Filmmaking

THE RED TAIL LOOKS AT OUTSOURCING

Mike Johnston, who wrote the article here on the site about the indie film Ink and piracy, has started an online video series about indie film. His first episode consists of a phone interview with the makers of The Red Tail, a documentary about job loss and outsourcing. From the film’s website: While 4,400 aircraft mechanics wage a seemingly endless strike to keep their jobs from being outsourced – Mechanic Roy Koch and his daughter Melissa (Director of The Red Tail in collaboration with Dawn Mikkelson) follow the trail of outsourcing to China. The Koch’s journey is a search for […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 9, 2010 Filmmaking
CANON’S DSLR LA RONDE

Speaking of the new DSLR cameras, Canon and Vimeo have launched a contest in which filmmakers are being inspired to create episodes of an eight-part narrative based on the old La Ronde structure: each episode starts by following the image that ends the previous episode. Details from PDN Gear Gude: Canon gave Laforet a still image of a cab and then asked him to interpret it into a 2-3 minute short film. Laforet’s film, which was shot with a Canon EOS 7D digital SLR, ends on a still image. Contestants are then asked to take that image and interpret it […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
SXSW TRAILER WATCH: AARON KATZ’S COLD WEATHER

Out of all the films associated with The Film Movement Formerly Known as Mumblecore, Aaron Katz’s Quiet City was perhaps the most visually assured. There was a real poetry and sensitivity to light and locations in that film, and his follow-up, Cold Weather, looks to take his filmmaking to a new level. The film will premiere at SXSW ’10, and the trailer is below.

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
ROBINSON DEVOR MAKING DOC ON FORD ATTEMPTED ASSASSIN

In a press release sent out this week, director Robinson Devor (Police Beat, Zoo, which scored on Filmmaker’s Top 25 of the Decade list) is currently underway in San Francisco on a documentary on Sara Jane Moore, who attempted to assassinate President Gerald Ford in September 1975 outside the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco. Written by Devor, Charles Mudede and shot by d.p. Sean Kirby, Moore (pictured), now 80 and currently on parole after thirty years in prison, returns to San Francisco for the first time since the assassination attempt to be interviewed. The film also chronicles the lead […]

By Jason Guerrasio on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
STRATEGIZING YOUR PARK CITY RELEASE

Jon Reiss has an excellent two-parter up at Ted Hope’s Truly Free Film blog. Titled “25 Points to Consider in Approaching Your Festival Premiere,” it’s broken down in a list of things you should consider in general before arriving at, really, any festival with your film, and then those other things you should think about if you are planning to make the festival premiere some part of your distribution launch. The latter piece in particular hit home as I’ve spoken to a number of filmmakers recently who have asked for DIY distribution advice. They want to know who to partner […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
THE VIRTUAL NEW YORK… OR L.A…. OR TOKYO… OR MOSCOW

I found this link on Twitter (sorry, can’t find the original tweet to attribute to) and it read something like, “Why New York’s new location fees are a bad idea.” Of course, green screen backdrops are nothing new, and all of us probably see a lot more of them in films than we realize. But this demo reel from Stargate Studios points to how ubiquitous they may become. Stargate Studios Virtual Backlot Demo from Stargate Studios on Vimeo.

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
REPORTS FROM BOTH SIDES OF THE DSLR DEBATE

At Filmmaker, we’ve covered the new generation of DSLR cameras, like the Canon 5D and 7D and Nikon D90, quite a bit, and while there’s a huge amount of interest from the indie community about these cameras, there’s also criticism of them as substitutes for professional HD cameras. I came across this morning two blog posts that articulate both sides of the issue. On Philip Johnston’s HD Warrior blog, he’s penned a post titled, “Filming with an HD DSLR: The Things They Don’t Tell You.” Here is his intro: RED Digital Cinema are in the process of producing the worlds […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 8, 2010 Filmmaking
SUNDANCE FROM A NEW YORK STATE OF MIND

Over at Huffington Post, Stewart Nusbaumer previews the upcoming Sundance Film Festival from the point of view of its New York visitors. Thelma Adams, Meira Blaustein, Karina Longworth, Mike Maggiore and I all pick some upcoming pre-favorites from the Sundance selection. Here’s me on Josh and Benny Safdie’s Daddy Long Legs, which, it was announced today at indieWIRE, will be available on VOD right after the festival via Rainbow Media’s Sundance Selects (run by IFC). “One New York film I’m especially keen on is Josh and Benny Safdie’s Daddy Long Legs, which stars Frownland director Ronald Bronstein as a hopeless, […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 7, 2010 Filmmaking
KICK-ASS TO OPEN 2010 SXSW

According to South by Southwest’s Web site, Matthew Vaughn‘s upcoming fanboy comedy Kick-Ass will open the festival when it begins March 12. The movie follows average teen Dave (Aaron Johnson), a comic-book fanatic who becomes a real-life superhero. Lionsgate will open the film April 16. A few other titles were announced for the 2010 SXSW, including Aaron Katz‘s new feature, Cold Weather; a doc on Motörhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister; and a doc by James Franco that takes a behind the scenes look at creating an episode of Saturday Night Live. The festival will run from March 12-21.

By Jason Guerrasio on Jan 6, 2010 Filmmaking
BRANDON HARRIS’S MOST OVERLOOKED FILM OF THE YEAR

Over at his Cinema Echo Chamber, Brandon Harris extolls on Kim Gok’s Exhausted, a comically desolate whatzit of South Korean underground cinema. Minimalist and bleak but with a certain repetitive humor, Gok’s film had its U.S. premiere at the Syracuse International Film Festival and went on to play Pusan and Rotterdam, where Harris and I both saw it, but has played in few other places. It is not out in the States, can’t be streamed, as Harris notes, and I never remember seeing it at Kim’s before they closed. From Harris, the plot: An unnamed pimp and prostitute/girlfriend live and […]

By Scott Macaulay on Jan 6, 2010 Filmmaking

Cookie	Duration	Description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional	11 months	The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
viewed_cookie_policy	11 months	The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.

Cookie	Duration	Description
cfmrk_cic		Used by Cloudflare to route user traffic for this Site.
sparrow_id		Installed by Cloudflare. Used to identify individual clients behind a shared IP address and apply security settings on a per-client basis. It does not store any personal identifiable information.

Cookie	Duration	Description
OAGEO		Installed by the Revive Ad Server. Used to cache geolocation (session, deleted when closing the browser)
OAID		Installed by the Revive Ad Server to distinguish users.