Robert Machoian & Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck
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“How Could One Document the Unseen?”: Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck on Their Haunted Cinema Eye Honors-Nominated Short, The Last Days of August
In their latest short film, The Last Days of August, which depicts the slow-motion desolation of a Nebraska town economically denuded by online retail, prolific filmmakers Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck create a haunted visual poetry — a blend of formally arresting, incisively spare images and heightened sound design. The two filmmakers, who appeared on our 25 New Faces list in 2010, began as shorts filmmakers and in recent years have directed arresting character-based, documentary-tinged features (God Bless the Child, When She Runs, and, for Machoian solo, The Killing of Two Lovers and The Integrity of Joseph Chambers). But throughout their […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 22, 2022 -
The Five Terrors of Filmmaking
Filmmaker 25 New Faces Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck’s latest feature, God Bless the Child, premieres at IFP’s Made in NY Media Center on Friday, August 7th and runs through the 13th. Robert, Rodrigo, Producer Laura Heberton and many special guests will be there in person. Tickets are available here. The film will be digitally released on many platforms on August 18th and is already available for pre-order on iTunes. Below, Machoian and Ojeda-Beck open up about what terrifies them when they make a film and offer a clip from a new series of shorts about their film, 40 Years […]
by Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck on Jul 31, 2015 -
Five Questions with God Bless the Child Directors Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck
Winner of the Best Narrative Feature award at the Atlanta Film Festival over the weekend, Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck’s God Bless the Child is a naturalistic, quotidian portrait of five children roaming the streets and marshes of Davis, California after their mother skips town. Machoian and Ojeda-Beck capture their characters with both formal remove and striking intimacy, as their interplay suggests the nature of young bodies left to their own devices. Though the Grahams — Harper, Elias, Arri, Ezra, and Jonah — exist in the film without any parental supervision, all five happen to belong to co-director Machoian, a relation which the pair were […]
by Sarah Salovaara on Mar 30, 2015 -
What Does It Mean to be a Producer?
Alongside her current Kickstarter campaign for Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck’s God Bless the Child, producer Laura Heberton pens this guest essay for Filmmaker reflecting on the many different ways one can be a film producer in our Internet age. Both God Bless the Child and another picture produced by Heberton, Alison Bagnall’s Funny Bunny, premiere at the 2015 SXSW Film Festival. This coming Friday, at about 2 o’clock in the morning, I will finally get to meet, in some (probably nondescript) lobby of a hotel in Austin, Robert Machoain and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck — in person and for the very […]
by Laura Heberton on Mar 11, 2015 -
Can a Filmmaker Balance Movies with a Full-Time Teaching Career?
Selected for Filmmaker’s 25 New Faces series, filmmakers Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck are currently on Kickstarter via producer Laura Heberton’s campaign to cover festival expenses for their latest feature, God Bless the Child. In the below guest essay, Machoian, who works as an adjunct professor, ponders the current dilemma in his life: should he accept a full-time teaching position that will necessarily change the rhythm of his filmmaking? Read on, and check out the film’s campaign on Kickstarter and consider donating. “Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.” This is a phrase I hear thrown around often, I […]
by Robert Machoian on Mar 10, 2015 -
Robert Machoian & Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck
When they met as undergrads at CSU Monterey Bay, Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck had different styles but found a third when working together. “A lot of my early work was pushing what people can process with quick cuts and juxtaposition of image,” Ojeda-Beck says. And “I was really exploring duration,” Machoian adds — “what can be done in a single shot and really raw, raw sound, mainly straight off the mic.” Their short films together display a handle on classic arthouse film style. Visuals are the key, along with luscious colorful imagery and solitary characters in simple situations, with […]
by Mike Plante on Jul 17, 2010
