As part of their annual look at SXSW, The Austin Chronicle gets ready for the fest with this piece on iconic psychedelic comic book artist Gilbert Shelton, who’s best known for his Freak Brothers comics. He will also have an exhibit of his work in town during the fest as well as Harry Knowles conducting a conversation with Shelton on March 15 at the Austin Convention Center. Here’s an excerpt from the piece: Freewheelin’ Franklin, Phineas, and Fat Freddy symbolized the pot culture of the Sixties, their free-spirited lifestyle in pursuit of sex, drugs, and rock & roll the model […]
Announced earlier today, the 9th annual Tribeca Film Festival announced their Competition roster and films in their Showcase category for this year’s fest, which takes place April 21 – May 2 in New York City. Some of the highlights include Alex Gibney‘s work-in-progress screening of his doc on Eliot Spitzer and (get this) Vincent Gallo lending his voice in the animated film, Metropia. Full list of films are below. World Narrative Feature Competition “Buried Land,” directed by Geoffrey Alan Rhodes and Steven Eastwood, written by Geoffrey Alan Rhodes, Steven Eastwood, and Dzenan Medanovic. (USA, UK, Bosnia and Herzegovina) – World […]
Celebrating its 15th anniversary, the Gen Art Film Festival runs through April 7-13 at the Ziegfeld Theatre in NYC. Opening the festival this year will be the directorial debut of How I Met Your Mother star Josh Radnor with happythankyoumoreplease, featuring a cast of young up-and-comers like Zoe Kazan, Malin Akerman, Pablo Schreiber, and Kate Mara. The other anticipated premieres include Sebastian Gutierrez‘ Elektra Luxx, James Keach’s Waiting for Forever, Adrian Grenier’s Teenage Paparazzo, Patrick Hoelck’s Mercy, and Alexandre Franchi’s The Wild Hunt. In addition, the festival offers three prizes in three categories. The Acura Grand Jury Award is given […]
Mother, the latest film by South Korean director Bong Joon-Ho, is an inky affair. The humor is dark and the sky is a soggy shade of gray. The bumbling characters have limited prospects, and when love exists, it’s intense and deranged enough to kill for. The central relationship in the film is between Yoon Do-Joon, a slow-witted young man, and his unnamed mother. The son is played by Wan Bin, a wide-eyed Korean heartthrob cast effectively against type; his good looks leave us continually disappointed by his character’s slow intellect. His protector, oppressor and champion—also known as his mom—is played […]
Just in time for SXSW is this blog post from Mark Suster, an “entrepreneur turned VC” who blogs at “Both Sides of the Table.” Titled “Making the Most of Sitting on Panels,” it begins like this: “Many of us in the technology, media and VC world sit on panels at lot. Many of them are painfully boring.” I have to agree. I’m not a big fan of panels for some of the same reasons that Suster cites. Most panels are too big. By the time everyone gets a chance to talk and each answer a few questions, time is up. […]
When I put together the clips for the “Young Person’s Guide to Kathryn Bigelow,” post below, there is one thing I left out. While scanning through her clips I did come across this music video for New Order’s “Touched by the Hand of God.” I don’t think I had ever seen it before, and I’ll confess that I initially stared at it trying to figure out if it was conceptual parody or whether New Order had had a mid-’80s hair-metal band image makeover I had somehow missed. (Correct answer: the former). Gray Miller posted this link below in the comments […]
As the current Massa Meltdown demonstrates, a lot of crazy talk can come out of legislators’ mouths. (For some of that crazy talk, I will definitely be tuning into Glenn Beck tonight when Massa is on for the full hour.) So when I was forwarded this link from Think Progress about a Florida state representative, Stephen Precourt, proposing a change to Florida’s film tax incentive that would deny the credit to films espousing “non-traditional” family values, I assumed it was just one guy shooting his mouth off and that it wasn’t really worth mentioning. But, as the post as well […]
Receiving its U.S. premiere at SXSW is Jukka Karkkainen’s The Living Room of a Nation, a documentary about six Finnish living rooms. From the production company’s website: The documentary film The Living Room of the Nation opens a portrait-like view into six Finnish living rooms. A collage of everyday events, the film is a story of changes, loneliness, responsibilities and the unavoidable passing of time. The trailer is below. The film plays Saturday, March 20, at 6:15 PM at the Alamo Lamar 3.
Filmmaker Marie Losier is well known in her New York for her beguiling experimental films, which include portraits of a number of today’s most unconventional and important artists. For the last four years she has been filming Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, artist and founding member of Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV, among other ventures. Beginning in 1993, P-Orridge began a radical art project with his wife and artist partner, Lady Jaye, in which they both underwent plastic surgery to resemble each other, creating, they said, “an indivisible third,” a “pandrogyne.” Lady Jaye passed away in 2007, and Losier’s film will tell […]
If you’re craving the look and feel of an indie from the ’90s then Tao Ruspoli’s debut feature Fix may be the disc you’ll want to pop in. Chronicling a wild one day journey around Greater Los Angeles, we follow Bella (Olivia Wilde) and Milo (Ruspoli) as they shoot a documentary on Milo’s brother, Leo (Shawn Andrews), who they pick him up from jail and attempt to drop off at rehab before 8pm. The catch: they have to raise the $5,000 needed to get Leo in the clinic or it’s back to jail. With an impressive soundtrack leading the way, […]