Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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DENTATA’S “EARWIG,” BY RICHARD KERN
Back in the day, Richard Kern did many of our covers — Robert Duvall, Kim Pierce/Chloe Sevigny/Hilary Swank, and Michelle Rodriguez, for example. Recently he gave us a shot of Sasha Grey for The Girlfriend Experience that is only in our print edition. But the truly well-viewed will remember Kern’s string of New York underground and transgressive films from the 1980s, movies like The Right Side of My Brain, Submit to Me, and Goodbye 42nd St. This new Kern music video of the band Dentata is more straight-up performance, but it still boasts his great eye and specific vibe. Dentata […]
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RADIOHEAD ANNOUNCES NEW ALBUM, END OF “RADIOHEAD MODEL”
A couple of years ago at a film panel discussion I had to smile at the irony of a $600/hour entertainment attorney solemnly intoning to an audience questioner that his indie-film revenue issues would be solved if he embraced “the Radiohead model.” That is, if the filmmaker decided, like the English superstar band did with their album In Rainbows, to allow fans to pay what they want, even if that was only a penny. But that was back when free was the thing. Indeed, while others had previously experimented with such pricing models, that Radiohead did so with one of […]
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Criterion Joins Hulu Plus
Beginning today The Criterion Collection has made available over 150 titles from its library on Hulu’s paid service, Hulu Plus. Known best as a destination for streaming the latest in popular TV series (as well as full runs of some TV shows), with the Criterion deal (only available in the U.S.) Hulu is trying to grab the attention of movie buffs, while keeping pace with it’s biggest competitor, Netflix. UPDATE: A spokesperson for Criterion confirms that Hulu will exclusively stream Criterion titles by year’s end. With today’s launch you can stream some of the Criterion essentials: The 400 Blows, The […]
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IFP NARRATIVE LAB APPLICATION LAUNCHES TODAY
The IFP Narrative Lab launches its online application today. From the website: IFP’s Independent Filmmaker Labs is the only program in the world currently supporting first-time feature directors in post-production to complete, market and distribute their films. Focusing exclusively on low-budget features ( Through the Labs, IFP works to ensure that talented emerging voices receive the support, resources, and industry exposure necessary to reach audiences. The Lab is really an excellent program that provides a wealth of intensive mentorship having to do with all the aspects of filmmaker that follow production. Recent Lab films include such Sundance selections as Pariah, […]
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The Map
Alice Munro wrote a short story once called “Deep Holes,” and it’s as fitting a title as any when one considers her body of work. Munro has made a career out of writing the same short story over and over again, but because that story is shot through with an incredible amount of depth, with endless bottoms of nuance and complexity and minor shifts and adjustments each time, it constantly amazes. Jonathan Franzen (who himself rewrote his 2001 classic novel The Corrections as the even better Freedom), reviewing Munro’s 2004 collection Runaway, nailed it: I like stories because it takes […]
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WHAT’S IN MY INSTAPAPER: SUNDAY MORNING LINKS, 2/13/01
Here are a few of the articles in my Instapaper this week. At Bad Lit, Mike Everleth has his usual excellent selection of Underground Film Links, including this link to “Foreign Cinema: Whither San Francisco’s Experimental Film Legacy,” by Kimberly Chun at the Bold Italic. She visits Canyon Cinema and and various local filmmakers, looking for scene described in the Pacific Film Archive’s first book, Radical Light. Chuck Tryon watches (and likes) The Fighter with his Massachusetts-born fiance and notes the reference to the documentary High on Crack Street: Lost Lives in Lowell: A look back at the documentary shows […]
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TRAILER WATCH: “ARTHUR” (VS. “ARTHUR”)
At Hollywood Elsewhere, Jeff Wells picks up on the character mystery suggested by Arthur‘s trailer, i.e., has Liza Minelli’s role of “Linda Marolla,” played in the remake by Greta Gerwig, really been demoted to not much more than a cameo? Or are Russell Brand, conspicuous consumption, and arch repartee with Helen Mirren (in the John Gielgud) role that much easier to market than Gerwig’s rising star? And, oh yeah, the original had something to do with drinking…. (By the way, can we put a moratorium on the use of “Under Pressure” in movies and movie trailers?)
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Darren Aronofsky’s Top 5 Books On The Movies
Over at The Browser, Black Swan director Darren Aronofsky names and discusses his top five books on films and filmmaking. There’s an obvious one (Sidney Lumet’s Making Movies), an unexpected autobiography (Kirk Douglas’s The Ragman’s Son), and then the following screenplay tome. From Aronofsky’s piece: The Writer’s Journey, Christopher Vogler. It’s the Bible for screenwriters. I think it’s the best book on how to write a screenplay ever written. It helped me get through so many roadblocks as a writer. Vogler adapted the work of Joseph Campbell, an American academic, to the art of screenwriting. Vogler’s approach to screenwriting was […]
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FILMMAKER MAGAZINE LOOKING FOR BUSINESS WRITERS
Last Fall I posted a call for new writers to submit their work, and from that reach-out I connected with several folks whose bylines you have seen on our site and in our pages over the last few months. Now, I am specifically looking to connect with experienced writers interested in covering the business (i.e., financing, production, distribution and marketing) sides of independent film. If you are a published writer who has done hard news and investigative reporting on the film business and would be interested in writing for Filmmaker, please drop me a line at editor.filmmakermagazine AT gmail.com.
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DIRECTOR MIGUEL ARTETA ON “CEDAR RAPIDS”
I love what director Miguel Arteta has to say about comedy at the end of this short, unedited interview conducted during this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The director of such Filmmaker favorites as Star Maps and Chuck and Buck is in theaters today with his new comedy, Cedar Rapids, starring Ed Helms.
