Now up is our curated list of VOD titles for April. Some notables include Sofia Coppola‘s Somewhere, the grindhouse Hobo with a Shotgun, the latest doc from Chris Hegedus and D.A. Pennebaker Kings of Pastry and James Gunn‘s Super, which is in theaters this weekend if you can’t wait for it on VOD on the 13th. And to find more films that have been released in previous months on VOD or streaming, go to our VOD home page.
These past two weeks I’ve been in Rochester, NY working on the Orphaned soundtrack with all the usual suspects and collaborators. (Let me know if there are issues with the feed. This is an ongoing daily live feed where I will eventually be distributing free content…it is part of my MFA thesis.) I had been trying to write a response to the latest “explosion” of indie film acquisitions, the new world models of indie film financing, and the influx of nobody filmmakers. BUT I found that others with something to say, have already said it best, so I scrapped it. […]
One of the great joys of being a critic is the childlike sense of wonder that comes with being the first to discover something new (that, and as the esteemed music critic Lester Bangs once put it, getting free shit). I first met Zachary Oberzan after seeing his one-man show Rambo Solo, developed with Nature Theater of Oklahoma, in early 2009. (Yes, for the record the tickets were comp since I was reviewing for Theater Online.) At the time I wrote, “I have seen the theater future and its name is Rambo – or more accurately, one fearless thespian named […]
Friends of the late Karen Schmeer, the documentary film editor whose credits include Errol Morris’s Fast, Cheap and Out of Control and Greg Barker’s Sergio, have honored their colleague by creating a fellowship for editors. They have partnered with ACE, SXSW, IFFBoston, the Manhattan Edit Workshop, and Powell’s books for this program intended to help-and-coming documentary editors while remembering Schmeer’s extraordinary accomplishments. Schmeer died last year when she was struck by a car fleeing a drug store robbery. From the group’s website: We are now accepting submissions for the Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship. Awarded annually, the Fellowship was created […]
Charles Ferguson follows up his hard-hitting Iraq War documentary, No End in Sight, with another investigative look at a complicated and controversial subject: the global economic crisis. In Inside Job, Ferguson indicts the growth of the banking industry for causing the global economic crisis, asking why not a single person has gone to jail because of it. By Scott Macaulay
I don’t have an iPhone. There, I’ve said it. I’m still holding onto my Blackberry. (Note to Apple: please let me upgrade to an iPod Touch by putting a camera in it and, while you’re at it, switch to Verizon.) So when Sundance kindly sent me their new Sundance Film Festival iPhone app, I sent it to the most knowledgeable person about apps I know, producer Noah Harlan, whose 2.1. Films has a division, Two Bulls, that makes apps which have included everything from a film footage calculator to an app for Victoria’s Secret. First, here’s the official word from […]
Africa First is a program started by Focus Features in which the specialty distributor identifies promising new directorial talent from continental Africa, provides them grant money for the creation of short films, and then brings them to New York for a summit weekend of mentorship, feedback, and discussion with the program’s advisory board. Read about the 2009 award recipients here, and check out this video documenting this year’s summit, which just concluded. About half-way through you’ll see clips of the award films, which are a fascinating look at the diversity of work being developed in Africa these days.
You may have noticed that I’ve been posting in our Web Exclusives a number of first-person pieces by filmmakers discussing their distribution saga. We have already had producer Jake Abraham on distributing his film, Lovely by Surprise, and then writer/director Rob Perez on making the transition from studio distribution to DIY distribution with his nobody. The latest in our informal series is from Zachary Levy, director of the documentary Strongman. His piece, “Making our DIY Moment Matter,” is a refreshingly thoughtful take on what the trend towards alternative distribution should mean for our filmmaking. Check it out, and look for […]
Each week I hear from more and more filmmakers who are shooting professional pieces on the new Canon, Nikon and Panasonic still cameras. This footage from 23-year-old filmmaker Khalid Mohtaseb of Next Level Pictures is some of the most gorgeous I’ve seen. It’s shot on the Canon 5D MKII using the Magic Lanterns Firmware Update as well as a Kessler Pocket Dolly. Egypt / Lebanon Montage from Khalid Mohtaseb on Vimeo. For more on these cameras, see here at Filmmaker “Shutterbugs” and “Pimp Your DSLR,” both by Roberto Quezada-Dardon.
Yesterday wrapped up the first day of the Open Video Conference, a two-day event being held at New York University Law School featuring speakers, screenings and events all centering around the topic of Open Video. The conference, which can be livestreamed on its website, is produced by the Participatory Culture Foundation, the Yale Internet Society Project, the open source video platform Kaltura, iCommons, and the Open Video Alliance. What is Open Video? Quoting from the website: Open Video is a broad-based movement of video creators, technologists, academics, filmmakers, entrepreneurs, activists, remixers, and many others. When most folks think of “open,” […]