky’s fluid, expressionistic lensing brings the mental turmoil of the film’s characters — the healer, the boy, and the boy’s distraught, […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 13, 2016 -
SXSW: Five Questions for In a Valley of Violence Writer/Director Ti West
SXSW and Ti West have been to each other over the years. The Austin festival premiered his debut feature (The Roost) before going on to play Trigger Man and then breakthrough picture The Innkeepers, which landed West on our Winter, 2012 cover. Now he returns to Texas with, certainly, his starriest movie to date, and one that steps outside of the horror genre he’s best known for. Produced by his usual team alongside Jason Blum and his Blumhouse Pictures, In a Valley of Violence is a revenge western starring John Travolta, Ethan Hawke, Taissa Farmiga and Karen Gillan and set […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 12, 2016 -
“I Love Everything About Exorcism”: Five Questions for Another Evil Writer/Director Carson Mell
Multi-hyphenate Carson Mell has been known in the independent film world for some of the most subversively entertaining animated shorts of recent years, including Bobby Bird: The Devil in Denim. He’s acted, appearing recently in Marielle Heller’s The Diary of a Teenage Girl. And he’s now an established television writer, having written for the series Eastbound and Down and Silicon Valley. Which is all to say that the subject matter of his first feature would have been anyone’s guess. Beating a comedy about alcoholic astronauts to the punch is his SXSW-premiering, IFP Narrative Lab selection, Another Evil, a comedy about […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 12, 2016 -
SXSW: Five Questions for Hunter Gatherer Writer/Director Josh Locy
Virginia-born Josh Locy makes his feature debut at SXSW with Hunter Gatherer, a drama about forty-something African-American-man beginning life anew after prison — and after the support network he thought he had fail to reengage with him in his new life. Locy originally planned to become a Baptist minister, but a detour led him to the director David Gordon Green, for whom he worked, and the job of art director, which he now practices on various independent and studio films. Below, he discusses the origins of his story, what he learned from Green and how working in the art department […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 12, 2016 -
SXSW Preview: 20 Films and Presentations to Add to Your Austin Calendar
Last year was a great one for SXSW Film. Two of the year’s best independent films, just reaching theaters now (Krisha and Creative Control), premiered at the festival, and the Film and Interactive conferences offered up their typically dizzying assortment of how-to panels, seminars and forward-thinking keynote talks. As I anticipate this year’s edition from, literally, an altitude of 30,000 feet, Barack Obama has already left the room, folks on Twitter are complaining about the long registration lines, and the gear heads and app-makers are setting up shop in the Austin Convention Center for their mammoth trade show. Me, I’m […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 11, 2016 -
In a Valley of Violence DP Eric Robbins on Shooting Ti West’s New Film in 35mm
Don’t let the title mislead you: In a Valley of Violence is only Ti West’s second non-horror film. This time around, West tackles the Western with a tonal twist. In an inspired bit of expectation-reversing casting, this classic saga of a violent town on the frontier has John Travolta as the good guy and Ethan Hawke as the villain. The film premieres tomorrow at SXSW. In advance, cinematographer Eric Robbins answered some questions about shooting on 2-perf 35mm, lighting in the desert and his longtime collaboration with West. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 11, 2016 -
Writer/Director Benjamin Dickinson on Making his Social Satire Set in the World of Augmented Reality, Creative Control
Opening in theaters today from Amazon Studios and Magnolia Pictures is Creative Control, Benjamin Dickinson’s wickedly intelligent social satire set in a near-future advertising world enamored with the latest thing: augmented reality. The New York-based writer/director’s second feature, following 2012’s lo-fi apocalyptic drama, First Winter, Creative Control is an impressive leap forward. Realized on a modest budget, the film won a special jury award at last year’s SXSW for “visual excellence,” and, indeed, Dickinson and his collaborators incisively riff on the very plausible possibilities of augmented reality rigs like Google Glass and Magic Leap to imagine a world where avatars, […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 11, 2016 -
Watch: Nicholas Winding Refn’s Hypnotic Hennessy Ad
Via Nowness comes this 1:44 second Hennessy advertising from Drive director Nicholas Winding Refn. In no less than seven chapters (!), its fragmented narrative is burnished with the hyper-sensuous glow found in the director’s underrated Only God Forgives. From Nowness: For their most daring campaign to date, Hennessy gave carte blanche to filmmaker Nicolas Winding Refn to explore the layered experience of tasting the brand’s classic drink, the Hennessy X.O. “We were given the keys to the kingdom,” says the Only God Forgives director. “It was extremely brave of Hennessy to trust me with so much: For me this is […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 10, 2016 -
Emelie‘s Andrew Corkin on Becoming an Independent Film Producer
With over 30 assorted producing credits ranging from Martha Marcy May Marlene to An Oversimplification of Her Beauty to The Benefactor, Andrew Corkin is a constant figure in New York’s independent film scene. Uncorked, the production company he runs with partner Bryan Reisberg, has a filmography encompassing shorts, features, television and web, and the material ranges from auteur independent drama to so-called “elevated genre” pictures like Emelie, in theaters and on VOD platforms now from Dark Sky Films. Corkin’s most recent production, The Alchemist Cookbook, world premieres next week at SXSW. Last year I sat down Corkin for a public […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 9, 2016 -
Trailer Watch: Pamela Romanowsky’s The Adderall Diaries
Pamela Romanowsky’s adaptation of Stephen Elliott’s meta-memoir, The Adderall Diaries, gets a pulse-pounding trailer from A24. The film tells the story of a writer, Elliott, navigating writer’s block while reporting on a murder trial taking place within San Francisco’s SM community. James Franco, who originally optioned Elliott’s book, plays the writer; Amber Heard is the journalist who gains his access to the case; and Ed Harris plays Elliott’s father, whose rageful relationship with his son provides the film’s emotional throughline. The film premieres on DirectTV on March 10 and in theaters April 15.
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 8, 2016
