Disclosure: I’ve never done therapy, although it has certainly been suggested over the years. Any recent therapy-curiosity was tempered by watching a couple of episodes of the Naomi Watts/Netflix series Gypsy, which made seeing a therapist seem like being the unwitting subject of a Sophie Calle art piece. Offering a point-of-view both more optimistic and realistic is, timed to National Therapy Day, a set of six new shorts from directors Alex Karpovsky and Teddy Blanks in which five women and one man discuss their various experiences in therapy. Director Kimberly Peirce talks about an experience in couples therapy, author Susan […]
by Scott Macaulay on Sep 25, 2017Writer/director/producer duo Michael Tyburski and Ben Nabors — 25 New Faces alums from 2013 — have a trailer for their new short film. Actor Seeks Role stars another alum — director/Girls regular Alex Karpovsky — as a struggling thespian who takes on a job as a medical actor, exhibiting symptoms he doesn’t possess for student doctors to test their diagnostic skills on. (Shades of Leslie Jamison’s essay on the topic.) The film hopes to launch online later this spring.
by Filmmaker Staff on Feb 11, 2015You may recall that a decade ago, the ever-independent-minded Caveh Zahedi (A Little Stiff, I Am a Sex Addict) tried to launch a series, “Tripping with Caveh,” in which he and a guest would take hallucinogens and enjoy themselves. That didn’t pan out, for reasons Zahedi explains in this essay, so now he’s launched a lower-stakes version. You can get stoned with Caveh or not, and in this first installment Girls regular/Red Flag director Alex Karpovsky chooses to indulge. Not without a little prodding: “OK, so I’m gonna start getting stoned,” Zahedi says up top. “Maybe I’ll just wait a […]
by Vadim Rizov on Dec 22, 2014In the final clip from this roundtable discussion between host Russell Constanzo and directors Alex Karpovsky (Red Flag), Ry Russo-Young (Nobody Walks), Antonio Campos (Simon Killer) and Craig Zobel (Compliance), the quartet talks about the advantages of budgeting for reshoots and how they managed to edit during production. From April 1, the full hour-long roundtable conversation from which this clip is taken will be live on 4/1 at RamblingOn.tv.
by Nick Dawson on Mar 29, 2013In this week’s episode of Rambling On…, host Russell Costanzo talks to directors Alex Karpovsky (Red Flag), Ry Russo-Young (Nobody Walks), Antonio Campos (Simon Killer) and Craig Zobel (Compliance) about the parameters they put on success, and the pitfalls of being too focused on the perceived success of their movies. Check back next week for another episode of the show, exclusively here on the Filmmaker website.
by Nick Dawson on Mar 21, 2013On the latest episode of Rambling On…, host Russell Costanzo talks to directors Ry Russo-Young (Nobody Walks), Antonio Campos (Simon Killer), Alex Karpovsky (Red Flag) and Craig Zobel (Compliance) about the directing wisdom they’ve gained since making their debut movie. Check out a new episode of this great series every week on the Filmmaker site.
by Nick Dawson on Mar 14, 2013Rambling On, the independent film interview show produced by filmmakers Russell Costanzo and Melissa B. Miller (The Tested), returns with this latest installment featuring directors talking about, well, directing. Costanzo hosts, and the directors featured are Craig Zobel (Compliance), Ry Russo-Young (Nobody Walks), Alex Karpovsky (Red Flag) and Antonio Campos (Simon Killer). Check it out above, and then in next week for another installment.
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 8, 2013While probably best known as belligerent barista Ray on the HBO show Girls (and also for his role as a lousy houseguest in Lena Dunham’s Tiny Furniture), Alex Karpovsky started out and continues to be a prolific indie film director who makes diverse styles of micro-budget films. His fourth and fifth films, the stylistically contrasting Rubberneck and Red Flag, are being released by Tribeca Film and screen at Film Society of Lincoln Center from February 22. In Rubberneck, Karpovsky plays a scientist obsessed with a former fling, and in the road trip comedy Red Flag he plays a filmmaker named Alex Karpovsky who is […]
by Miriam Bale on Feb 21, 2013Director Sam Neave and his producer/star Marjan Neshat are both Iranian-born, but the films they tend to make together — including 2003’s Sundance entry Cry Funny Happy and their terrific new two shot high-wire act Almost in Love — focus on the romantic travails of upper-middle-class Westerners in ways that are as funny as they are earnest. Their newest film, despite its intentionally schematic, downright arty structural contrivance, is a surprisingly rich meditation on friendship, the difficulty of settling down and the importance of being earnest. Performed in humorous and melancholy shades by an odd assortment of performers, most notably Ms. Neshat, Gary Wilmes, Alan Cumming and Alex Karpovsky — who […]
by Brandon Harris on Feb 13, 2013A genuine meditation on male friendship, the absurdities of indie moviedom and many different kinds of loyalty, Daniel Schechter’s Supporting Characters, a surprise hit at last year’s Tribeca Film Festival, sneaks up on you, its seeming limitations becoming its strengths over the course of its easy-going 87 minutes. Despite being shot in a fashion that recalls a comedy you might find on FX, Supporting Characters maintains an old-fashioned, craftsman-like quality about it; it’s written with feeling and humor that rings with truth, offering us characters whose lives are as complicated and full of ambiguity as our own. Alex Karpovsky and newcomer Tarik Lowe have […]
by Brandon Harris on Jan 23, 2013