The Dirties
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To the Moon Via Stanley Kubrick: Matt Johnson on Operation Avalanche
Nothing on screen is ever fully truth. Even in the most honest and seemingly unbiased documentaries, manipulation and subjectivity reign. That caveat is accepted when there is explicit knowledge that one’s watching creative content, but blatant deceit is a much dangerous affair. In Operation Avalanche, director Matt Johnson travels in time to 1967 to ingeniously recreate and humorously speculate about some of the most divisive footage in American history, moving images that surely change the landscape of what humanity was capable of. For some, however, the moon landing is an orchestrated sham built on the artifice of moviemaking. Johnson’s sophomore […]
by Carlos Aguilar on Sep 20, 2016 -
Critic’s Notebook: Slamdance 2013, Part Two
The Dirties may very well be some kind of terribly depressing cautionary tale or it may just be that the joke is on us, but this debut film from Matt Johnson, who also stars and co-wrote, couldn’t be more topical. It’s bound to cause much discussion should it find larger audiences, and perhaps even if it doesn’t, as the spectre of school shootings hangs heavy in many hearts this winter.The most talked about film at this year’s Slamdance even before winning the festival’s Grand Jury Prize at a ceremony last night at Park City’s Treasure Mountain Inn, Johnson’s film is […]
by Brandon Harris on Jan 25, 2013 -
Slamdance Winners Announced
Last night, the winners of the Slamdance Film Festival were announced. The Grand Jury Prize on the narrative side was awarded to Matt Johnson’s The Dirties, arguably the buzz title of the festival, in which two teens set out to make a movie about the bullies who are making their lives a misery. In the doc section, the main award went to Nicole Teeny’s Bible Quiz, about a lovelorn teen hoping to win the National Bible Quiz Championship and the love of her team captain, which stood out to a jury which included Filmmaker‘s own Dan Schoenbrun. The audience awards for narrative and […]
by Nick Dawson on Jan 25, 2013
