While I was following the premiere of the new Final Cut Pro X at the Las Vegas FCPUG Super Meet Up at NAB Tuesday night via Twitter (and posting some of the best tweets below), David Leitner, d.p. and editor who is reporting for us from the conference, was in the room. I got him on the phone as he left the presentation, and in this audio interview he talks about native editing, the changes in the UI, the “magic” of Apple, the price, the shortcuts built into the app, the new capabilities of the timeline, the color matching, the […]
“Something as revolutionary as the first version of Final Cut Pro when introduced in 1999.” That’s how the new version of Apple’s editing software was announced at the Final Cut Pro User Group Super Meet Up at NAB tonight. The new version of FCP has been hinted at for months, and after several prominent editors were shown a demo — and made to sign NDA’s that apparently only allowed them to leak words like “awesome” — the post production community has been awaiting its official unveiling. Many thought it would appear this summer alongside the release of the new OS, Lion, […]
Coinciding with the release today of TV on the Radio’s new album, Nine Types of Light, is a near-feature consisting of a video for each song, all sequenced with an eye towards a longer-form narrative. From the band’s site: Nine Types of Light is as much an album as it is a movie by TV on the Radio. The movie is meant to be a visual re-imagining of the record, and includes a music video for every song on the album. The band personally asked their friends and the filmmakers they admired to help direct the music videos. Tunde Adebimpe, […]
In the opening scene of Zeina Durra’s debut, The Imperialists Are Still Alive!, Asya, a young artist, poses naked for the camera. A hijab on her head, a machine gun in hand, she explains to an off-screen assistant her rationale for why the religious freedom fighter she’s portraying might have waxed her pubic hair. It’s a scene that is as funny as it is politically loaded, much like the movie that follows. Although its milieu — the young, privileged and the artistic — is the stuff coming-of-age movies are made of, The Imperialists Are Still Alive! is more than just another […]
Last summer in L.A. the Sundance Institute presented their first-ever ShortsLab, a day-long workshop for short filmmakers. The success of the event has led the Institute to expand ShortsLab to three cities this year with the first being Chicago on May 7 (NYC will happen on July 9 and L.A. Aug. 6). The Chicago workshop will include seminars, screenings and panels that focus on story, production and distribution. There will also be a panel dedicated to short film programmers, as they’ll talk candidly about what films they’re looking for and give tips on how to get your short noticed. Some […]
Described as a “comedic symphony of disappointment and forgiveness,” Alex Ross Perry’s new feature, The Color Wheel, is written by lead Carlen Altman and Perry, and shot in a lovely, low contrast B&W by Sean Price Williams. Some of you may remember Altman for her role in Ry Russo-Young’s You Won’t Miss Me. And you’ll remember Ross from his feature Impoplex of a couple of years ago. According to the website, the film rests “uncomfortably somewhere between the solipsistic, unrepressed id of late Jerry Lewis, the confrontational pseudo-sexual self loathing of Philip Roth, and the black and white motels, diners […]
This past weekend, the documentary as a tool for change was discussed at “Envision: Addressing Global Issues Through Documentary,” a forum co-sponsored by the IFP in partnership with the United Nations Department of Public Information. In her introductory remarks, Joana Vicente, IFP’s executive director, said that the goal of the event was to unite the “filmmaking community with the activist [community].” It was a sentiment echoed by Kiyo Akasaka, the Under-Secretary-General for Communications at the UN who encouraged the activists and filmmakers in the attendance to partner with each other “to envision a better world” and “meet the needs of […]
Today launches a new monthly column by director and traveler Lucas McNelly, who will be introducing us to the films and filmmakers he meets through his “A Year Without Rent” project. Ardent readers of the Filmmaker Magazine blog (which should be everyone), might remember that earlier this year, my Kickstarter campaign “A Year Without Rent” made a little bit of noise by raising over $7000, or roughly 60% of the target, in the final day without the help of any rich uncles. Rather, we did it the new-fashioned way — $20 at a time, fueled almost entirely by social media. […]
The 2011 Dallas International Film Festival closes today, wrapping up an 11 day fest that accomplished what all regional fests should: screening favorites on the festival circuit while highlighting the talents of filmmakers in its community. Thanks to the tireless efforts of the Dallas Film Society (which took over the festival when the three-year licensing and consulting deal with AFI wasn’t renewed before the 2010 fest) — specifically chairman Michael Cain and artistic director James Faust — the 5th DIFF has integrated itself nicely into a Dallas arts community that already has a full calendar of events to choose from […]
Filmmaker Simon Horrocks posted a comment below, and I clicked on his Twitter page. There there was a link to the website for his forthcoming feature, Third Contact, which has an effectively creepy teaser. On Horrocks’ Twitter I found a link to this trailer by Gavin B. James. It’s for a film called Footsteps that stars Brendan Sexton. As I watched (every shot is great), I thought of Polanski, Argento, Melville… FOOTSTEPS trailer from gavinbjames on Vimeo. The film has its N.Y. premiere at Anthology Film Archives on April 27 at 9:15. Tickets are six bucks.