Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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Not an Option: The Ins and Outs of Shopping Agreements
The motion picture and television industries have become increasingly informal in recent years. In the past, agents would sign actors and writers before trying to sell their services or material, members of producing teams would sign collaboration agreements with their partners before taking a project to a studio, and producers would enter into written option agreements with writers under which they would pay money to exclusively option the motion picture and television rights to a property. These days, however, many agents will “hip-pocket” new artists and promote them without a contract to avoid commitment; a collaborator will walk a project […]
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Charting the Course: Data Visualization in Documentary Film
“Every single pixel should testify directly to content.” So says Edward Tufte, a professor emeritus at Yale and pioneer in the field of data visualization. And if this emphasis on clarity and, essentially, story is true in the world of static infographics, it’s exponentially so when content comes at 24 frames per second. In the short PBS film The Art of Data Visualization, Tufte reaches far back in time, before the mundane pie charts and bar graphs that school children are taught to decipher, finding the beginnings of data visualization in stone-age cartography and the rise of science during the […]
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Positive Trauma: Editor Mathilde Bonnefoy on CITIZENFOUR
Paris-born editor Mathilde Bonnefoy has criss-crossed documentary and fiction, working with directors such as Wim Wenders (The Soul of a Man) and, most prominently, Tom Tykwer. Her first feature editing credit is the director’s time-bending international hit Run Lola Run, and she has continued to work with Tykwer on Heaven, Three and The International, among others. Long based in Berlin, Bonnefoy, as she relates below, was sought after by Poitras because of her work on Tykwer’s films and the “thriller” nature of CITIZENFOUR’s source material. Below, in the final days of post-production, I speak to Bonnefoy about encrypted workflows, working […]
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When Restoration Met Distribution
As CEO of the Los Angeles-based creative studio and postproduction house Cinelicious, Paul Korver had the unsettling feeling that too many deals were passing him by. The preferred film scanning and restoration vendor for Criterion and Alamo Drafthouse, Cinelicious was also making a name for itself as a digital intermediate supervisor. Touring the festival circuit with the likes of Boyhood and Prince Avalanche, Korver found himself in conversation with various rights holders who were looking to restore films but without the funds to do so. What if, he thought, Cinelicious had a distribution arm to monetize that restoration investment? Thus […]
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Afternoon Smackdown: Pre-Vis’ing a Fight Scene
Action cinematographer Lawrence Ribeiro forwards this short video of an afternoon’s work — literally. Below, he explains how, with a camera and two top stuntmen, he can mock-up a dynamic fight scene. From Ribeiro: Here’s a chase and fight sequence we shot, in five hours, using two top stunt professionals and one camera. In 2nd unit, we’d consider this type of shooting a level above pre-visualization (previs). Previs is a critical tool for designing action sequences. Sometimes all a script will say is, “…and they fight.” So videos like this allow us to experiment with choreography, and save time and […]
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See No Evil 2 Directors The Soska Sisters on Collaborative Directing
In the upcoming issue of Filmmaker, Esther Robinson writes about directors who work in pairs. Robinson’s focus is on how two directors is better than one when it comes to navigating the development and financial aspects of being a director, and she surveys a number of them on how they structure their work. But then there’s the also the basic question: how do they actually do it? Is everything discussed jointly? Does one talk to the actors and the other direct the camera? Is one more dominant in production and the other in post? In this short clip, Jen and […]
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Why Independent Filmmakers Should Embrace GoPro (and Vice Versa)
Filmmaker Adam Bhala Lough is in the final days of an Indiegogo campaign for his skater doc, The Motivation 2.0: The Chris Cole Story, currently featured on our partner page. Below, he writes about his use of GoPro cameras for his independent films. Visit the Indiegogo page for more information on his project and please consider donating. GoPro cameras have long been popular in the action sports market and reality television, but have been completely ignored by the indie film community. This should change and here’s why: Recently I needed to film a car scene, where two characters were driving and […]
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Watch: The Art of Terrence Malick’s Voiceovers
They’re a tricky thing, voiceovers, and arguably no one utilizes them as frequently and as effectively as Terrence Malick. Where many filmmakers deploy them as an expository device, Malick allows voiceovers to deepen his characters’ perspectives through literal and abstract observations. This video essay from Kevin B. Lee and Scott Tobias at the Dissolve analyzes the evolution of voiceovers in Malick’s films, from a young Sissy Spacek and Linda Manz in Badlands and Days of Heaven to the layered choruses of The Tree of Life and To The Wonder.
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“A Zinging Mix of Naturalism and Edge”: Jessica Oreck’s The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga
With Jessica Oreck’s The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga opening today at MoMA in New York for a week-long run, we are rerunning Howard Feinstein’s review from the New Directors New Films festival. Running the length of this labor-intensive doc about man’s late-developing historical estrangement from nature are excellent hand-painted animated panels depicting a composite Slavic fairy tale about displaced tween siblings Ivan and Alona who have, out of desperation, taken refuge in a forest they had learned to fear as small children. Residing there is the evil witch Baba Yaga, whose house is built on chicken legs and […]
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“My Grandfather Nearly Blew Up the Entire Eastern Seaboard”: Matt McCormick on Kickstarter Doc Buzz One Four
Filmmaker Matt McCormick penned the following essay, published in conjunction with his Kickstarter campaign for the documentary Buzz One Four. Visit Kickstarter for more information, and consider making a donation. It’s true. My grandfather nearly blew up the entire eastern seaboard, or at least the area spanning from Washington D.C. to roughly Philadelphia, or maybe even New York, depending on which way the wind was blowing that day. But then again, it all depends on whom you ask. Air Force officials claim that there is no way the two 9-megaton thermonuclear bombs on board the B-52 bomber my grandfather (accidentally) […]
