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[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 8:30 pm — Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] Deciding not to do a tour documentary on the band, which was what was first proposed. I have strong feelings about the distance between performer and audience, and I didn’t want to contribute anything more to this gap. I wanted to make something that I would be psyched to see and here it is. That and deciding which kid to kill in a scene were pretty difficult. In the end it was a combination of his hair and fake blood that did it.
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 9:00 pm — New Frontier on Main, Park City] The most difficult decisions on our film were made in the editing process and had to do with balancing music, tangent and story. We had one scene in particular that looked great and had a really good friend of mine and her son acting in it. Everywhere we placed the scene in our movie seemed to throw it out of balance or clutter the narrative. The last thing I wanted to do was lose some of those shots, and I especially didn’t want to cut my […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 9:30 pm — Eccles Theatre, Park City] The easiest decision that I made with respect to the film was to film it in stereo (3D). In hindsight, this became the hardest decision as the creative and technical challenge was with us every single day and continues through the post and the exhibition path. The outcome, however, is stunning.
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 3:00 pm — Egyptian Theatre, Park City] Probably the hardest decision during the whole process of making Contracorriente was casting the lead role of Miguel. The story of Contracorriente relies completely on the shoulders of the main character and so I needed a talented actor that could be both strong and vulnerable, masculine and sweet, who wouldn’t shy away from playing a man in love with his wife and with another man and who would be believable in the role of a fisherman and leader of his town. I also wanted him to be Peruvian […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 29, 6:15 pm — Eccles Theatre, Park City] With our budget, we could only afford a 23-day shoot schedule on a complicated ensemble movie. At that time, my decision was, “Should we cancel the film or did I think we could do it in the days allotted?” I’m happy that we went ahead with production and, in the long run, our limitations and the pressures they added kept us on our toes and made for a better movie. I am very proud of our cast and crew, who worked under very difficult conditions to produce such […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 6:00 pm — Eccles Theatre, Park City] I chose to work with an ensemble of mostly non-actors in a choreographed and precise mise-en-scene that allowed little improvisation. I had become disenchanted with film and with filmmaking. I knew that only a strong element of risk could bring back my sense of wonder. What makes a story unique is not what you tell, but how you to tell it — and the choices you make are the core of creativity. We shut ourselves in a house full of mirrors with a revolving camera that observed everything […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 25, 11:30 pm — Library Center Theatre, Park City] Trying to figure out the fake blood from the real while on set. We work pretty hard when shooting but also play equally hard. There were many nights when the cast and crew would celebrate and drink together after an intense day of shooting… let’s just say it was not unusual to have someone walk onto set the next morning bandaged and bloodied. The greatest part about it was that the FX department would shoot photos for documentation and use our own surly cast/crew’s random scrapes, bruises […]
Tasked with “celebrating experimentation and the convergence of art and film,” the New Frontier section at Sundance has been exhibiting feature films and installations for the last four years. Shari Frilot is the programmer, and spent the entire year reviewing work from new artists, figuring out which part of the ground being broken she wants to put in front of the Sundance audience. How to show film art in an art film context? Frilot tries to make sure that the artists all “speak the same language” as cinema. This year, the spotlight artist is Pipilotti Rist, who creates video work […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 25, 9:00 pm — Temple Theatre, Park City] Well let’s just say this, making a film about Joan Rivers was not easy. Phew! There’s Darfur, Afghanistan and then there’s Joan Rivers! Our producer Seth Keal reminded me of truly the hardest decision we had to make during the filming process. It came during the editing process when we were faced with whether or not to leave in the vagina fart jokes. It almost came to fisticuffs in the editing room, seriously! You think Obama had it tough when he decided to send in 30,000 additional troops […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 25, 9:30 pm — Eccles Theatre, Park City] Long before the cameras rolled on The Extra Man, we faced a decision of Sophie’s Choice proportions: whether or not to sign off on an impossible production schedule or pull out of the movie completely. We had expected to make the film on an incredibly challenging 30-day shoot. However when everything was budgeted out, we were left with only 27 shoot days, a rather extreme difference. When our a.d. nervously handed us this document, there were many days that were literally unmakeable. No matter how quickly we moved, […]