Paul Krik, writer/director of Able Danger, opens his independent conspiracy thriller in four cities on September 11. (In New York, you can see the film at the Pioneer Theater.) Krik was kind enough to give Filmmaker two lists of his favorite films. In this first part, he lists his favorite conspiracy movies. In the second, he’ll list his favorite films about 9/11. In general a conspiracy movie for me has to do with exposing. Chinatown – Greatest movie ever. Goebbel says, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The […]
Named one of 2007’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film, Memphis writer-director Kentucker Audley‘s debut feature continues the mumblecore tradition of twentysomethings exploring life and love, but set out in the country where things are a little more laid back than the usual metropolitian mumblecore setting, Audley’s (who’s real name is Andrew Nenninger) tender tale of a young man on the cusp of adulthood is a loose, comedic look at a simple life that grows more complicated by the day. Also starring as the lead, Audley plays a young musician who spends his days writing songs while lounging in his […]
I always admire the blog writings of my colleagues who are able to jump from screening to keyboard, whipping out paragraphs of incisive critical prose. I tend to need more time to mull over the films I see as my opinions will shift from day to day. Take the first picture I saw in Toronto: Finish director Anti Jussi Annila’s Sauna, which was shamelessly hyped in the program book to cine-geeks like myself as recalling both the films of Andrei Tarkovsky and Eli Roth. And while, yes, there are clear connections to the work of these two (in its bleak […]
Yesterday walking from one theater to another at the Varsity multiplex that houses the Toronto International Film Festival’s Industry Screenings, I thought that things seemed a little quiet, missing the usual crowded hub-bub. No one seemed to agree with me, though. “This will be a rebound market,” predicted one sales agent friend, who thought that a nice flurry of sales would materialize from the screenings this week. Another shrugged at my observation. “Everybody is here,” he said. And later even I didn’t agree with myself after I wound up at two very crowded parties filled with industry players. The first […]
The blog post, below, titled “Breaking In,” in which filmmaker Marc Maurino discussed the tensions between jobs, job security and filmmaking, inspired several responses. You can find them in the comments section to the original post, but filmmaker David Munro just wrote with a longer reply so I’m posting it here as its own entry. It’s David Munro (New Faces ’98, Full Grown Men). I read Marc Maurino’s reply to your newsletter entry. It got me thinking, too. Unlike Marc, who is just now contemplating his next move as a talented aspiring director, I drank the full jigger of indie […]
What’s with the media and indie film these days? I attend my first party in Toronto, eager to catch up with old film friends and see some new movies, but the toxic murk of today’s business environment keeps seeping in. I got a ride in from the airport with a sales agent friend who, while bemoaning the difficult market for auteur films worldwide, said to me, “You have it worse in America. It’s not that the films do any poorer there, but there’s so much focus internationally on the American release that when they do fail everybody around the world […]
Bradley Beesley‘s sequel to his breakout hit Okie Noodling will be screening this Friday and Saturday at the IFC Center in New York. If you’re not familiar with the film, here’s a sum up from the release: In 2001, filmmaker Bradley Beesley brought the strange subculture of barehanded catfishing to the screen in ‘Okie Noodling’, which won the Audience Choice Award and 1st runner-up for Best Documentary at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival. Now he returns to his home state of Oklahoma to see how the sport has evolved over the last decade in ‘Okie Noodling II’. Revisiting the colorful, […]
VENKATESH CHAVAN IN DIRECTOR CHRIS SMITH’S THE POOL. COURTESY VITAGRAPH FILMS. Chris Smith is an interesting conundrum, a filmmaker who brings a narrative verve and energy to his documentaries and approaches fiction films with the delicate restraint and remove of a documentarian. A graduate of University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s film program, Smith first appeared on the scene in 1996 with American Job, a low-key narrative feature loosely based on the work experiences of the film’s star and co-writer, Randy Russell. During the editing of that film, he met Mark Borchardt, an oddball wannabe horror filmmaker who became the subject of Smith’s […]
This piece by Karina Longworth discussing a panel discussion at Telluride on the crisis in independent film is essential reading. Ann Thompson, director Danny Boyle, distributor Michael Barker, critic and professor Annette Insdorf and writer/director Paul Schrader all talk about changing models and whether or not independent film as we know it is dead. There’s a lot of great stuff here, but these words by Schrader are choice, and they echo the comments I far less eloquently tried to advance in the Filmmaker magazine panel discussion that we recorded for the next issue. From the piece: “Technology is leaving behind […]
In Variety, Ali jafaar reports on a new production company poised to pump a billion dollars into film production. From the piece: Abu Dhabi has set its sights on joining the big leagues of pic production. The Abu Dhabi Media Co., which oversees the emirate’s film, TV and radio outlets, is launching a production shingle with $1 billion to spend on developing, financing and producing feature films over the next five years. Company dubbed Imagenation Abu Dhabi, which will also oversee Abu Dhabi’s existing $1 billion production fund with Warner Bros., has a mandate to produce eight features a year […]