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Gary Hustwit’s 10 Web Tips For Doc Filmmakers
I dropped in on the IFP Documentary Labs a couple of times, and one of the highlights for me was the “Web Tools for Documentary” workshop run by guest speaker Gary Hustwit, a filmmaker who used the web to great effect in the production and self-distribution of his “Design trilogy” of Helvetica, Objectified and Urbanized. Hustwit, who worked in publishing and distribution before he moved behind the camera, really knows this stuff inside out – and considers his engagement with the web an integral part of what he does now. “I think of all this stuff as filmmaking – […]
by Nick Dawson on May 29, 2012 -
CRICKET’S CLUB
If you want to be your own film cricket, as Ray Pride would say, then check out Criticker, a new “personalized search engine” in which you record your numerical scores on a number of movies and then sit back as the site predicts what else you might like. The difference between this site and others seems to be a very healthy representation of independent and foreign films.
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 19, 2006 -
FILM INDEPENDENT LAUNCHES SITE
Film Independent (formerly the IFP/Los Angeles) has launched their new website. Surf over there for news about the Spirit Awards, the upcoming L.A. Film Festival, and the organization’s other programs. Also up are a series of interviews by Lisa Garibay with folks like Michel Gondry and Capote producer Caroline Baron, winner of this year’s AMC/American Express Producer’s Award.
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 7, 2006 -
A LIFE IN TICKET STUBS
There’s an eccentric tracking of life and movies through ticket stubs posted by Mike over at Botsko.net. Having collected all his movie ticket stubs for six years, he puts their data in a spreadsheet and analyzes his moviegoing habits through dating, Fandango, ticket price increases, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and the birth of his child. One of his conclusions: he wound up paying more for movies he liked: What’s interesting though is that the average price I paid per ticket reflects my opinion of the movie. The better I rated the movie, the more I paid on average […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 23, 2006 -
CRANKED UP
Twitch, which is a great site covering what it calls “strange little films from around the world” (with a heavy emphasis on Asian art and genre films) links to Handcranked Films, a collective of filmmakers who include War (pictured) director Jake Mahaffy, one of Filmmaker‘s 25 New Faces of 2005. What I didn’t realize until Twitch’s piece is that Handcranked includes a number of other filmmakers, including Daniel Sousa and Jeff Slas, and that all of their work is featured on the site. Here’s what Todd at Twitch has to say about them: “Handcranked is a collective of film makers […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 22, 2006 -
THE SILENCE IS OVER
Forgive us as we iron out the kinks on the new site design. We just learned that due to an improper setting comments from readers have been going into the ether as opposed to onto our website. We’ve just reinstated those formerly lost comments and have changed our settings so comments are posted immediately.
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 17, 2006 -
FRESH REVIEWS
Ann Thompson has a good “Risky Business” column up at The Hollywood Reporter that tracks the growth of Rotten Tomatoes, the movie review aggregator. Along with Metacritic, the site is part of a shift by which now 90% of a younger demographic finds their movie reviews online. Thompson describes how Rotten Tomatoes survived the Internet bust and is now a thriving go-to advertising destination for distributors confident of the critical appeal of their films.
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 5, 2006 -
DIVINE NEUROSIS
Artist, filmmaker and production designer Dan Ouellette contributed a thoughtful and in-depth interview with Chris Cunningham to Filmmaker‘s current issue (sorry, it’s only in the print magazine), and today he’s just launched his new website, Neurotica Divine, which has to be one of the best personal artist sites I’ve seen. At the beginning of his film career Ouellette was known for his production design of Hal Hartley’s early work. More recentlly Ouellette production designed Alice Wu’s Saving Face. But Ouellette has always been a vivid visual artist whose work combines science-fiction and horror imagery with dashes of surrealism and dark […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 6, 2005 -
BE VERY AFRAID…
I’ve long been a fan of Dennis Cooper’s, the author of such formally audacious, heartbreakingly terrifying and sexually transgressive novels as Closer, Frisk and My Loose Thread. He has a new novel, God, Jr., a “PG-13” one, coming out this spring, but in the meantime Cooper has chosen the small Void Books to publish a “side project,” The Sluts, he considers too much for his regular publisher, Grove. Considering that Cooper has spent his entire literary career living outside the envelope, it does make me a little afraid to contemplate this new one. Says the press release: Set largely on […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 22, 2004 -
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE WORK
I always admire those who are able to lay either their professional and personal lives out online for all to see. One person who does this when it comes to his independent film producing is Muse Production’s Chris Hanley, who has made an entertaining habit of posting on his website copies of business emails he’s received under the apt header of “Scathing Letters.” For a while the letters sections was filled with angry back-and-forths from folks like Vincent Gallo and Don Murphy over older Muse projects, but Hanley has updated the site recently with two choice bits of correspondence, both […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 6, 2004
