17728 Results for “”
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Art School Hangover: Director Martine Syms on The African Desperate
LA-based digital artist and filmmaker Martine Syms makes her feature debut with The African Desperate, a deeply funny and unflinching survey of the embedded racism within what the artist classifies as “elite spaces.” Syms previously made 2017’s Incense, Sweaters & Ice, a 69-minute art installation that depicts three generations of Black women and the nature of their surveillance. With The African Desperate, Syms vies for a more personal angle by centering her film on Palace (frequent collaborator Diamond Stingily), a Black MFA student who’s finishing her degree at Bard College, where the director received her MFA in 2017. While the […]
by Natalia Keogan on Jul 14, 2022 -
The Running Woman: Writer/Director Andrew Semans on His Rebecca Hall-Starring “Resurrection”
Director Andrew Semans’s 2012 debut feature, Nancy, Please, follows Paul (Will Rogers), an unraveling Ph.D. candidate obsessed with reclaiming his dog-eared, notes-filled copy of Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit from a spiteful ex-roommate (Eleonore Hendricks). Despite his increasingly desperate attempts, Paul just can’t get Nancy to relinquish the book from their formerly shared apartment. As the ex-roomie continues to live rent-free in Paul’s head, his deteriorating mental state prevents him from completing his thesis. Less interested in why Nancy won’t relinquish the book than why Paul so easily accepts his newfound submissiveness, Nancy, Please is a dark comedy about not being […]
by Erik Luers on Jul 14, 2022 -
Texts and Contexts: On Rethinking the Teaching of Cinema Studies in 2022
My students know how to edit footage and use a zoom lens; they’re experts on lighting and composing a shot. But because they learned those techniques through their phones to upload to social media platforms, they use them in a completely different manner than what usually gets taught in a filmmaking class. It might be easy to dismiss these skills, developed mostly to impress their friends, but more and more jobs are looking for university graduates who can create, use and distribute video content (or just light themselves for Zoom). In that model, appreciating a movie is not exactly a […]
by Peter Labuza on Jul 14, 2022 -
Worlds Within Screens
In the late 1990s and early aughts, film schools moved away from film itself as digital cameras (and editing) became the main tools. What’s happening today may not be quite as seismic but will still change film schools’ DNA: the movie and TV industry is moving toward virtual production. Popularized by The Mandalorian, virtual production essentially takes green/blue screen to the next level, and in some ways, it reverses traditional workflows. Instead of cast and crew finishing principal photography and then handing it off to an army of VFX techies, the techies create that VFX before anyone steps on set. […]
by Matt Prigge on Jul 14, 2022 -
Stepping In: Indie Directors Isabel Sandoval, Blackhorse Lowe and Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy on Their First Television Experiences
In the past 18 months, Isabel Sandoval has expanded the narrative around queer and trans filmmakers’ abilities to direct a wide range of material with her episode of the Hulu series Under the Banner of Heaven, Blackhorse Lowe has brought quirky humor and his own life experience to Hulu’s Reservation Dogs and director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy has represented Pakistani and Muslim communities in Marvel and Disney+’s Ms. Marvel. They’re all crossing over from the feature world to direct television for the first time, while also building careers outside the industry glare of Los Angeles. Award-winning trans director Isabel Sandoval moved from […]
by Destiny Jackson on Jul 14, 2022 -
After the Party: Surveying the Business and Sales Environment at Cannes
Film business sprang back to life in Cannes this year, with nary a peep from the usual “sky is falling” fearmongers. After two years of virtual markets, dealmakers were thrilled that premiering films could be watched together with international audiences, meetings could be done in person with near-full film slates and projects could be negotiated across territories with support from a multitude of producers. As UTA Independent Film Group’s John McGrath said on a panel at the American Pavilion, festivals and in-person marketplaces create the kind of urgency that drives deals and business. Indeed, there hasn’t been such an abundance […]
by Tiffany Pritchard on Jul 14, 2022 -
“… People Bond with Marcel the Way You Bond with the Ladies in Grey Gardens“: Director Dean Fleischer-Camp on the Winning Animated Feature Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
When I interviewed Dean Fleischer-Camp and Jenny Slate about their short film, Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, for Filmmaker‘s 2010 25 New Faces series, both remember the project resulting from a period where they were a little down. Then a couple, Fleischer-Camp described being “unfilled” at work, while Slate said, ‘I was depressed… a little bit. We were at a time in our lives when whatever we made would have a layer of gravity. And the real magic of [the movie] to me is that it has this layer of gravity, but it’s still about an adorable little shell.” […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 13, 2022 -
Film Streams See Change Fundraiser Spotlights Women Documentary Filmmakers
On July 16, the Omaha, Nebraska based non-profit Film Streams is hosting a local celebration for See Change, the organization’s initiative that strives for gender parity in their programming. The fundraiser will spotlight four women documentary filmmakers, featuring a discussion moderated by Film Streams’ artistic director, Dr. Diana Martinez. The four visiting filmmakers are Ramona Díaz (A Thousand Cuts), Grace Lee (American Revolutionary), Yoruba Richen (The New Black) and Lucy Walker (Waste Land). The event will be held at Film Streams’ Dundee Theater, the longest-surviving cinema in Omaha. Film Streams Executive Director Deirdre Haj, who took on the title last […]
by Natalia Keogan on Jul 13, 2022 -
Watch: Matt Wolf’s 2012 Short I Remember: A Film About Joe Brainard
Filmmaker Matt Wolf has made his 2012 documentary short I Remember: A Film About Joe Brainard available to watch on Vimeo. The film utilizes archival recordings of Brainard reading his seminal 1970 memoir-poem I Remember, as well as videos and photos from the artist’s childhood and NYC exploits. Brainard’s artistic legacy is expansive and multi-disciplinary, encompassing collages, assemblages, paintings and drawings, among other art forms. He was also a prolific writer, often using hand-drawn comics to accompany his poetry and prose. Brainard died in 1994 of AIDS-related complications. Wolf, who was one of Filmmaker’s 25 New Faces of Film in […]
by Natalia Keogan on Jul 13, 2022 -
Trailer Watch: Jeff Baena’s Spin Me Round
With a cast featuring an array of director Jeff Baena’s frequent collaborators, Spin Me Round is likely to fit right in with the filmmaker’s established quirky canon. The trailer shows Alison Brie (who co-wrote Baena’s previous directorial effort, 2020’s Horse Girl) as a woman who wins a company retreat to a so-called “institute” on the outskirts of Florence, Italy—and eventually falls for the extremely Italian CEO. Of course, this idyllic Mediterranean romance quickly gives way to a web of secrets and illusions. Also starring are Aubrey Plaza (Baena’s wife and collaborator since 2014’s Life After Beth), Alessandro Nivola, Molly Shannon, […]
by Natalia Keogan on Jul 12, 2022
