Filmmaker Videos
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Exclusive Clip: Dennis Hopper in The Last Film Festival, His Final Movie
A few years ago, director Linda Yellen met her hero, Dennis Hopper, at the Sundance Film Festival. As she writes on the Kickstarter page for The Last Film Festival, “Sundance is simply one of the best film festivals in the world, and I wondered what the worst would be like? Dennis turned to me and said ‘That’s a great idea kid, you write the script and I’ll do it.’ And he did!” From the page: The Last Film Festival is a feature length comedy starring Dennis Hopper, written by Michael Leeds and me. Dennis plays Nick Twain, a big-time Hollywood Producer […]
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Exclusive Clip: Adrien Brody and Kevin Ford’s SXSW-Premiering Stone Barn Castle
One of the more intriguing documentaries scheduled to premiere at SXSW is Stone Barn Castle, which depicts Academy Award-winner Adrien Brody’s restoration of a damaged stoned barn in upstate New York — “reminiscent of a European castle” — over the course of a seven-year period. As the short clip above details, the documentary appears to be as much about community, physical work and personal achievement as it is about design. The official blurb is below: In 2007, Academy Award winning actor Adrien Brody fell in love with a partially burned stone barn, reminiscent of an old European castle, hidden in […]
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Watch: Albert Maysles on The Beales
Last Friday, a day after Albert Maysles’ passing, Grey Gardens opened for a 40th Anniversary run at New York’s Film Forum. The new 2K digital restoration of the 1976 documentary, courtesy of Janus Films, will roll out in limited cities over the next couple of months, and the Criterion Collection has released a brief interview with Maysles on his working relationship with the Beales, in which he speaks about the women’s setbacks and their fascinating — not to be confused with abnormal — qualities. For reminiscences on Maysles and his work, I’d recommend this piece by Richard Brody, which speaks to the undying […]
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Watch: The Creation of “Tondoscope,” a New Aspect Ratio
Scanning the Tribeca slate, it’s hard not to wonder what exactly “Tondoscope” is. The capsule for Gust Van den Berghe’s Lucifer claims this is an aspect ratio of his own devising, and this video provides some clarity on what that mean. You can watch a trailer here, but the basic idea is that Tondoscope is a circle. In this nine-minute video, Van den Berghe explains the origins of his idea, and his DP and assorted representatives of the University of Brussels make it happen. From carving the lens to sound mixing (tricky when characters restricted to a circle move not […]
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Trailer Watch: Anja Marquardt’s She’s Lost Control
Opening March 20th at the Media Center in Dumbo is Anja Marquardt’s atmospheric debut, She’s Lost Control. Recently nominated for two Independent Spirit Awards, including Best First Feature and Best First Screenplay, the film stars Brooke Bloom as a graduate student/sex surrogate who emotionally abandons herself to one of her more violent patients. At SXSW last year, where the drama had its North American premiere, I wrote that “Marquardt uses the untraditional avenue of sex surrogacy to explore the contradiction at the crux of her character study,” in portraying a woman who has trouble practicing the very intimacy she preaches.
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Watch: The Subterranean Stadium, A New Errol Morris Short Film
For his next semi-unlikely move, Errol Morris is making six shorts for ESPN Films. This first installment, The Subterranean Stadium, delves into the world of electric football. With guidance from “commissioner” John “Larue” DiCarlo, Morris uses his typically on-point interview skills (and offscreen, typically astonished-sounded questions) to guide us through a game whose players claim, plausibly, is as complex as chess.
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Watch: Whiplash, The Short
Initially unable to raise the $3 million budget for Whiplash, Damien Chazelle made a proof of concept, 18-minute short film that premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. Now available online, the short looks to be more or less an exact excerpt of the feature script, distilling Fletcher’s emotional manipulation, rage, and abuse into three consecutive scenes. The precise editing, gliding camerawork, and J.K. Simmons’ high octane performance are all on display, though the short — presumably for budgetary reasons — lacks the isolated, brooding mood and dark yellow color pallet of the feature version. Also notable is that Johnny Simmons was […]
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Watch: Long Shots and Adrift Characters in the Films of Paul Thomas Anderson
Not to go overboard with the Paul Thomas Anderson supercuts (but to go a little overboard with the Paul Thomas Anderson supercuts), here is a nice essay from Jacob T. Swinney that strings together a selection of long shots from the director’s first six films — a nice contrast to his application of close-ups in Boogie Nights. Emphasizing the unmoored nature of Anderson’s characters both psychologically and contextually, Swinney notes that “We are often presented with characters lost within the frame, and therefore have trouble connecting with said characters–we become isolated ourselves.”
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Watch: “Red & Yellow: A Wes Anderson Supercut”
You can’t say that Rishi Kaneria doesn’t know what he’s interested in when he makes his supercuts. Following logically on the heels of “Stanley Kubrick: Red,” which looked at that director’s use of the color, now we have “Red & Yellow: A Wes Anderson Supercut.” Red’s on the left, yellow’s on the right, and there’s an oddly disproportionate emphasis on his 2007 short Hotel Chevalier.
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Shaka King on Releasing His Sundance Short Mulignans Online
Newlyweeds filmmaker Shaka King made the slightly unorthodox decision to release his short film Mulignans online almost immediately following its Sundance premiere last month. Turns out, King never thought of Mulignans as a festival hopper, but a piece of work meant to be seen by “as wide an audience as possible as soon as possible.” Currently at 61,000 views and counting on Vimeo, I asked King to elaborate on his decision: We initially made Mulignans for the web, but a couple friends suggested I enter it into Sundance…and I’m glad I did. But the ultimate goal was always to get it out there […]
