Filmmaking
Filmmaking
-
“Forgetting the Camera Was Rolling, It Hit Me”: DPs Neema Sadeghi & Nicholas Bupp on Serious People
In Serious People, a music video director hires a doppelganger to take his place at work after he learns that his wife is pregnant. The film, co-directed by Pasqual Gutierrez and Ben Mullinkosson, is inspired by Gutierrez’s own expectant fatherhood and is a 2025 Sundance Film Festival NEXT selection. Neema Sadeghi (Noel Miller: Stop Crying) and Nicholas Bupp (Aporia, Salam) served as co-cinematographers. Below, they talk about working without a crew and contrasting a calm visual style with a mounting sense of narrative tension. See all responses to our annual Sundance cinematographer interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being […]
-
Sundance 2025: BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions, The Virgin of the Quarry Lake, Atropia
After the unscheduled drama of BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions’ abrupt removal from Sundance’s lineup, financier Participant Media’s attorney’s open letter accusing public director Kahlil Joseph of creating a secret cut as justification for said removal and the feature’s reinstatement in the lineup thanks to a new buyer, the film finally screened with the now-very-known context that somewhere in there is an extra minute not in the Participant-cleared cut. I can’t imagine where; this sprawling 113-minute essay film is all tangents and free association, to the point where it seems like you could subtract or add an infinite amount of material […]
-
“Having a Crew Was Not an Option: DP Gianluca Matarrese on GEN_
Patients seeking gender-affirming care and in vitro treatments in Italy flock to Niguarda public hospital, where Dr. Maurizio Bini is considered one of the preeminent experts in the field. This is the subject of director and cinematographer Gianluca Matarrese’s film GEN_, premiering in the World Cinema: Documentary Competition at Sundance this year. Amid an increasingly hostile conservative climate, Dr. Bini and his patients navigate social stigma alongside much-needed medical intervention. Below, Matarrese discusses the decision to film most scenes from behind a book shelf, being inspired by Frederick Wiseman and relying on natural lighting. See all responses to our annual […]
-
Shorenstein Center Announces Spring 2025 Cohort of Documentary Film Fellows
The Shorenstein Center announced today the Spring 2025 cohort of Documentary Film Fellows. From the press release: The group joins the Center under the auspices of the Documentary Film in the Public Interest Initiative and will spend the semester conducting research and engaging with the HKS community about the challenges facing the field and its impact on civic life. The Documentary Film in the Public Interest Initiative is designed to support new research, analysis, innovation, and provocation around core issues facing the documentary film sector. Through the Fellows’ projects, the Shorenstein Center will engage in examinations of public impact and […]
-
Things I Learned About Filming Shamans While My Marriage Ended
In 2021, I was sitting in a dark room in the depths of the Andes, listening to the steady chanting of a Peruvian Shipibo shaman guiding me through a wildly personal and intense ayahuasca ceremony. I was bawling my eyes out, purging what felt like an entire lifetime of pain through my tears, the tribally-robed medicine man before me some kind of God pulling the abuses of my past up and out of my body with his song. The next day, I saw this same man eating oatmeal in Nike sweatpants and jovially WhatsApping his wife. I was disoriented: I […]
-
Remembering David Lynch, 1946 – 2025
Director David Lynch, whose works plumbed the dream life of the American unconscious, revealing both joy and the deepest of horrors within, died today at the age of 78. “It is with deep regret that we, his family, announce the passing of the man and the artist, David Lynch. We would appreciate some privacy at this time,” his family posted on Facebook. “There’s a big hole in the world now that he’s no longer with us. But, as he would say, ‘Keep your eye on the donut and not on the hole.’ It’s a beautiful day with golden sunshine and […]
-
Remembering Film Independent President Josh Welsh
Josh Welsh, Film Independent’s President, died December 31, 2024 at home following a five-year battle with colon cancer. He was 62. Welsh began his association with the non-profit nearly 30 years ago, volunteering at its annual Spirit Awards in 1996 while working in L.A. as an actor. After joining the staff, Welsh worked his way up through various positions: Filmmaker Labs Coordinator, Filmmaker Labs Manager and Director of Talent Development. In the latter position, he oversaw and helped create all the organization’s talent development programs, including the Labs, Project:Involve and the Fast Track Film Financing Market. He also administered Film […]
-
Notable Tech in 2024
Innovation in cameras, lenses, lighting, batteries, and more pressed onward in 2024, despite production doldrums and pain points across the industry. These advances arrive at a time when all the world walks around with a capable 4K video camera in their pockets, when a youngest generation pivots to vertical videos from social media. While the future of the film business as we knew it may seem cloudy, the steadily rising quality and capability of low-cost gear does continue to lift all boats. Below are brief notes on some of the tech standouts of 2024. Let’s hope that ginned-up xenophobia—manufactured panics […]
-
“I Keep My Local 600 Card So I Can Operate”: Rachel Morrison on The Fire Inside
When she competed in the 2012 Summer Olympics, Claressa Shields became the first American woman to win a gold medal in boxing. It was the culmination of a lifelong struggle to make her way as a fighter. Growing up on the edge of poverty in Flint, Michigan, Shields trained with coach Jason Crutchfield in a long-term collaboration. Nicknamed “T-Rex” for her short arm span, she was the subject of the 2015 documentary T-Rex: Her Fight for Gold. In 2019, Oscar-nominated cinematographer Rachel Morrison chose a project about Shields for her feature directing debut. Working from a script by Barry Jenkins, […]
-
The Best Films of 2024 As Chosen by Some of Its Key Filmmakers
As the year draws to a close, the urge to compile “best of the year” lists feels both inevitable and deeply complicated. In a world grappling with profound crises—most notably the genocide in Palestine and ever-deepening fractures in democratic institutions globally—such an exercise risks seeming trivial, detached from the urgent realities shaping our collective experience. Yet cinema at its best has always offered a lens to confront, process and perhaps even find meaning in the chaos. This list emerges not as an escape but as a form of engagement, a way to reflect on the artistic vitality that endures and […]
