6301 Results for “Open ”
-
“We Can Do Whatever We Want”: The Makers Of The Podcast Mission To Zyxx On Doing Indie Sci-Fi Comedy On The Cheap
Sound-only projects got an entire day at IFP Week 2018, which may irk sticklers wondering what podcasts are doing in a seminar once dedicated solely to film. Well, as more and more filmmakers consider themselves some-kind of cross-platform storyteller, podcasts are natural medium for their work. (See, for example, this Filmmaker article on filmmakers embracing that medium.) And, IFP itself added audio storytelling as one of its main areas of interest earlier in the year. To boot, independent aural projects and independent cinema share a lot of similar concerns, aesthetic as well as financial. Take Mission to Zyxx, an improvised […]
by Matt Prigge on Sep 26, 2018 -
Back to One Podcast: Taran Killam
The hilarious Taran Killam lets us peek under the hood of his comedic craft in this half hour. He stars in the new ABC series Single Parents (premiering September 26th) and the comedy Night School (opening September 28th) opposite Kevin Hart and Tiffany Haddish. He’s probably best known for his six years on Saturday Night Live. We talk about how that “bootcamp” prepared him for almost anything. But his talent goes beyond comedy. He writes, directs (check out his film Killing Gunther on demand), and sings (he was King George III in Hamilton). Plus he finally answers a question I […]
by Peter Rinaldi on Sep 25, 2018 -
“How Do You Possibly Do Justice to All This in a Single Film?”: Steve James on America to Me
Steve James has never shied away from going big. From his 1994 breakthrough, the near-three-hour Hoop Dreams, through long-players like Stevie and The Interrupters, the filmmaker has never been afraid to blow well past documentary’s traditional 90-minute mark. (He’s also played ball, as with 2016’s Oscar-nominated Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, which clocks in at a brisk 88.) Still, even for James, America to Me is ambitious. It’s his second dalliance with TV, after 2004’s The New Americans, spanning 10 hour-long episodes, which begin on Starz on Aug. 26. But it’s not just size that matters. It’s the scope, and the […]
by Matt Prigge on Sep 25, 2018 -
The Trees are Calling: The Films and Pitches of Camden International Film Festival 2018
Most film festivals can claim a thing or two: A dramatic location, a slate of coveted premieres, fancy fetes, unique guests, a platoon of industry heavies making the rounds, and, for better or worse, the media spotlight. I’ve never attended any film festival where I had the chance to wrap my arms around a tree–in a public park, no less, and in full view of pedestrians–and plant my ear firmly to its bark, as one of its official selections. And yet, there I was, in Camden, Maine, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, tree-hugging away. The four selected trees on the […]
by Steve Dollar on Sep 24, 2018 -
BlacKkKlansman DP Chayse Irvin on Shooting with Expired Ektachrome and the Spike Lee Dolly
Early in Spike Lee’s collaboration with Chayse Irvin, the venerable director asked his cinematographer if there was anything special he needed for BlacKkKlansman. Irvin answered, “a third camera”—an extravagance on a low budget movie, but one Irvin believed would allow him “to take massive risks on every scene, whether it be a unique angle or the freedom to use a lens that was flawed.” Irvin embraced that self-imposed mandate for boldness by employing imperfect vintage lenses, “flashing” the image with a contrast-reducing filter and dusting off long-expired film stock. Never one to wilt in the face of risky choices, Lee […]
by Matt Mulcahey on Sep 21, 2018 -
“Audio Is A Very Visual Medium”: The Makers Of ESPN’s 30 For 30 Podcast On Working Without Images
The team behind the ESPN podcast 30 for 30 hate the word “podcast.” They think “audio documentaries” is a better fit. “The word podcast is just so unhelpful,” said Jody Avirgan, the show’s host and executive producer. “A lot of people hear ‘podcast’ and think two people in a room talking. I like those podcasts. But we’re trying to do stuff that’s much more akin to a short film than to that kind of podcast.” Of course, the 30 for 30 audio documentary series only exists because of film. They’re a spin-off of the 30 for 30 films, which began […]
by Matt Prigge on Sep 20, 2018 -
“We Just Have To Go One Gentle Step After Another”: Members of England’s The Space Arts Council On Embracing New Digital Platforms at IFP Week 2018
To be in the arts right now is to be excited and scared, often at the same time. The old ways are dying, but no one actually knows what the new ways even are. There’s so much potential in the digital landscape, but it’s unclear how it can be used—to find audiences, to fix old (and new) problems, to maybe even make money. These are issues that consume those involved with The Space, an English arts council set up at the BBC not only to fund art but to find new ways to get them out into the world. “There […]
by Matt Prigge on Sep 20, 2018 -
‘Nobody Wanted This Story’: Paula Eiselt And Heidi Reinberg On Making 93Queen At IFP Week 2018
Here’s a typical story about a documentary (or an indie, or occasionally even an experimental film): It cruises the festival circuit, likely at Sundance. It builds up buzz. Perhaps it collects some awards. It scores a distributor. Several months — or even a year, now and then even years — later it opens in theaters, riding on hazily recalled accolades and hopefully at least polite reviews. It is or isn’t a success, and there’s a chance it spends eternity lost in the vast bowels of iTunes. Some people (and a few reviewers) assume this is the tale of 93Queen, Paula […]
by Matt Prigge on Sep 19, 2018 -
TIFF 2018 Critic’s Notebook 8: In My Room, Wavelengths
Here’s what I did not expect to see last Monday: Béla Tarr, hunched by a door before the fourth and final screening of the experimental Wavelengths shorts programs so crucial to my annual TIFF experience. I’d missed a trick–news that he’d be with us had been tweeted out that morning, but I’m glad I didn’t know. Dropping in one of the crucial film figures of the last 30 years was a shock to the system; the red-carpet clutter unavoidably inseparable from nearly any festival faded away, and for a few minutes there was just Tarr, as stringent as expected, talking about the young […]
by Vadim Rizov on Sep 19, 2018 -
Hat in Hand
In September 2015, I launched a Kickstarter campaign—a tongue-in-cheek effort to raise $308 to make 12 hats embroidered with the word “movies.” Three years later, I find myself president of Movies Brand, a company that has released more than 30 products emblazoned with the word “movies,” worn by the likes of Mel Brooks, Josh Safdie, Ana Lily Amirpour, Larry Karaszewski and some 2,000 others. So, how did a Kickstarter joke turn into a real business? Well, it depends on what you mean by a real business. Some background may be in order here. My first love wasn’t hats. It was […]
by Kentucker Audley on Sep 17, 2018
