Filmmaker Videos
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Watch: Directors David Farrier and Dylan Reeve on Tickled, Their Working Relationship and the Importance of Graphic Design
The documentary Tickled begins as a story about the bizarre world of competitive endurance tickling but evolves into an investigation of the ominous company behind videos in which young men tickle one another. Co-directors David Farrier (a New Zealand TV journalist) and Dylan Reeve have endured harassment and lawsuits in the process of digging into what seems to be an extended history of intimidation and coercion. Following substantial media coverage, the film is set to open in the United States on June 17 after premiering at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival. I talked to the duo about what it’s like to work with a […]
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Trailer Watch: I, Daniel Blake, Ken Loach’s Palme d’Or Winner
The new film by British filmmaker Ken Loach, I, Daniel Blake won the Palme d’Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival and now it’s got a trailer (above) in advance of its U.K. release on October 21. The film stars Dave Johns as Daniel Blake, a 59-year-old in the North-East of England who falls ill and applies for unemployment benefits only to get caught in a mess of red tape. Along the way, he meets a single mother and her two children who are dealing with their own challenges. Sundance Selects has U.S. rights to the film, but no release date has […]
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Watch: The Radical Beauty of Tangerine
When Tangerine was released in 2015, much of the press attention focused on the fact that it was shot entirely on an iPhone 5s. Though that technical feat is impressive, the raw beauty of the film is equally striking. Set on Christmas Eve, Tangerine follows transgender sex workers and best friends Sin-Dee (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) and Alexandra (Mya Taylor) on an odyssey through various Los Angeles subcultures. At Fandor Keyframe, a new video essay (above) by LJ Frezza examines the film’s unique aesthetic and how director Sean Baker and DP Radium Cheung found beauty from a position of marginalization.
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Watch: “David Fincher: From a Distance”
In his latest video, Jacob T. Swinney inspects David Fincher’s approach to the long shot. Clips from Fight Club, Zodiac and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, among others, serve as examples of the filmmaker’s use of distance. Supplementally, you can also watch Swinney’s previous video, David Fincher’s Extreme Close-Ups.
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Trailer Watch: Award-Winning Life, Animated, More Than a “Film About Autism”
Directed by Academy Award-winner Roger Ross Williams, Life, Animated, won the directing award in the U.S. documentary competition at Sundance earlier this year before making the festival circuit. Based on the bestselling book by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ron Suskind, the documentary tells the inspirational story of Owen Suskind, a young man with autism who connects to the world through animated Disney films. The film, which just got its first trailer (above), follows Owen as he takes his first steps towards independence. Interweaving classic Disney sequences with scenes from Owen’s life, the film’s original animation provides access to Owen’s amazing imagination. “Owen’s world and […]
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Watch: Rainbow Flag of Film: A Tribute to LGBTQ Cinema
In the latest Fandor Keyframe video essay, Candice Drouet considers how the values of the rainbow flag relate to the images found in LGBTQ cinema. Featured films include Carol, Milk and Blue Is the Warmest Color, among many others.
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Watch: The Lion City, 2, a Mind-Blowing, Multi-Year Time-Lapse Video
Australian filmmaker Keith Loutit, a pioneer in tilt-shift photography, has just raised the bar in time-lapse photography with his latest video, The Lion City, 2. A portrait of a changing Singapore, the video features time-lapse shooting that took place in multiple locations over years. Writes Loutit: When we pass by landscapes they appear fixed in time, but they change around us constantly. The idea behind this film is to reveal this change by returning to the same camera positions over the years. In the comments, Loutit reveals that he shot the video over three years, and while his ability to […]
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Watch: A Message from Martin Scorsese
Leandro Copperfield created “Kubrick vs Scorsese” in 2010, paying tribute to filmmakers Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese in the form of a video montage. Scorsese has now responded to the video with a message to Copperfield, six years after the initial release of the homage. (If you are unable to see this video on your mobile device, click here.)
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Watch: Understanding the Cinematography of Robert Elswit
Sareesh Sudhakaran examines the cinematography of Paul Thomas Anderson’s frequent DP Robert Elswit in the latest wolfcrow video. Sudhakaran discusses lighting and camera techniques, including camera movement and the use of specific lenses in Elswit’s work.
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Watch: Three Minutes of the Most Incredible Cinematic Drone Footage
I juried the New York City Drone Film Festival last year, so I’m even more impressed with this amazing compilation reel of this year’s winners. Drone cinematography has come a long way in just a year, with some knock-out moments on this reel that move drone filming away from landscape shots and sports coverage. Don’t get me wrong — sports are big here, and some of these aerial shots of soaring snowboarders are amazing. But check out the narrative winner, The Smallest Empire, from Corridor Digital, which adds a tilt-shift technique to depict the blossoming of an entire civilization. (The […]
