Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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“ALL IN – THE POKER MOVIE” DIRECTOR DOUG TIROLA ON DOCUMENTARY RELEVANCE, HIS MARKETING DILEMMA AND FIGHTING IMDB
Last week, I wrote on the Filmmaker blog about the dilemma faced by director Doug Tirola in the marketing of his new film, All In – The Poker Movie. As promised, Tirola has written an expansive first-person piece describing in more detail the situation he faced. All In – The Poker Movie opened at the Cinema Village on Friday March 23rd 2012 and is now rolling out to over 40 markets including Los Angeles and Chicago. The film was originally shown at a festival in 2009, but over the past three years has undergone some distinct and important changes. However, included in the marketing […]
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The Blue Velvet Project, #96
Second #4512, 75:12 Dean Stockwell has said that he based his character Ben on a Carol Burnett sketch: “You know that thing that I do with my eyes? Carol Burnett had a character of this super snooty woman and she was always like this. I stole it and I told her one time and she laughed her head off when I told her.” And in an alternate-universe sort of way, this entire sequence at Ben’s is like one of the extended Carol Burnett Show sketches from the mind 1970s, with Harvey Korman and Tim Conway. The awkward pauses, the physical […]
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Artificial Paradises — A Hammer to Nail Review
(Artificial Paradises world premiered at the 2011 International Film Festival Rotterdam before screening at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival. It opens theatrically in New York City at the reRun Gastropub on Friday, March 30, 2012. Visit the film’s official website to learn more.) Yes, Yulene Olaizola’s Artificial Paradises is about drug addiction. But not only does Olaizola take her time in revealing this agenda, her patient filmmaking and reverence for the gorgeous natural environment in which she shoots keeps that agenda from elbowing its way into the foreground. It’s this gentle approach that distinguishes Artificial Paradises from the rest of […]
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BAMCINEMAFEST ANNOUNCES INITIAL SLATE
Today the BAMcinemaFest unveiled a selection of the films that will play at Brooklyn’s BAM between June 20 and July 1. The slate is dominated by titles that premiered in at Sundance, although there are also films here that bowed at Toronto and Cannes last year. The vast majority of the films announced here are also made by New Yorkers — many of them Brooklynites — while Brian M. Cassidy & Melanie Shatzky (named in our 25 New Faces back in 2007) enjoy the rare coup of having two films in the fest: the narrative Francine and the doc The […]
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KASUMI REMIXES FOR THE VIMEO AWARDS
Filmmaker is a media partner for this year’s Vimeo Awards, where the Remix Category will be judged by last year’s winner, Kasumi. Below, she explains what she does in a succinct 60 seconds that also explains the video remix genre in general. Vimeo Festival + Awards Judge: Kasumi from Vimeo Festival + Awards on Vimeo. Kasumi is in the midst of fundraising for a feature-length documentary, Shockwaves. Check out her project video and more info at USAProjects.Org. And for more on the Vimeo Awards, visit their Tumblr blog.
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MUSIC VIDEO: SHEARWATER’S “YOU AS YOU WERE”
Filmmaker and Filmmaker contributor Alix Lambert directed the new Shearwater video, which just went online. It’s from their new Animal Joy album, and, appropriately, there is animal imagery. I asked Alix about the origins of the video’s concept, and she emailed back: When I first listened to the song, I just wrote down the lyrics that most jumped out at me. The bloody nose became a thread that I wanted to go through the film. Jonathan wanted to include Nicholas Kahn’s wonderful costumes, which I was thrilled about and from there I felt like there should be some kind of […]
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TRAILER WATCH: HARMONY KORINE’S “THE FOURTH DIMENSION”
An anthology film with bizarre “rules” that was produced by Vice Films and Grolsch FilmWorks and directed a trio of international auteurs including Harmony Korine, The Fourth Dimension was always destined to be decidedly odd. But, on the evidence of this newly released trailer, it looks like it could be pretty great too. Korine’s contribution to the film features Val Kilmer as a motivational speaker (called Val Kilmer!) trying to get people to harness their “awesome secrets,” while the rest of the film is comprised of segments from Russian director Alexey Fedorchenko and Poland’s Jan Kwiecinski about a time travel-obsessed scientist […]
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TRAILER WATCH: “DESPITE THE GODS”
On Facebook, Hammer to Nail’s Michael Tully describes this as “The Trailer of the Century!” And certainly Penny Vozniak‘s Despite the Gods — a doc about Jennifer Lynch making her third feature, Hisss, in India — looks incredibly compelling and entertaining. Judge for yourself below! The movie premieres at Hot Docs at the end of next month, and I’m looking forward to hopefully catching up with it shortly afterward.
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The Blue Velvet Project, #95
Second #4465, 74:25 1. Dorothy and Frank split their angles of vision; everyone is watching everyone. But it is Dorothy who suggests and defines the off-screen space, the space where Donny is kept behind a closed door. 2. Ben has just said, to one of the Party Girls, “Darling, could you bring some glasses, and we’ll have a beer with Frank. Please, sit down.” 3. Ben’s quiet formalism is not at all ironic. Rather, his decorum (which Frank calls “suave”) suggests that there is a proper and an improper way to conduct matters of evil in this world, and his […]
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Music, Parallax Sounds and the City
This past week I had the pleasure of working again with my long time friends and collaborators Damon Locks and Wayne Montana on a play that I am developing. Damon is a Chicago-based musician who is featured in a documentary currently in development, Parallax Sounds, which “explores the intimate connection between music and urban landscape in Chicago.” Directed by Augusto Contento, the film also features Steve Albini, Ken Vandermark, and Ian Williams, among others. Locks and Montana created original music for the soundtrack of my own film The Mark of Cain. Their ability to think cinematically and incorporate the sounds […]
