Michael Totten
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25 New Faces
Welcome to the 2010 edition of Filmmaker‘s annual survey of new independent film talent. Victoria Mahoney Writer-director Victoria Mahoney began her artistic career as an actress in theater and then film. “Shelly Winters was my teacher,” Mahoney says. “If you touched your hair too many times in her class, she’d come over and cut off your bangs. She taught me the gift of stillness.” After working off-off Broadway, Mahoney went to L.A., did a number of pilots, a few European films, and a season of Seinfeld (she played Gladys Mayo, owner of the clothing store Putumayo). But then there […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 20, 2010 -
Alex Jablonski & Michael Totten
“This project has been like what musicians call ‘woodshedding,’” says Alex Jablonski about his collaborative venture with Michael Totten, Sparrow Songs. “We are finding our voice, trying out different styles, and learning so much.” Adds Totten, “In the past I’ve let this idea of ‘I don’t have the right money or equipment or subject matter’ prevent me from moving forward. Sparrow Songs has taught me to get rid of the idea of perfection because it doesn’t exist.” What is Sparrow Songs? Simply, it’s a year-long filmmaking project in which director-editor Jablonski and d.p. Totten make and upload one short doc […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 17, 2010 -
SPARROW SONGS, GOD, KAROKE AND BANKSY
Sparrow Songs is a documentary project by filmmaker Alex Jablonski and d.p. Michael Totten, who are making and posting one short doc film per month on their site for a whole year. They are six episodes in, and the films are quite wonderful. Averaging about eight minutes, they are poetic essays that capture the essences of specific places, people, and moments, and that then, without pretension, build these observances into larger statements about love, truth, community, and the ways we are choosing to live our lives. The films include Porn Star Karoke, about the crowd that gathers weekly at an […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 29, 2010
