Filmmaker Videos
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Watch: The First and Last Appearance of Quentin Tarantino Characters
This one’s pretty self-explanatory: director Albert Gómez presents the first and last appearance of every major character in Quentin Tarantino’s movies in splitscreen. It does, of course, get bloody.
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Trailer Watch: Todd Solondz’s Wiener-Dog
Seventeen years after director Todd Solondz introduced us to Dawn Wiener (Heather Matarazzo), the downtrodden pre-teen star of the darkly comic Welcome to the Dollhouse, the character, now all grown up (and played by Greta Gerwig), returns in the quasi-sequel, Wiener-Dog. Dawn is just one of several characters featured in Wiener-Dog, which tells a variety of stories, all revolving around a particular dachshund. Featuring Kieran Culkin, Tracy Letts, Danny DeVito, Ellen Burstyn, Julie Delpy, and Zosia Mamet, the film premiered earlier this year at The Sundance Film Festival and is scheduled to be released on June 24 by Amazon Studios and IFC Films. You can check out the […]
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Watch: Albatross, A Short Film by Theodore Collatos
Yesterday we premiered Christopher Jason Bell’s short film One Times One; today, we’re following up with the premiere of his colleague/interlocutor Theodore Collatos’ short Albatross. It’s the story of a young girl being raised by her uncle, only to have their relationship disrupted by the unexpected return of her father. As Collatos told Bell in their conversation (which we published Tuesday), “I really wanted to continue to build a fictional story within the context of Matt Shaw’s actual life. Elements of real story beats with real people in a poetic and seasonal time structure. Seasons pass, family changes and the mysteries of life go […]
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Watch: The Video Essay to End All Video Essays, On “Excellent Themes” in Pleasantville
If you’ve seen a lot of video essays purportedly analyzing the themes, visual motifs etc. of various films, you’ll know that they are, by and large, not very good, simply latching on to famous film titles for an easy traffic layup. Enter Kentucker Audley: director and actor, proprietor of No Budge and the Movies brand. In this inaugural video essay, Audley takes an analytical look at Pleasantville. “It’s a really cool movie, as you probably remember,” he explains, “with cutting-edge cinematography and excellent themes,” nailing the fatuous tone of many an online underperformer. Bonus points for blithely naming the director as […]
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Watch: One Times One, A Short Film by Christopher Jason Bell
Yesterday we posted a conversation between filmmakers Christopher Jason Bell and Theodore Collatos about their films, practicing their craft, managing expectations and much more. Today we’re premiering Bell’s short film One Times One, which had its origins as excised footage from his feature debut The Winds that Scatter. As he explained: “For Winds, we ended up with a 3.5 hour assembly cut. There were a lot of things that I was very attached to that ultimately needed to go. One of them was a small arc in which Ahmad made friends with a man named Mike — he met this guy while looking […]
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Watch: The Best Films from Cannes This Decade
The Palme d’Or winners are one matter, but what are the best films to premiere at Cannes this decade? Kevin B. Lee unveils a personal canon in this video essay, making the case for Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Assassin, Hong Sang-soo’s The Day He Arrives, Jean Luc-Godard’s Goodbye to Language and more.
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“Is the Remix Method Going Stale?” Watch: Everything is a Remix: The Force Awakens
One of our 25 New Faces in 2011, Kirby Ferguson has, with his Everything is a Remix Project, created a web series that artfully blends cultural criticism with legal and copyright commentary. In the latest edition, Ferguson considers J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: The Force Awakens and wonders if blockbuster artistic sampling has run its course. “Is remixing a weak point in The Force Awakens? Is the remix method growing stale? Have we reached the limits of remixing?” For his conclusions, watch the video above.
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Werner Herzog to Teach Online Filmmaking Class
Traditional film school is overrated, according to Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Werner Herzog, who has signed on to teach an online filmmaking class. “You spend way too much time in film school. It costs way too much money. You can learn the essentials of filmmaking on your own within two weeks,” said Herzog in the (above) trailer for his class. The new class, which will focus on the art of both feature and documentary filmmaking, will be offered as part of the online education platform MasterClass. Pre-enrollment is open to everyone and the class will become available this summer. “Werner Herzog vibrantly and charismatically […]
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Watch Errol Morris’ Short Demon in the Freezer
Though smallpox has been eradicated, stocks of the virus remain for research purposes. Should these samples be destroyed in order to prevent them from being used as a biological weapon? Demon in the Freezer, the compelling short documentary from Academy Award-winner Errol Morris (The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons From the Life of Robert S. McNamara), explores the issue as part of The New York Times Op-Docs series. The film is Morris’ eighth film published by Op-Docs and the 200th Op-Doc video since the series launched in 2011. “It all comes down to the question of how best to protect ourselves against ourselves. […]
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Watch: “Mulholland Drive: How Lynch Manipulates You”
In his latest, The Nerdwriter considers how David Lynch manipulates audience expectations to subvert cliches and mess with your response as a viewer. Central talking points: Betty’s audition and, of course, Club Silencio.
