Filmmaker Videos
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Watch: Todd Haynes and Julianne Moore on Safe and Far From Heaven
Christmas cometh early now that the formerly out of print masterclass Safe is available from the Criterion Collection. To promote its release, director Todd Haynes sat down with star Julianne Moore to discuss the film’s forebears in female alienation (Red Desert, Jeanne Dielman, and DeLillo’s White Noise), as well as its unexpected Sirkian underpinnings. Moore also talks Safe‘s larger context, as a harbinger of the ’90s independent film boom, and how her first collaboration with Haynes ultimately defined the trajectory of her career.
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Short Film: Person to Person, Directed by Dustin Guy Defa
The New Yorker streams short films — who knew? This discovery is particularly welcome because just posted on the magazine’s YouTube channel — and embedded above — is Dustin Guy Defa’s terrific Person to Person, one of the works that landed the filmmaker on our 25 New Faces list this year. Here’s Brandon Harris on the film here at Filmmaker: Speaking of throwback cinema that doesn’t simply appropriate but forges its own thing out of the familiar, Dustin Guy Defa’s Person to Person is a film one could watch a dozen times. Assuming he doesn’t change the Vimeo password and […]
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Trailer Watch: Terrence Malick’s Knight of Cups
The trailer for Terrence Malick’s next film, Knight of Cups, is both what you’d expect at this point — musing voiceovers, aggressively prowling cameras in constant motion, people on the beach — and some new developments, like much more flesh on display, aggressively digital cinematography and seemingly way more time spent in urban centers than usual.
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Watch: Jackie Chan’s Brand of Action Comedy
The latest edition of Tony Zhou’s “Every Frame a Painting” series takes a look at the king of action comedy, Jackie Chan. Consistently putting himself at a disadvantage like the silent film stars Keaton and Chaplin, or defamiliarizing the familiar as weaponry, Chan’s perfectionism and attention to detail have set him above the rest for decades running. In the video, Zhou also closely analyzes the difference in Chan’s Chinese and American work, particularly the director’s editing, which can compound or dismantle the effects of Chan’s stunt work.
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Festival Trailer Watch: Borscht 9
December 17 – 21 I should be concentrated on Christmas shopping, but I’ll be at Borscht 9 in Miami. (Sorry, friends and family.) Borscht 8 was my favorite film event of 2012, and I can’t wait for this year’s edition. What’s Borscht? (Aside from a soup?) Here, from the site: The Borscht Film Festival (est. 2004 by New World School of the Arts high school students) is a quasi-yearly event held at iconic Miami venues that commissions, produces, and showcases movies created by emerging regional filmmakers telling Miami stories that go beyond the city’s insipid exterior. Borscht Corp is an […]
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Trailer Watch: Mad Max: Fury Road
This new trailer for George Miller’s forthcoming fourth Mad Max movie can speak for itself. You know the drill: cars blow up, lots of desert, fierce men wearing improbable makeup, explosions for days. Bracing stuff.
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Watch: Paul Thomas Anderson’s Use of Steadicam
On the almost eve of Inherent Vice‘s release, here is a Kevin B. Lee video essay from the archives that analyzes Paul Thomas Anderson’s varied use of steadicam. Whether it’s enhancing the subjectivity of his principal character’s experience in Sydney/Hard Eight, juggling multiple entries through the guise of spectacle in Boogie Nights, or exploring relationships through space in Punch Drunk Love and There Will Be Blood, Anderson continually pushes the camera technique to new applications.
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Watch: A “Language Lesson” from Jim Finn’s North Korean Mockumentary The Juche Idea
The FBI can’t prove that North Korea is responsible for hacking into Sony, releasing thousands of documents and confidential company information. So it can’t be said with any certainty that the hack was launched as an official attack on James Franco and Seth Rogen’s forthcoming let’s-assassinate-Kim Jong-un comedy The Interview, although the outraged North Korean government has expressed their approval, stating that “hacking into Sony Pictures might be a righteous deed of the supporters and sympathizers with the DPRK.” Regardless of how it shakes out, what better time to revisit Jim Finn’s peerlessly odd, deadpan take on North Korean propaganda? 2008’s The Juche […]
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Watch: Boyhood Behind the Scenes Featurette
As Boyhood continues to steamroll the Critic’s Awards, here’s an exclusive behind-the-scenes look from Hulu at the 12 year production. Linklater discusses everything from the conception of the project and its autobiographical elements, to the evolution of his working relationship with Ellar Coltrane, and the visual consistency of the film. The short also features interviews with Patricia Arquette Coltrane, Lorelei Linklater and Ethan Hawke from Year One to Year 12.
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Watch: Kathryn Bigelow’s Elephant Poaching Short Last Days
Written by Steven Soderbergh’s frequent collaborator Scott Z. Burns and directed by Kathryn Bigelow, Last Days is a grimly succinct argument against buying materials made out of ivory and other products from endangered species. Trafficking in endangered species is the fourth largest illegal business in the world, behind drugs, weapons and human trafficking, and the short links their sale directly to last year’s Al Shabaab attack on Nairobi’s Westgate Mall. There’s disturbing footage of the mass shooting included and bloody animation of elephant slaughter as well, so brace yourself. The short film’s official site is here.
