Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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Quarantine Reading: John Gregory Dunne’s The Studio
As a publication about film, we find ourselves in the peculiar position of publishing during a moment when theatrical access to movies, and their ongoing future, is as much in question as everything else. During this suspension of normal filmwatching habits, we’ve reached out to contributors, filmmakers and friends, inviting them to find an alternate path to the movies by participating in a writing exercise engaging with any book about or lightly intersecting with film, in whatever way makes sense to them. Today: Eric Marsh on John Gregory Dunne’s all-access portrait of 20th Century Fox in 1967, The Studio. In 1967, […]
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Tin Cup, Picnic at Hanging Rock and Mikey and Nicky: Jim Hemphill’s Home Viewing Recommendations
One of the best American comedies of the 1990s hits Blu-ray this week with Warner Archive’s release of Tin Cup, director Ron Shelton’s deliriously romantic and sharply observed meditation on the blurry line between self-sabotage and greatness. Kevin Costner, in the loosest and most engaging performance of his career, plays golfer Roy “Tin Cup” McAvoy, a driving range pro whose self-described inner demons have kept him from achieving his potential while old rival David Simms (Don Johnson) has risen to the top of the profession. When David’s girlfriend Molly Griswold (Rene Russo) comes to Roy for golf lessons and Roy […]
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Canon Reformation (2): New Commercials, 12 Monkeys, Mysterious Skin
Along with getting re-accustomed to watching movies at home, I’m also relearning the rhythms of having TV in my life on a regular basis, which hasn’t been the case for a good while. My preferred choice for some daily structure and accompanying info drip is local news via two easily streamable options, ABC and CBS. The former’s preferable because they almost never cut away to, or acknowledge, the daily presidential press conference. Anchor Bill Ritter was temporarily home with COVID-19 before returning to the studio, while weatherman Lee Goldberg was for a while doing the forecast from what looked like […]
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Masters of Horror, Madam Secretary, Rough Air: Danger on Flight 534: Jim Hemphill’s Home Video Picks
One of the more interesting experiments in mid-2000s cable television was Mick Garris’ Masters of Horror anthology for Showtime, a series that lasted only two seasons but yielded terrific work by John Landis, Stuart Gordon, John Carpenter, John McNaughton, and Garris himself. It’s now streaming free on the advertiser supported platform Tubi, and many of the episodes are well worth revisiting – particularly Joe Dante’s The Screwfly Solution, an entry from season two that presciently taps into current anxieties relating to both the coronavirus and the #MeToo movement. The movie begins with a series of unprovoked assaults on women by […]
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New York State Film Tax Incentive Renewed But Trimmed; Many Lower-Budget NYC Independent Films No Longer Eligible
The New York State film tax credit was reduced from 30% to 25% and qualification requirements made tougher in budget legislation signed last week by Governor Andrew Cuomo. Alarmingly for filmmakers shooting low-budget in New York City, new rules make pictures budgeted in the six figures ineligible for any New York tax credit at all. Projects that shoot a majority of their days in the five boroughs of New York City, Westchester, Rockland, Nassau, or Suffolk counties will be subject to a new minimum spend requirement of $1 million, and projects that shoot the majority of their days in any […]
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“We’re Definitely Not ‘Social Distancing’ Distance”: Zia Anger on Performing My First Film Online
After nearly two years of performing My First Film live in theaters, Zia Anger has reconfigured her piece for livestreaming. Currently being streamed to small groups in preview mode, each performance is announced on Anger’s Twitter the morning of; capacity is small and quickly filled on a first come, first served email RSVP basis. The middle core of the show—Anger’s story about her never-premiered first feature, told via a mix of video footage and select online browsing, narrated via TextEdit narration typed out in real time—has remained essentially the same. The beginning and ending have been necessarily rethought: where a key […]
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Field of Vision and Topic Announce COVID-19 Relief Fund for Documentary Freelancers
Field of Vision and Topic Studios announced today a relief fund for documentary freelancers impacted by the coronavirus pandemic and corresponding economic shutdown. The $250,000 fund is financed from the two organizations’s current operating budgets, and the funds, intended to alleviate economic hardship due to loss of income or opportunity, will be dispensed in two tranches and in amounts up to $2,000 per freelancer. Rent, healthcare, utilities, groceries and other life expenses can be covered by the funds. In a press release, co-founder and executive producer of Field of Vision, Charlotte Cook, said, “This is an incredibly hard time for […]
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The Future of Film is Female Launches Streaming Channel
Nonprofit organization The Future of Film is Female has launched a streaming channel that will screen short and feature films by its members for free from now until April 14. Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday the site will release a new short film; on select Fridays, the site will stream a feature-length title. Their first week of films are (online) premieres of films by Laci Dent and Eleanor Wilson as well as what’s termed a limited run of Veronica Kedar’s Family. Included in the upcoming The Future of Film is Female calendar are films from past “25 New Faces of […]
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Quarantine Reading: W. K.-L. Dickson’s The Biograph in Battle
As a publication about film, we find ourselves in the peculiar position of publishing during a moment when theatrical access to movies, and their ongoing future, is as much in question as everything else. During this suspension of normal filmwatching habits, we’ve reached out to contributors, filmmakers and friends, inviting them to find an alternate path to the movies by participating in a writing exercise engaging with any book about or lightly intersecting with film, in whatever way makes sense to them. Today: hello, it’s me. — Vadim Rizov Last January, I went to MoMA to see British silent film […]
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DAFilms, DocAlliance’s Streaming Service for Seven European Nonfiction Festivals, Launches in the US
DAFilms is a VOD platform run by the DocAlliance, which (per their press release) is “a creative partnership between seven of the major European documentary festivals.” Those seven are CPH:DOX, Doclisboa, Millennium Docs Against Gravity FF, DOK Leipzig, FIDMarseille, Ji.hlava IDFF and Visions du Réel. As of March 30, America-based streamers can start streaming for the site for $6.99/month (or $4.99/month with an annual subscription, with individual rental fees for certain titles). While the exact catalogue has yet to be determined, the plan is to showcase some of the best titles from these festivals, both old and new, with future […]
