And we’re back with my fourth and final post in a series looking at some of the year’s best TV. In previous weeks I’ve sung the praises of FX’s Louie, HBO’s Game of Thrones, and AMC’s Breaking Bad. This week I’ll be gushing about NBC and DIRECTV’s dearly departed football drama Friday Night Lights. One Wednesday night this past February I sat on the floor for an hour at a loud sports bar just east of Union Square in Manhattan. Three-hundred-and-sixty-four days out of the year, this place would not have not been my scene. But tonight, they were screening […]
Dave Kruta grew up drawing and painting, but fell into cinematography in an unusual way. Working as a web designer, a job for a friend led to a video project. This eventually led to working as a DIT – he is a member of Local 600 DIT – but he says his passion is cinematography. He’s been doing more d.p. work this past year, perhaps helped by the fact that he bought his own Red Epic system earlier in the year. In this interview he talks about using the Epic and Alexa, the M and X versions of the Epic, […]
Internet Video (IV) will play an increasingly important role in the distribution of independent “film.” Even for the few who still shoot, edit and distribute on 16mm or 35mm stock, your future – if only for marketing and promotion — is tied to the digital 1s and 0s that are redefining media and communications. IV distribution is restructuring release “windows” and revenue recoupment. Revenue opportunities through DVD sales are shrinking; the TV market (with the exception of HBO, PBS and some made-fors) is evaporating; international commitments are tougher to snag; and the once higher mark-up on educational sales is a thing […]
In part 1 of this interview, filmmaker Jared Flesher talked about his latest project, Sourlands, and making the switch to a large sensor DSLR camera. In part 2, Jared talks about how he works as a one-man crew, other equipment he uses, finishing the project, and what future camera he might like to use: You were your own crew for this documentary? Part of my style of filmmaking is to be a one0-man film team. There are practical reasons for that. I’m working on a fairly limited budget, so if I don’t have to pay a sound man, or someone […]
As one of Filmmaker‘s “Best of 2011” posts, Dan Schoenbrun hailed Louie as one of the year’s best TV shows. And now, as the year closes, the comedian has launched one of the year’s best DIY distribution and marketing efforts. As John Biggs wrote at Techcrunch, Louis CK is offering his Live at the Beacon Theater concert film for $5 as a DRM-free download or stream. And while the Hollywood studios are currently fighting piracy by borrowing a page from the firewalls of authoritarian regimes (see the SOPA legislation currently before Congress), C.K. is taking a more human approach. He […]
Jared Flesher is a self-taught filmmaker. He shot his first feature-length documentary, The Farmer and The Horse on a Canon consumer camcorder, shooting and editing the entire movie himself. With the success of that movie under his belt, he moved on to his second documentary, Sourlands, which he just finished shooting and hopes to complete by June of 2012. For this movie he decided to make the switch to a larger sensor camera, and chose the Panasonic GH2. In the first part of this interview, Jared talks about why he made the movie, and his experience making the switch to […]
Over the past two decades, French filmmaker Cédric Klapisch (L’Auberge Espagnole) has distinguished himself as a writer-director of mature, well-balanced social dramas with a comedic edge. Films like Russian Dolls and Paris (both featuring heartthrob actor Romain Duris, who has made six films with the director) explore the emotional dynamics of ambition and disappointment, love and family relationships against the backdrop of Europe’s ever-shifting cultural identity in the 21st century. Now Klapisch wades into the waters of world financial distress with a snappy satire about haves and have nots that in some respects channels the sentiments of Zuccotti Park’s most […]
Welcome to part one of a series in which I’ll be highlighting some of 2011’s boldest, most inventive television. Each of the shows that I’ll be writing about are helping to redefine the artistic possibilities of television as a medium. And where better to start than with FX’s Louie, the most consistently surprising half-hour on TV. Twenty years ago Seinfeld built a reputation on the claim that it was a “show about nothing.” Whereas other sitcoms of the era defined themselves through high-concept premises, outrageous characters, and cheap, saccharine “will-they-or-won’t-they” tactics, Seinfeld followed four unlikable, unremarkable friends through the tiresome travails of everyday […]
I haven’t done one of these in a while — a roundup of a few things I’ve stored in my Instapaper for weekend readings. As the year goes on, Melancholia is emerging as my favorite film of 2011. Part of the reason, I think, is that the discourse about it is becoming more and more interesting. Whereas Von Trier’s Cannes comments dominated the dialogue following its opening, now not just critics but viewers are grappling with the film’s meanings. From the Occupied Territories Tumblr comes “Depression, Melancholia, and Me: Lars Von Trier’s Politics of Displeasure,” an extraordinary essay in which […]
Originally published in the Fall 2010 issue. The time frame needed to produce an independent feature these days can seem longer than the lifespan of its underlying technology. Cheap HDSLRs challenge high-end camcorders that cost 50 times more. Even RED One, whose revolutionary bona fides were golden two years ago, suddenly feels status quo. And lurking around the corner — due at year’s end — is a vanguard of new, inexpensive large-sensor camcorders from all the usual suspects. It’s been said that the geek shall inherit the earth, but this is getting ridiculous. How’s a producer to make sense of […]