[PREMIERE SCREENING: Tuesday, Jan. 25, 3:00 pm — Egyptian Theatre] I believe that All Your Dead Ones is actually built upon surprise. It is a project that we decided to undertake with a very reduced production team and that meant that surprises would abound and appear around every corner: for instance, the weather conditions are very variable in the region where we shot the movie and this complicated even further our challenge of using only natural light right at the moment were the sun is completely perpendicular. Every day we were forced to expect the climatic surprise of the day, […]
Originally printed in our Fall 2010 issue, we asked a number of leading independent producers about their producing models and how they’re finding everything from financing to material to office space. Lynette Howell has three titles in this year’s Sundance: Chris Kentis & Laura Lau’s Silent House, Azazel Jacob’s Terri and Andrew Okpeaha MacLean’s On The Ice. How to pay oneself a salary, maintain an office and employ assistants? And embrace risky projects? For Lynette Howell the answer is staying in constant motion. Raised in working class Liverpool, Lynette Howell decided to drop her British accent after just a few […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 9:00 pm — Egyptian Theatre] One of the biggest surprises while shooting Kinyarwanda on location in Rwanda is something that we may have just taken for granted. Frankly, it could have been a surprise in the U.S., in a community not familiar with low-budget or independent filmmaking. The community, many of our crew, and local officials seemed to have a really strong grasp of the work of big budget films — situations where, as a solution, money is often thrown at a problem. Many were also very familiar with the other extreme: people picking up […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 3:00 pm — Eccles Theatre] The biggest surprise associated with the making of Take Shelter was, without question, Jessica Chastain. When traveling the festival circuit with my first film, Shotgun Stories, I was fairly outspoken about the fact that Michael Shannon is one of the greatest actors working today. When casting Take Shelter, a film that is anchored by the relationship of a married couple, the biggest question I had was: “What actress could go toe-to-toe with Michael Shannon?” Then the universe delivered me Jessica Chastain. When thinking about this role my executive producer, Sarah […]
A storytelling pandemic. By Lance Weiler.
From a screenplay by Leslie Dixon, Neil Burger takes us on a pharmaceutical-fueled joyride through a conspiratorially intelligent New York business world in Limitless. By Scott Macaulay PLUS: Leslie Dixon on nurturing your inner Tarantino.
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 12:00 pm — Temple Theatre] As a first-time filmmaker, being accepted into the U.S. Documentary Competition at Sundance was obviously the biggest surprise. But what was also a huge surprise was going back to read the outline that I wrote in the summer of 2008 when Hot Coffee was just a dream. After finishing the film in the summer of 2010, I reread my original outline and to my great surprise realized that the final version of the film was almost exactly what I had laid out in the outline, despite having not gone back […]
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 12:15 pm — Eccles Theatre] The biggest surprise is how the movie began, and how it ended. We started with no money, a basic treatment and a Sony EX3. I didn’t really care about getting all my ducks in a row before starting. We just started. Brit Marling, Morgan Marling (her sister), Liang (my friend from China) and I went to Connecticut where I grew up and we set out to make this epic indie minimalist science fiction drama. On the first day, Brit came back from a run in the morning and told us […]
Michael Tully began his career with a flurry, getting selected for Filmmaker‘s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2006 on the back of his debut feature Cocaine Angel, and then following it up the next year with Silver Jew, a documentary about Silver Jews frontman David Berman. In the years since, Tully has stayed active, shooting Mary Bronstein’s Yeast, acting in a handful of movies by fellow Generation DIY peers, including Aaron Katz’s Quiet City and Ry Russo-Young’s You Won’t Miss Me, and editing the indie film website Hammer to Nail. But, in terms of new films, he has […]
Since Joe Swanberg’s first feature film, Kissing on the Mouth, premiered at SXSW in 2005, he’s managed to make at least a feature a year, multiple web-series, and found regular launch-pads at SXSW and IFC Films. When Swanberg directs a film, he really functions as a craftsman of the entire work: while he eschews screenplays in favor of improvisation, he works as cinematographer, editor, and usually acts in the film. As the nexus of a low-budget film movement stressing honesty, stories chronicling the lives of people in their twenties, and improvisation (this movement begins with an “M,” ends with “core,” […]