Interviews
Interviews
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A Matter of Life and Death: Lee Isaac Chung and Abigail Harm
We all require friendship, companionship. In the three films Lee Isaac Chung (known as Isaac) has made, he observes assorted relationships in vastly different milieu: in Munyurangabo (2007), the bustling central market of Kigali, the capitol of Rwanda, and that country’s verdant countryside and poor isolated villages; a beach house smacking of privilege on the southeastern coast of the U.S. in Lucky Life (2010); and, in his latest, the mysterious, inventive Abigail Harm (2013), a large but charmless apartment on a depressing, sparsely populated edge of New York City. The dramatic emphases, however, are less on bonding than on the […]
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“I’m Envisaging a New Kind of Movie:” SFX Legend Douglas Trumbull on Kubrick, Malick and the Future of Film
Douglas Trumbull has been behind some of cinemas most spectacular special effects. His impressive C.V. includes working on 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Blade Runner and most recently Tree of Life. He also directed Silent Running in 1972 and Brainstorm in 1983, most remembered as the final film appearance of Natalie Wood. He has also been one of cinema’s great pioneers, always pushing technology to its limit, whether that be designing films for World Fairs, making rides for Universal and Luxor Hotels, or simply backing new technologies such as IMAX. Never standing still, the self-proclaimed […]
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Leading the Way in Non-Traditional Distribution: Jonathan Goodman Levitt’s Follow the Leader
Jonathan Goodman Levitt’s Follow the Leader may have recently won the Jury Prize in the Feature Film Competition at the 2013 Northside Festival in Brooklyn, but its DIY distinction lies far beyond what’s captured in front of the lens. Over the course of three years, Levitt’s doc trails a trio of high school class presidents (and aspiring U.S. presidents) – all male and all hailing from one of the original 13 Colonies (Virginia, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania). Even more remarkable than these teenagers’ evolving attitudes, though, is the director’s distribution game plan, deployed with the targeted precision of a political campaign. […]
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Be Natural: Interview with documentary filmmakers Pamela Green and Jarik van Sluijs
Filmmakers Pamela Green and Jarik van Sluijs have worked on documentaries in various roles including as co-producer of the Emmy-nominated documentary Bhutto. Their company, PIC Agency, has produced titles for movies including 42 and The Kingdom, and they have also produced content for award shows, commercials and other productions. “People come to us to add to the story when you can’t turn the camera back on,” says Green. They have specialized in creating new content by combining graphics, stock footage, new footage and editorial. These techniques should be especially useful for their first documentary, Be Natural, about the first female […]
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Developing Original Horror: Jeffrey Grellman on Writing Mermaid Down
Writing in a genre like horror is a balancing act between striking all the traditional chords and finding a new way to engage — and frighten — your audience. There are certain plot points that more or less must be reached, but how that’s done is where the audience gets all its enjoyment and where all the writer’s creativity comes into play. There’s been lots of engagingly original horror films coming out lately — The Conjuring, You’re Next, etc. — but to specifically discuss the writing process I wanted to talk with someone who’s still at the development phase. Jeffrey […]
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Joe Swanberg talks Olivia Wilde, CAA and Going Bigger on Drinking Buddies
The confident and funny Drinking Buddies is Joe Swanberg’s first picture with a real budget (above five figures) and real stars (Olivia Wilde, Jake Johnson, Anna Kendrick and Ron Livingstone), but don’t jump to the conclusion that it’s some kind of rom-com sell-out. The emotional messiness, generational indecision and loose-limbed storytelling of Swanberg’s previous work are all present here, honed and amplified by a terrific cast and sharp production team. The film has traditional elements: two couples, flirtations and one weekend in the country. But then there’s alcohol — specifically beer — and not just flowing during one climactic meltdown […]
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Lucy Mulloy on Una Noche
As sweltering as it is unforgiving, Havana is a tough place. Tourists rarely travel beyond the district that give the impression of faded tropical glory, but much of the city more or less resembles the Bronx or Newark of the ’80s. Black markets thrive and people have to hustle to survive; especially after their families have poured through there food rations. The nightclubs that fueled a vibrant Western tourist culture are a remnant of their former selves. Cigar salesmen keep busy, but like everyone else, they live with a thinly disguised fear. Lucy Mulloy’s magnificent debut film Una Noche, adapted […]
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Jake Price on Unknown Spring and Documenting the Japanese Tsunami
Jake Price may primarily be known as a photojournalist, working for outlets like the BBC and the New York Times. But with his latest project, Unknown Spring, he’s strengthening a new identity as an immersive, interactive documentary filmmaker. As his thoughts below illustrate, however, he sees photojournalism, traditional film, and online interactive media all as an extension of nonfiction storytelling–different tools to explore In March 2011 he journeyed to the Tohoku region of Japan to document the devastation left in the wake of the Pacific tsunami. That project eventually became an html5 website featuring photographs, audio recordings, full-motion video, and […]
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The POV Conversation: Josh Aronson and Adam Larsen on How to Interview
Last year, to celebrate POV’s 25th anniversary, Filmmaker organized a series of conversations between documentary directors whose work had been featured on the PBS non-fiction showcase. Last month we continued this series with a discussion between filmmakers Stephen Maing and Lixin Fan. This week we are featuring a conversation between Adam Larsen, whose first feature length documentary film Neurotypical is currently streaming on the POV website, and Josh Aronson, director of Oscar nominated documentary on deafness Sound and Fury. Here the two compare their different interview techniques. Click here to watch Larsen’s Neurotypical, an exploration into living with autism and how it reflects on what it means to be “normal”, […]
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“25 New Faces” Josephine Decker and Lauren Wolkstein on Hitchcock and the Choreography of Sex Scenes
Just named as two of Filmmaker‘s “25 New Faces of Independent Film,” Josephine Decker and Lauren Wolkstein have both produced an impressive body of work that has placed them as bold, young voices on the independent film scene. Decker’s feature Butter on the Latch premiered to strong reviews, including a New Yorker article that called her film “an utter exhilaration of cinematic imagination.” An actor in many of Joe Swanberg’s films, Decker is finishing her new feature film Thou Wast Mild and Lovely while Wolkstein, whose short Social Butterfly premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and whose The Strange Ones showed at SXSW […]
