Documentary
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Directors Leo Chiang and Johnny Symons Talk Screening LGBT Doc Out Run in Boycott State North Carolina
Ironically launching at the stellar Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, North Carolina right as the anti-LGBTQ HB2 legislation hit the fan, S. Leo Chiang and Johnny Symons’s Out Run follows the Ladlad Party in the Philippines — the only LGBT political party in the world — in the run-up to what could be a history-making election. An artistic political doc, Out Run is both riveting and familiar, as the leaders (including Bemz Benedito, a trans woman who serves as the face of the party) deftly employ campaign strategies that include everything from transforming beauty parlors into headquarters to […]
by Lauren Wissot on Apr 19, 2016 -
Prisons without Crime: Brett Story on Her Genre-Subverting Doc on Mass Incarceration, The Prison in Twelve Landscapes
Brett Story’s The Prison in Twelve Landscapes screens this Sunday at the Art of the Real showcase at the Film Society at Lincoln Center. Given the growing consciousness about police violence and the awe-inspiring momentum of the movement for black lives, the film couldn’t be more timely, though it eschews the hot-button approach. Story has crafted a profound and political film that, while not sensational, is quietly shocking — even if you are already steeped in the project’s central theme. By taking an innovative and unexpected approach to the subject of mass incarceration, Story reveals just how deeply entrenched the problem of over-policing is. The […]
by Astra Taylor on Apr 14, 2016 -
Camden International Film Festival Calls for Entries to Points North Fellowship
The Camden International Film Festival (CIFF) is now accepting submissions for its Points North Fellowship, which provides grants bringing six teams of filmmakers to participate in the Points North Pitch at the Camden International Film Festival from September 15-18, 2016. For the first time in 2016, all selected Points North Fellows will receive a $2,000 cash grant sponsored by the Chicago Media Project and an individual donor. The six projects selected for the Points North Fellowship will receive two All Access passes to the festival, five nights of accommodations and a round-trip flight to Maine. The Fellowship takes place before, during and even […]
by Paula Bernstein on Apr 13, 2016 -
Trailer Watch: LoveTrue, by Alma Har’el
Very high on my list of anticipated works at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival is LoveTrue, Alma Har’el’s follow-up to her stunning documentary, Bombay Beach. For her new hybrid doc, Har’el — a Filmmaker 25 New Face — has followed three very different couples whose behaviors challenge our expectations of what constitutes a love story. She’s also employed actors, who play her real-life subjects past and future selves. Har’el’s work is always provocative, soulful, and rich with stunning images and gorgeous music. Last year, I watched a short work-in-progress cut of this project, and interviewed Har’el. Here she is answering […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 11, 2016 -
5 Questions for Raising Bertie Director Margaret Byrne
Raising Bertie follows three young men over the course of five years as they grow into adulthood in Bertie County, a rural African-American-led community in North Carolina. Director Margaret Byrne had originally set out to make a short film about The Hive, an alternative school for at-risk students. But when the school was shut down due to lack of funding, she saw the potential for a broader project about the underfunded rural educational system and how it affects African American boys, in particular. Shot in intimate verité style, the film follows Reginald “Junior” Askew, David “Bud” Perry, and Davonte “Dada” Harrell […]
by Paula Bernstein on Apr 8, 2016 -
Watch: Álvaro, from UnionDocs Living Los Sures Project
Inspired by Diego Echeverria’s 1984 documentary, Los Sures, Living Los Sures is an expansive documentary produced over five years by 60 artists at Brooklyn’s UnionDocs Center for Documentary Art. Premiering online today here at Filmmaker is Álvaro, directed by Alexandra Lazarowich, Elizabeth Dealaune Warren, Daniel J Wilson & Chloe Zimmerman, a short doc about the daily ritual of longtime Southside, Brooklyn resident Álvaro Brandon. Timed to the restoration and Metrograph screening of Echeverria’s cinema verite work, about the largely Puerto Rican and Dominican community of the Southside of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, Living Los Sures consists of 40 short films, the interactive […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 7, 2016 -
Nonfiction Filmmakers Invited to Oregon Doc Camp
Now in its third year, Oregon Doc Camp, presented by Women in Film Portland, invites experienced documentary filmmakers to gather in an intimate, informal setting and work on career development. The event will run from May 12-15, 2016 at Silver Falls Lodge and Conference center in Sublimity, Oregon. This year’s programming will be centered around the themes of narrative storytelling and independent distribution, with a three-day program consisting of workshops, lectures, case studies, screenings and a master class, as well as the opportunity to screen works-in-progress. Director Jennifer Grausman, who most recently directed and produced the feature documentary Art & Craft and previously directed and produced […]
by Paula Bernstein on Mar 29, 2016 -
An Open Letter to the Tribeca Film Festival about Vaxxed
Tribeca Film Festival, I love you but you made a very serious mistake. On Monday, the widely discredited and dangerous anti-vaccination quack Andrew Wakefield tweeted: “Haven’t posted forever. Huge news tomorrow.” Perhaps he hadn’t “posted forever” because the media finally stopped giving him a megaphone. Perhaps once people in America and England began dying of measles, journalists finally realized that the “two sides to every story” approach granted Wakefield was literally killing people. Last I heard, Wakefield was headlining Conspira-Sea, a seven-day cruise where passengers learn about crop circles, chemtrails, yogic flying, ESP and astrology. Good, I thought, that’s where […]
by Penny Lane on Mar 24, 2016 -
Director Peter Medak Plans to Resurrect The Ghost of Peter Sellers
It was 1973 and Peter Medak was a hot director on the rise. Following the success of The Ruling Class, which had earned Peter O’Toole an Academy Award nomination the previous year, United Artists offered him Death Wish. But when the studio insisted on casting Charles Bronson instead of Medak’s pick, Henry Fonda, Medak passed on the project. Back in London, Medak ran into his friend Peter Sellers, who asked him to direct his next film, Ghost in The Noonday Sun, which was set to be filmed on the island of Cyprus. Somehow the idea of filming a 17th-century pirate comedy aboard real ships on […]
by Paula Bernstein on Mar 21, 2016 -
SXSW: Asperger’s Are Us Director/DP Alex Lehmann on Being “In It for the Story”
DP Alex Lehmann leaps to the director’s chair with Asperger’s Are Us, a documentary about an unusual comedy troupe. With one of its members soon leaving Boston to study abroad, the improv group consisting of four young men on the spectrum prepares for what may be its final performance. Executive produced by the Duplass brothers, the documentary was quickly purchased by Netflix for worldwide distribution. Ahead of Asperger’s Are Us‘s premiere at SXSW, Lehmann discussed acting as his own DP, scrounging for enough cameras to film the climax and following the story. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 15, 2016
