Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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Five Questions with Prince Avalanche Director David Gordon Green
In 2011, an Icelandic-British film called Either Way won Best Film and Best Screenplay at the Torino Film Festival. Just over a year later, David Gordon Green, an American filmmaker whose own projects have debuted at Torino, has remade Either Way into the comedy Prince Avalanche starring Paul Rudd (Knocked Up) and Emile Hirsch (Into the Wild). The movie studies two men who leave their city lives to paint traffic lines down a wrecked highway. As they move through the hot summer and learn more about one another, an unexpected friendship develops. Much to everyone’s surprise, Green pulled off shooting this feature film in Texas over […]
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Five Questions with C.O.G Director Kyle Patrick Alvarez
Kyle Patrick Alvarez did something many, many writers and filmmakers have never been able to do. He attained the rights to a David Sedaris short story. Alvarez’s second feature film, C.O.G, is the first film adaptation of Sedaris’ work. Perhaps somewhat unexpectedly, C.O.G wanders from Sedaris’ narrative and is instead imbued with Alvarez’s own personal experiences, which is what attracted him to adapting the story in the first place. The movie follows David, Jonathan Groff (Spring Awakening), as he spends the summer in Oregan on an apple farm. While David has high expectations for his time in this rural area, he ends up […]
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Five Questions with Fruitvale Director Ryan Coogler
On January 1, 2009, a Bay Area Rapid Transit officer shot and killed unarmed 22 year-old Oscar Grant, who was being detained on the BART train’s platform for alleged fighting. With the help of cellphone cameras, witnesses filmed the officer shooting Grant and both the footage and news went viral. When the officer was convicted of only involuntary manslaughter instead of second degree murder or voluntary manslaughter, peaceful protests turned violent and riotous throughout the Bay Area as the city made its anger known. Raised in the Bay Area himself, Ryan Coogler tackles the sensitive topic of Oscar Grant’s life […]
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Five Questions with I Used to be Darker Director Matt Porterfield
Though it only arrived three years ago, Matt Porterfield’s Putty Hill, with its unique blend of fiction and documentary and its crisp, patient filmmaking, has already become quite an influential and well-loved piece of the micro-budget cannon. Now Porterfield has returned with I Used to Be Darker, a more formally scripted work that follows a troubled young woman (Deragh Campbell) who moves in with her aunt (Kim Taylor), uncle (Ned Oldham), and cousin (Hannah Gross) in Maryland. The film premieres today in US Dramatic Competition at the Sundance Film Festival. Filmmaker: Tell me a bit about the development process for […]
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The 2013 Art House Convergence | The Brave New Art House
Each year, the owners and operators of America’s art house cinemas gather the week before the start of the Sundance Film Festival at a resort nestled in the mountains of Midway, UT. The Art House Convergence, this year celebrating its 6th anniversary, brings together theaters from all over the US and Canada to help foster the growth and viability of art house and independent cinemas. The Convergence, organized under the non-profit status of the Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor, MI and chaired by the Michigan’s Executive Director, Russ Collins, has continued to grow over the past six years; what began […]
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Five Questions with Cutie and the Boxer Director Zachary Heinzerling
Cutie and the Boxer functions as a love story about a couple and their devotion to their individual art. Zach Heinzerling’s directorial debut concerns itself with the difficulties of marriage, but also the trials of being an artist. After meeting Ushio and Noriko Shinohara in Brooklyn through a friend, Heinzerling was immediately fascinated by their relationship and lifestyle – two extremely different artists in attitude, age, and craft who have been married and lived together for over 40 years. Cutie and the Boxer came together over five years. Two or three years spent solely on getting to know Ushio and Noriko […]
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Stories From POV Hackathon
I am continuing my quest to better understand the wild new world of films that aren’t just on your TV or in your movie theater — but those that tell stories interactively, that are native to the web, that you can carry around on your phone, and whatever else clever storytellers are dreaming up (lest we be restricted to calling it all the ugly word transmedia). So, I share with you today the stories of the POV Hackathon. POV, the incredible PBS documentary series, hosts this event for documentary filmmakers to connect with designers and developers in the tech community, […]
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Sundance Institute Artist Services Program Expands Self-Distribution Opportunities
Keri Putnam, Executive Director of Sundance Institute, announced today that the Institute’s Artist Services program – which provides Institute artists with exclusive opportunities for creative self-distribution, marketing and financing solutions for their work –has expanded to include selected films supported by one foundation and five nonprofit organizations. Additionally, these organizations will join with Sundance Institute in continuing to shape the program and the services it offers. The Bertha Foundation, BRITDOC, Cinereach, Film Independent, the Independent Filmmaker Project and the San Francisco Film Society will each select films that they have supported to receive access to best-in-class digital distribution arrangements that […]
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Video Streaming & Indies
Now that the 2013 Sundance Film Festival is underway, it’s an opportunity to remind indie filmmakers that, sadly, their future is on the web and not in movie theatres. Park City screenings, parties and other get-togethers are great fun and a good chance to meet other makers and distributors. However, don’t expect to make a deal! This year Sundance will screen 119 feature-length films from 32 countries, including works from 51 first-time directors. These works were selected from 12,146 submissions, including 4,044 feature-length films and 8,102 shorts. One can only wonder if the odds for having one’s feature selected (2.9%) […]
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Dave Grohl on Directing Sound City
Dave Grohl has a history of fruitfully redefining himself. After Nirvana self-destructed, he went from being the former drummer for one the most momentous rock bands of the 20th century to being the frontman for one of the biggest acts of the 21st, Foo Fighters. So it shouldn’t seem too surprising to find him making a successful broad jump from musician to documentarian, especially with a project is as close to his heart as Sound City. Opening its doors in 1969, L.A.’s Sound City Studios was low on frills and gloss, but boasted an almost magical live-room ambience and a […]
