The Film, TV & Digital Session at the recent Hacking Arts event focused on film distribution, with panelists Richard Matson from Gathr Films, Adam Mosam from Pivotshare and Albert Reinhardt from Fandor. The panel was moderated by Elle Schneider of Digital Bolex. All three firms are involved with distribution. Pivotshare offers tools to help the filmmaker sell their videos online. Fandor is an online subscription platform that pays its filmmakers a share of its subscription fees. Gathr Films provides an on-demand theatrical experience; a screening of a film can be requested at a local theater, and if enough people buy […]
Christened Megunticook (“great swells of the sea”) by the long eradicated Penobscot Abenaki native American tribe that first lived in the region before it took turns being in the hands of the French and British during colonial times, the town of Camden, Maine is these days primarily a summering community for the northeast’s wealthy; its tiny population of just over 4,000 triples in size between Memorial and Labor Days. No wonder — the natural beauty of the place is quite stunning. It’s rolling hills and mountains, those great swells of the sea the PA’s were referring to, are covered in […]
IFP today announced that its third honoree at this year’s Gotham Independent Film Awards will be Oscar-winning actor Forest Whitaker. (The previously announced tributes were of Mayor’s Office Media & Entertainment Commissioner Katherine Oliver and writer/director Richard Linklater.) The tribute caps a highly successful year for Whitaker, who won great acclaim for his lead performance in Lee Daniels’ The Butler and produced Ryan Coogler’s Sundance-winning Fruitvale Station. He also appears in the forthcoming 2013 releases Black Nativity and Out of the Furnace. Announcing the tribute, IFP’s Executive Director Joana Vicente commented, “We are thrilled to pay honor to a man whose work […]
The mumblecore mumblecorp is growing up, a reality certain to impact American independent film for years to come. And we, their generation, are aging with them. Some of us are their peers, some their audience, some their collaborators. Others, like me, have a more indirect tether. If “fan” is not the correct word then we are those who, because of our interest in and pursuit of film over the last decade, have come of age in their shadow. The mumblecorp — that tenacious group of filmmakers who, by blurring narrative and autobiography, cinema and home video, pioneered ultra-low-budget filmmaking — […]
In anticipation of tonight “25 New Faces” screening at the IFC Center in Manhattan, I thought I’d share a handful of images from the first festivities of the season for the 2013 alums, the superb week of “25 New Faces” events at The Grand Cinema in Tacoma, Washington. 2o of this year’s 25 were in Tacoma this year, in an event that I refer to as “summer camp for filmmakers.” Here’s a flavor of who was there and what went on…
Tonight Filmmaker is holding its special “25 New Faces” screening (sponsored by Sony Creative Software and ARRI) at IFC Center in Manhattan, and there are two tickets up for grabs for tonight’s event. The following short films will play, followed by a Q&A with the filmmakers plus previous alums, including Blue Caprice‘s Alexandre Moors: RPG OKC (Emily Carmichael, 2013, 9 mins) Old Man (Leah Shore, 2013, 5 mins) High Maintenance: “Dinah” (Katja Blichfeld & Ben Sinclair, 2013, 12 mins) Social Butterfly (Lauren Wolkstein, 2013, 15 mins) Between Colors of I (Iva Radivojevic, 2013, 9 mins) Palimpsest (Michael Tyburski, 2013, 17 mins) To win, […]
Eclecticism governs the second half of the 51st NYFF just as it did the first. According to the Times, several common threads run through the week two batch, but these are little more than on-deadline segues. We could perhaps agree that all the films run at 24 frames per second. Below are recommendations I hope will sate the discerning ticket buyer. These are accomplished movies by directors who are not very well known in this country. Other films will sell out based on name recognition no matter the critical response, so, whether good, bad, or in-between, they will not be […]
This morning, Mayor Bloomberg and IFP’s Executive Director Joana Vicente kicked off the launch of the Made in NY Media Center by IFP alongside the Center’s Founding Artist in Residence, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson. At the event, Mayor Bloomberg said, “The Made in NY Media Center by IFP continues the work this administration has done to diversify New York City’s economy and provide access to affordable work space. New technologies and distribution platforms are appearing every day, and entrepreneurs, growing businesses and creative individuals will have the chance to harness their skills with the educational resources provided by the Media Center […]
Hacking Arts, a two-day event to “explore the intersection of arts and entertainment, technology and entrepreneurship” was held this last weekend at MIT’s Media Lab. The first day consisted of panels and product demos, while the rest of the event was devoted to participants working together to come up with new ideas in various topic areas, from mobile to art education. The panel sessions of the first day had a strong tilt towards art distribution and finding and interacting with your audience in the connected world. The music panel, titled “Social Sound: Music Fans Get Involved,” featured Kristen Bender from […]
The debate about the use and popularity of 3D in cinemas may be raging on but the San Sebastián International Film Festival has certainly embraced the format this year – and proved that content is the key to success. The Spanish festival opened with Juan José Campanella’s 3D animated family delight Foosball (Metegol), a comedy adventure which sees a soccer table champ take on a egotistical star with the help of his table-top team. The line-up also featured Alfonso Cuaron’s breathtakingly immersive space thriller Gravity midweek and closed with Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s endlessly inventive The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet. Jeunet’s film is an adaptation of the book by Reif […]