Documentary
-
UNDERGROUND MODES OF DISTRIBUTION #1
1. make a extreme documentary that almost drives you insane 2. go to airport 3. accidentally film naked woman in wheelchair with cat 4. convince security that its not performance art, keep camera 5. put on youtube 6. wait til CNN calls you (less than 24 hrs later) to air the video 7. promote upcoming DVD release John Maringouin (Running Stumbled, Big River Man) captured this scene in Oklahoma City yesterday. TSA eventually covered her up and then questioned John as they thought he staged the whole thing. There’s something funny about John – he got arrested while filming Steve-O […]
by Mike Plante on Dec 1, 2010 -
Duane Baughman, Bhutto
Benazir Bhutto, the two time Pakistani prime minister who in 2007 was assassinated just days after she returned from military imposed exile in Dubai to once again attempt to take control of the country, was the countries’ most significant civilian political figure of her generation. Using the tragic life and times of the Muslim world’s most dynamic and successful female politician as a lens through which to capture the larger political machinations and social upheaval that has led to the sixty-seven year old Pakistani state constantly being handed back and forth between an imperiled civilian government and a conservative military establishment, […]
by Brandon Harris on Dec 1, 2010 -
“SURVIVING HITLER” AT STRANGER THAN FICTION
Documentary fans have survived many things — Academy shortlists that ignore the year’s best films, the end of the Stranger Than Fiction fall season — but few can claim to have survived as much as the subjects of either Letters Home or Surviving Hitler: A Love Story, the final films of programmer Thom Power’s IFC series. A nine-minute montage created around letters and archival materials, Letters Home tells the story of director Melissa Hacker’s great aunt Freda, a woman who traveled through Germany and Austria in 1945 as a member of the American Army Women’s Army Corps. Hacker, a longtime Stranger […]
by Mary Anderson Casavant on Dec 1, 2010 -
2010 SPIRIT AWARD NOMINEES ANNOUNCED
Film Independent announced the nominations for their 2010 Spirit Awards today. Winter’s Bone leads with seven nominations, including Best Feature, Director and Female Lead. Joel McHale will host the show Feb. 26 when it returns back to the beach in Santa Monica. Full list of nominees below. BEST FEATURE 127 Hours Black Swan Greenberg The Kids Are All Right Winter’s Bone BEST DIRECTOR Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan Danny Boyle, 127 Hours Lisa Cholodenko, The Kids Are All Right Debra Granik, Winter’s Bone John Cameron Mitchell, Rabbit Hole BEST FIRST FEATURE Everything Strange and New Get Low The Last Exorcism Night […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Nov 30, 2010 -
“WINTER’S BONE,” “THE OATH,” TAKE HOME TOP PRIZES AT 20th GOTHAM AWARDS
IFP’s 20th Gotham Independent Film Awards took place last night in Lower Manhattan with Debra Granik‘s Winter’s Bone winning Best Feature as well as Best Ensemble and Laura Poitras‘ The Oath taking Best Documentary. Other winners on the night include Waiting for “Superman” winning the first ever Festival Genius Audience Award and Littlerock took home the Best Film Not Playing At a Theater Near You Award (chosen by the editors of Filmmaker). The show, co-hosted by Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson, was also filled with memories from Gothams past, including a beautiful montage to start the night. Tributes this year […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Nov 30, 2010 -
Into the Splice: After the Flood
Downtown Waterloo, Ontario. At night. A night unfinished. The previous evening I had spoken at a conference about analog nostalgia in the digital age. I brought a turntable with me from Michigan. And one single to play: “You’re Gonna Die” (1978) by the Ann Arbor/Detroit post-punk art band Destroy All Monsters, featuring Ron Asheton on guitar. At the border crossing entering Canada at Port Huron, I was asked a series of questions about the reasons for my visit to Canada. I answered in ways that made the guard skeptical, and I was told to go directly to Immigration. There, a […]
by Nicholas Rombes on Nov 30, 2010 -
PAIRING FILMS AT IDFA
For a docu-phile, attending the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam — with its nearly 300 films to choose from — feels less like being a kid in a candy store and more like being stuck in Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory for a week and a half. In addition to being Europe’s biggest fest for nonfiction flicks IDFA boasts round the clock events. (Literally — if you were still revved at three in the morning after IDFA Dance Night a program called “Docs Around The Clock” continued until 9AM, breakfast included.) In between screenings at the Pathe de Munt or the […]
by Lauren Wissot on Nov 29, 2010 -
DEBATING CLIMATE CHANGE AT IDFA
Before IDFA’s Green Screen Climate Debate began at the Escape Club in Rembrandtplein Monday afternoon, our host noted that none other than Al Gore was due to arrive at Schiphol airport at any moment (no doubt in one of his private environmentally-damaging jets). Though he was in Holland to receive an award, the Nobel laureate, unfortunately, had declined the festival’s offer to stop by to debate. Too bad because we were left with the star of Cool It, Bjorn Lomborg — the John Cameron Mitchell-resembling “skeptical environmentalist” whose book the film was based on — instead facing down Jan Rotman, […]
by Lauren Wissot on Nov 24, 2010 -
THANKS BE TO “MARLENE” AT STRANGER THAN FICTION
As inflatable stars arrive in Manhattan ready for their Macy’s close-up, one of the biggest stars in the history of film won’t be at the parade — she’ll be at the IFC Center. Tonight, Stranger Than Fiction will feature its penultimate screening, Marlene, a revival of the 1984 documentary about the reclusive film star Marlene Dietrich, directed by Maximilian Schell, an actor who appeared with Dietrich in Judgment at Nuremberg. Presented by John Walter, the director of How to Draw A Bunny and Theater of War, Marlene is partly the story of Dietrich and partly the story of Schell’s dogged […]
by Mary Anderson Casavant on Nov 23, 2010 -
OSCAR DOC FEATURE SHORTLIST: WHICH TITLES SHOULD HAVE MADE THE CUT?
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences revealed today the 15 films that have made their shortlist for the Best Feature Documentary category in the 83rd Academy Awards. They include: Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer, Alex Gibney, director (ES Productions LLC) Enemies of the People, Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath, directors (Old Street Films) Exit through the Gift Shop, Banksy, director (Paranoid Pictures) Gasland, Josh Fox, director (Gasland Productions, LLC) Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould, Michele Hozer and Peter Raymont, directors (White Pine Pictures) Inside Job, Charles Ferguson, director (Representational Pictures) The […]
by Jason Guerrasio on Nov 18, 2010
