Filmmaker Videos
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Five Questions for Drone Boning Drone Porn Creators Brandon LaGanke and John Carlucci
Drones. Porn. Directors Brandon LaGanke and John Carlucci of Ghost Cow Films have taken what might have been a cynical, viral video SEO-mashup and delivered something deeply weird and oddly hypnotic. While Drone Boning features couples having sex (so, yes, it’s adults-only and NSFW), the eerie glide of the drone and the camera’s distance from these writhing lovers make them more like elements in a video art piece than reflections of desire. Filmmaker previously featured the work of Ghost Cow when we curated LaGanke’s short film, Play House, for the Northside Film Festival. When he sent me this latest out-there […]
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Watch: A Montage of Heaven and Hell at the Movies (Mildly NSFW)
Opening with the decidedly non-canonical duo of Always and All Dogs Go to Heaven, this nifty eight-ish minute montage looks at the afterlife as rendered onscreen. Graphic matches and dialogue segues from one person protesting they don’t belong here to another are smoothly handled, and while it’s more for fun than study, there are some takeaways: i.e., that there’s very little difference in the degree of tackiness of the afterlife as rendered in What Dreams May Come and Little Nicky. Thanks to Press Play for the tip. (There is brief rear male nudity and a dude’s neck being torn apart, […]
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Watch: Richard Linklater and Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel Q&A
This post-SXSW screening Q&A for The Grand Budapest Hotel is a few cuts above average. For one thing, Wes Anderson, Jason Schwartzman and music supervisor Randall Poster get to have Richard Linklater as their moderator, which makes for a higher class of question and a more relaxed rapport between two sympatico filmmakers. Native Texans who’ve both worked with animation, Linklater and Anderson are equally ready to discuss the films of Max Ophuls and which Stefan Zweig books in particular they have or haven’t read. Other highlights: Poster talks about how they arranged to record with a full balalaika orchestra, Anderson […]
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Watch: How to Prepare a 70mm Interstellar Print for Projection
One of the more unexpected side effects of Interstellar‘s much-ballyhooed release in 35mm, 70mm and 70mm IMAX has been a wave of videos from local theaters showing their patrons exactly what it takes to prepare and project 70mm. My pick of the litter is this nicely shot two-minute video from the Willow Creek 12 Theater in Plymouth, Minnesota. Watch the process from start to finish as eight cans of film arrive, are unlocked, checked for damage, and then fed onto a platter for projection. An earlier video showed the theater testing its 70mm projector for its first 70mm engagement in 22 years. […]
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Watch: Sofia Coppola’s Christmas-Themed Gap Ads
It’s Halloween and you know what that means: less than two shopping months before Christmas! On the heels of summer’s David Fincher-helmed ads encouraging you to “dress normal,” we now have four Sofia Coppola-directed spots tied to the holiday season. The theme is that you don’t have to “get” your family, girlfriend or other significant players in your life to get them Gap. The shots and vibe are recognizably Coppola’s, the musical selections predictably eclectic. My pick of the litter — the only minute-long spot, the others being 30 seconds long — is embedded above, but it’s a playlist, so […]
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Watch: Anatomy of a Gag in Jacques Tati’s PlayTime
In honor of the Criterion release of The Complete Jacques Tati, David Cairns looks at the building blocks of the auteur’s visual gags in PlayTime, his finely choreographed exploration of technology and the modern era. In particular, Cairns examines Tati’s use of reflections and mirror images, as well as the illusion of space, which all play into the rigidity of the film’s expansive set pieces and its fractured narrative.
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Watch: Jason Voorhees of Friday the 13th on The Arsenio Hall Show
“The term ‘deranged sociopath’ gets thrown around a lot by the media these days,” Arsenio Hall said in 1989 when introducing Jason Voorhees on his show, “but it really applies to my next guest.” This was the year of Friday the 13th Part 8: Jason Takes Manhattan, and a peak-of-his-popularity Jason came out to a nice round of applause. Then he sat down and sat behind his expressionless mask barely moving while Arsenio fired off a barrage of questions to the silent hulk. “I see all your movies man, and you know what I’ve noticed?” No response. “You’re angry.” It’s […]
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Watch: Visualizing Character Choice in Snowpiercer
“How do you show character choice,” wonders Tony Zhou in this abridged version of his popular “Every Frame a Painting” essay series. Void of melodramatic “there’s no turning back” declarations, Zhou points towards Snowpiercer as a film that is constantly conveying its protagonists’ decision making process through right and left camera looks. Just as effective, if not a touch more subtle than its vocalized counterpart. Be forewarned: massive spoilers ahead.
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Watch: An Exclusive Clip from Malick Protege A.J. Edwards’ Debut The Better Angels
Here’s a clip from A.J. Edwards’ feature debut, The Better Angels, which opens November 7th. Edwards has been part of the Terrence Malick team since 2005, when he was an editorial intern on The New World and camera operator for the making of, and critics haven’t been slow to pick up on his mentor’s voice inflecting his feature debut. The Better Angels focuses on Abraham Lincoln’s childhood years, and in this clip you can see Malick’s influence in about five seconds: the Steadicam camera tracks relentlessly through the forest as young Abe arrives at his new log cabin home in […]
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Watch: How Fuji Makes XF Series Lenses
“Lenses are extremely delicate and have to be handled carefully, just like they are alive,” a Fuji factory worker says in this video from the company that will walk you through the entire process of making XF series lenses. All the steps are briefly touched upon, from mold pressing to coating, lens barrel processing, surface finishing, assembling, measuring, engraving, and finally packaging and shipping. Process and gear junkies, this one’s for you.
