# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 7/01/2009 01:52:00 AM Comments (0)

Premiering tomorrow at 7pm — and on the museum's YouTube channel — is the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA)'s Chinatown Film project, a collection of short films by Miguel Arteta, Patty Chang, Jem Cohen, Cary Fukunaga, So Yong Kim & Bradley Rust Gray, Amir Naderi, Sam Pollard, Shelly Silver, Rose Troche, and Wayne Wang & Richard Wong on their unique visions of Chinatown, New York. (Advance registration required to attend the opening.) The museum is located at 215 Centre Street, and the exhibition continues both on YouTube and on the exhibition's blog (appropriately in Chinese and English.) The exhibition also includes a user-generated component:

We want you to share your films, up to 7 minutes long, about your city's Chinatown. We're interested in large metropolitan Chinatowns as well as single strip mall Chinatowns! We want all formats, from camera phone video to Super 8mm film. This project is about re-seeing Chinatown through the eyes of filmmakers. And it's about taking the art of filmmaking to Chinatowns the world over.

Accepted entries will be posted to the Museum's YouTube channel.

The series curating producer is independent film producer Karin Chien (The Exploding Girl), and the exhibition will continue with more films, including shorts on all the world's Chinatowns from a number of esteemed international directors. The trailer for the exhibition is below.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/30/2009 04:16:00 PM Comments (0)

Ted Hope tweeted this Current TV indie film parody short this morning and it's been getting a lot of comments. Yes, it's silly, but too often accurate in parts. So, whaddaya say, let's all vow to banish these indie cliches!

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/29/2009 07:32:00 PM Comments (1)

An eventful day in Los Angeles found the Los Angeles Film Festival announcing its award winners amidst gatherings of far different sorts. A massive Iranian march took over much of Westwood; impromptu rallies protesting the Honduran military coup sprung up across the city, and here and there were still pockets of moon-walking, white-gloved Michael Jackson mourners. But in the relative wine-sipping calm of an intimate Westwood locale, the festival hosted a small awards ceremony to announce the winners of this year's competitions.

The Target Filmmaker Award, which rewards the finest narrative film in competition at the Festival (and comes with $50,000) went to the directing duo of Sam Fleischner and Ben Chace for their Brooklyn-by-way-of-Jamaica odyssey Wah Do Dem (What They Do) (pictured above). Following a endearingly goofy young hipster (nearly the whitest man in Brooklyn) as he staggers across the beaches, mountains, and cities of Jamaica in order to reunite with a cruise ship he barely enjoyed anyway, the film fashions its seemingly haphazard travelogues and accidental encounters into a very concise sense of narrative movement, one mixed with an embrace of the sheer pleasure of opening oneself to strangers, chance, and life itself. For the jury (comprised of producer Albert Berger, actress Rosemarie DeWitt, and film critic Elvis Mitchell), Wah Do Dem was "“a film that could feel anecdotal but through its musical shifts and tone, and its vision of the world as a newly optimistic place, Wah Do Dem (What They Do) creates a strong and profound emotional narrative."




The Target Documentary Film Award, given to the finest documentary film in competition (and which also comes with a suitcase filled with $50k), went to Those Who Remain (Los Que se Quedan) (pictured right), by Juan Carlos Rulfo and Carlos Hagerman. The flipside to the multiple documentaries on Mexican immigrants in the USA, this poetic documentary instead unveils the lives of "those who remain" in Mexico; many have loved ones in the U.S., and see them only once every few years, while others steadfastly refuse to follow the economic trail north, preferring instead to appreciate what they have. Rulfo and Hagerman's eye for details both poetic and utterly realist—a wrinkled hand picking crops, fireworks sparkling in a darkening sky, a battered telephone receiver that's the only connection between a father and daughter—give the film a power that's rare in documentary. The jury (film critic David Ansen, writer-director Anna Boden, and director Darius Marder) stated, “With its generosity of spirit and lyrical grace that illuminates a human landscape with fresh eyes, Those Who Remain reminds us that documentaries can be both journalism and poetry.” The film's Saturday evening screening offered up a further surprise, with one family that had been interviewed in the film finally reunited here; the mother and daughters had made it successfully to the United States, to join the father who had been separated from them for years. "I am so happy to finally see my father," said one of the young daughters, to barely a dry eye in the house; "I hope that no families have to be separated like we have."

A new (and much deserving) award this year was the Target "Dream in Color" Award, given to the Best Short in the "Future Filmmakers" Section (a showcase for high-school student filmmakers) was given to Sam Lubin for Lipstick. During the presentation, the jury proclaimed, "We congratulate all the filmmakers on their extraordinary work. While we were impressed with the scope and diversity of all the high school shorts, we select Lipstick, a simple and powerful film, which can inspire other future filmmakers to make movies with very little. Using just two props, one location, and two actors, the filmmaker creates a compelling story about a character dealing with personal yet universal issues of identity and communication. It is a visual film with a strong point of view. In Lipstick, we see both a present and future filmmaker.”

Other awards given include:

The Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature went to the topical The Stoning of Soraya M., directed by Cyrus Nowrasteh, which followed the struggles of a Iranian widow, and ignited a fascinating post-screening seminar with the director, lead actress Shohreh Aghdashloo (who has become a kind of accidental spokeswoman on Iranian women's rights during the film's release), and novelist Khaled Hosseini on women's rights under Islamic regimes, the rise of fundamentalism, and the dichotomies between Islamic scripture and practice.

The Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature went to Soul Power, directed by Jeffrey Levy-Hinte. Eva Norvind’s Born Without (Nacido Sin), part of the festival's intriguing spotlight on the Mexican documentary festival Ambulante, won the Audience Award for Best International Feature.

The award for Outstanding Performance in the Narrative Competition went to Shayne Topp for his performance in Suzi Yoonessi’s Dear Lemon Lima. Given to an actor or actors from an official selection in the Narrative Competition, this is the sixth year the award has been given at the Festival.

The award for Best Narrative Short Film went to Antonio Mendez Esparza’s Time and Again. The award for Best Documentary Short Film went to Anna Gaskell’s Replayground. Jérémy Clapin’s Skhizein won the award for Best Animated Short Film.

The Audience Award for Best Short Film went to Instead of Abracadabra, directed by Patrick Eklund. Grapevine Fires, directed by Walter Robot won the Audience Award for Best Music Video for Death Cab for Cutie.

# posted by Jason Sanders @ 6/29/2009 03:08:00 PM Comments (0)

I was working with a young director who was very talented, but who was also prone to panic — causing her to lose her perspective and clarity (an issue I’ve had to deal with myself at times). So I wrote this ‘"cheat sheet" for the fellows to carry with them for when they felt lost. To be honest, I created it just as much for myself…


The Unofficial Sundance Shooting Cheat Sheet

You may never need this, but if you’re feeling a little lost, or out of control, or not sure, remember…

1. Breathe. Calm down. Fear and anxiety are the enemies of complex, open, creative thought. A calm leader inspires confidence. If you need a minute to clear your head, or decide what you want, take it. Everyone can wait.

2. Slow down — rushing is not the same as efficiency.

3. Remember what your scene is really about: Why is this scene in your film? What do you want the audience to feel or understand from it? What are you trying to achieve emotionally with your use of camera and image? What do each of the characters want in this scene? How are they trying to achieve it? Which character’s scene is it? What is their journey in this scene?

While all of the above SHOULD seem obvious, there isn’t a director alive who hasn’t lost sight of some or all of the above while they were shooting a difficult scene.

4. In both rehearsal and shooting — try giving your actors actions — things their character is trying to achieve in the scene, instead of emotional states to play. Get back to what the character WANTS.

Let’s say you’re doing a scene where one character wants to intimidate another.

If you tell the actor "yell" you may just get a general, obvious performance.

But if you give them something to DO (e.g. ‘try and scare the crap out of the other character’), you will allow them into the creative process, and they may find ways of achieving what you want that weren’t what you expecting, but that are more interesting. Maybe instead of the screaming you imagined, you’ll discover they’re more frightening with a whisper. Maybe a chilling smile is more effective than a glare.

Be brave enough to let your actors (and your crew) make you better. No one is genius enough to do it alone. Then you can gently guide those creative impulses, picking the ones you like best, and helping the actor shade what you find together

5. When you have the scene on film the way you think you want, if you have a little time, do an extra take or two in a different way. Why not see what happens if you try something a bit different. If your actor has been intimidating the other with a lot of outward emotion and intensity, suggest they try one with everything held in, like a snake. See what you get.

What’s the worse that happens? You hate it and don’t use it. What’s the best that happens? Unexpected magic. Plus, a good actor will often have something they want to try, but are scared it might not work or will look foolish. Give them their chance to go out on a limb.

6. Remember the scene will NEVER be just like it is in your head. It may be better, it may be worse, it may just be different. But if you get stuck trying to make it "just the way you imagined it" you may well get stuck on the road to hell. Remember what Truffaut said: "The secret of good directing is knowing exactly what you want, but having no ego about giving it up the second anyone has a better idea."

Remember the script is a blueprint, an outline. But when building a house you often deviate from blueprints to make things better. — Keith Gordon

7. Remember to thank, praise and take care of your cast and crew. They’re your team. They’re your army. If they feel unappreciated and ignored you will not get their best efforts and thus your best scene. Don’t leave your actors standing out in the sun, wondering what’s going on while you talk to your DP for a half hour.

8. Have fun. Breathe. Smile. There are so few people lucky enough to have the adventure you’re on.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/29/2009 12:01:00 AM Comments (1)

Leaving the Sundance Lab is always a melancholy feeling. I’m happy and excited about seeing my wife, but not about re-entering the "real world" of Los Angeles, where the deal is the thing, and where projects are judged on potential economic return, not artistic merit.

The week is full of great memories, watching young filmmakers take steps — sometimes leaps — towards defining their voice and material.

Some bravely challenged their whole script, re-writing as they worked, and adding whole new scenes to their pieces that gave them more depth.

Others found ways to integrate their desire to create a specific cinematic style, with a way to maintain the emotion of the story.

Directors of pieces with divergent elements and styles made strides towards seamlessly integrating their scripts’ humor and sadness, so within one scene they could leap nimbly back and forth in mood.

One filmmaker learned that scenes she dismissed as ‘exposition’, could be very emotional and important if she approached them with passion.

Every filmmaker grew, stretched and challenged themselves. I think (I hope!) they all leave with a greater sense of clarity and confidence then when they started. I only wish we’d had even more time with them.

They’ve had so much thrown at them by so many people, they’ll be a lot of processing to do. And it will be fascinating to see what the films themselves are like when they actually get to make their features (a surprisingly large numbers of the fellows do, with Sundance’s help). That part is often delightful,

A few years back I worked with Miranda July on Me and You and Everyone We Know. I loved her script, but while I was at the lab — early in the process that summer — she was still struggling to deal with her actors and crew to get what she wanted, and to find a visual language that would capture the quirkiness of her script, without being self-conscious. It was a major thrill to see her final film in the theater, and realized how much she had triumphed to create something whole, special and unique.

It’s funny, sometimes the most important thing you can give as an advisor are small bits of advice that help lead to directors thinking in new ways. On one set, I pointed out that the actor whose close-up was being shot couldn’t see the person he was talking to, because a lighting flag was in the way. The director hadn’t felt comfortable challenging their DP’s needs, and so said nothing. But once he mentioned it, they quickly came to an accommodation that worked for both the actor and the image. After that he was more aware of what his actors needed, and that as captain of the ship he had every right to try to get everyone what they needed to do their best work.

Other times it’s hour-long, sometimes tearful talking sessions, that go way beyond filmmaking into the challenges these young people carry from their personal lives that are affecting their work. Someone who felt judged and belittled as a kid, can either be too meek on a set, or too much a bully — either way a form of self-protection. Sometimes we have to be amateur psychologists to get at the issues underneath their struggles.

I’ll leave off with a document I created at Sundance a few years ago. I was working with a young director who was very talented, but who was also prone to panic — causing her to lose her perspective and clarity (an issue I’ve had to deal with myself at times). So I wrote this "cheat sheet" for the fellows to carry with them for when they felt lost. To be honest, I created it just as much for myself…

Check back tomorrow for Gordon's Sundance Director's Cheat Sheet.

For part one of this series, click here. For part two, click here.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/28/2009 11:49:00 AM Comments (0)

“When I see this picture, the chemistry between us is delightful still,” began Jon Voight as he and Dustin Hoffman took the stage late last night after a packed Los Angeles Film Festival screening of John Schlesinger’s 1969 classic Midnight Cowboy at the Hammer Museum’s Billy Wilder Theater. “It's still a little bit of a miracle to see, when actors have such chemistry; when one of us starts moving, the other one does too.” Forty-some years after making the film, that chemistry was still on display during the two great actor’s conversation, hosted by LA Times critic Kenneth Turan. Exceedingly generous with their time and thoughtful responses, Voight and Hoffman entertained the audience with recollections of the film’s shooting, the director John Schlesinger and his working style, American filmmaking in the early Seventies, and, above all, their collaboration together. Seeing the film again (the two claimed to have sat in the audience for the final half hour), what’s clear is that Midnight Cowboy has lost none of its power over the decades. In fact, compared to many contemporary “independent visions” on display here, it’s probably gained power, its scaly gutter-level realism and humanist force only serving to highlight the relative lack of such filmmaking in today’s American independent cinema.

What follows is a loose transcription of highlights from a memorable evening….

ON (FINALLY) GETTING CAST IN MIDNIGHT COWBOY

DH: I was just going to go back to the stage after The Graduate (Hoffman’s first role, which made him an immediate star). As a New York actor working in theater and used to working with great works, film scripts were a bit “thin,” so I wasn’t getting anything interesting. But Midnight Cowboy had an amazing script (by Waldo Salt), and was based on a novel. The problem was that Schlesinger, as a serious “artist,” refused to see me, because of the success of The Graduate; he considered it, and me, too lightweight.

“When I finally got an audition, I got all dressed up in character, and had him meet me at around 3am around Times Square, in some laundromat, just to show how serious I was.”

JV: “I thought of Dusty immediately when reading the script.”

"On a trip to London I saw Schlesinger's A Kind of Loving, and couldn't believe what I saw, couldn't believe that I could work with this guy."

“When I first went in to read, I think I lost it. Put too much into it. A few months later I ran into an actor friend of mine in LA, who said, “Oh, I’m doin’ GREAT; I’m up for this great part in a new Schlesinger film!” And then I realized I needed to get back to New York, and read again for that part, and get it.”

(Voight went on to praise the casting director, a friend and champion who was able to get him another audition. "I pleaded with her, and when I went in to audition, she was there, and was able to introduce me to Schlesinger; I think that personal introduction from her truly helped.")

DH: "Schlesinger didn’t want Voight because he was from Yonkers, didn’t have that Texas accent, but I told him, “Well, John, He’s an actor.” So Jon went to Midlands, Texas, or Big Springs, with a tape recorder to nail the Texas accent.”

JV: "I’d go into bars to try and get away with being Texan."


THEIR COLLABORATIVE PROCESS:

DH: "Jon and I were fascinated with these guys (the characters), and how they were friends. We’d improvise and rehearse together forever."

"We improvised that bit with the comb (on the stairs after the party). Putting my head on his chest was improvised. And improvisation work is just something they don’t make time for now."


On their friendly rivalry during the shoot, each anxious to upstage the other: DH: "We were like fighters, who in the end would embrace."

On an early shoot, even before they really began to work on their characters, the walk across a bridge in the snow:
DH: "So I’m still working on my character, and even trying to get a sense what the cough is all about. So I’m coughing and coughing, and I start coughing so much as we’re walking, I throw up all over his boots. And Jon goes up to Schlesinger, and says, 'Is he going to do that every scene?'”

WORKING WITH DIRECTOR JOHN SCHLESINGER (a key figure in the British New Wave, whose features included Billy Liar, Darling, and A Kind of Loving; Midnight Cowboy was his first American feature)

JV: "Schlesinger was an artist. Whatever he’s doing onscreen, he’s painting. You see him up there, and that’s what he’s doing with the film."

“What I remember about John is his self-doubt. And that was his process. Like he was having a child, having labor pains before each scene. This film came out of him.”

"We knew something was happening, and it was because of John Schlesinger."

"The director is the man. We’re the beneficiaries of this great talent.”

On the final day of shooting, in Texas, when Voight noticed Schlesinger shaking and sweating in the hot Texan sun, looking ill:
"I thought he was having a heart attack, and I asked him what was wrong. 'What will they think of us?!,' he said. 'We’ve made a film about a dishwasher who goes to New York City and fucks a lot of women!” (Laughter).

"He had finally realized what the film was about." (Laughter).

"And I grabbed him and said, “We’ve made a masterpiece that we’ll live in the shadow of forever.”

On Hoffman's doubtfulness over the movie's power:
"I always do little sketches during my shoots, and I had done a little sketch of me and Dusty in character. And Dusty sees it, and just says, “Geez, I hope the movie is that good.”

DH: "He knew about acting, and could talk the language of actors more than any other actor that I knew.”

SCENES AND MOMENTS:

On the hippie/acid sex party scene, with cast members culled from the Andy Warhol circle (including Viva, Ultra Violet, and Paul Morrissey):
DH: "John was friends with all of those people. That shoot for the party went on for a week. It sure didn’t have to." (Laughter).

“We’d get there at 7am for makeup and prep and everyone would still be there, shooting up, with all kinds of oral sex going on….”


On the "taxi" scene ("I'm walkin' here! I'm walkin' here!!!):
DH: "Schlesinger just told us to walk down and then across this street. We didn’t have any permits or anything, so we were shooting with a hidden camera in a van across the street. Jon and I were in character, looking like real New Yorkers, and nobody knew who we were. It was a real problem, though, walking and then getting to the light, to time it right on the “walk” signal, because Schlesinger didn’t want us to stop and wait, just keep walking."

"So it took us like 10-15 takes, and we were always messing up the timing. And then finally we get it right, and we’re walking across the street…and this cab runs the red light. My brain is yelling, 'Hey, I'm ACTING here,' because it was messing up the take, but I can’t do that, cause we’re still shooting, so my mouth translates that as 'Hey, I’m WALKING here.' And so it worked. But that cab still almost hit us."

On the toilet-sex scene:
DH: "In previews, blocks of people would just get up and walk out. Bob Balaban (actor and future director) was all excited about his first role; he even called up his parents. But he’s gotta tell them, 'Hey, it’s my first role; I’m getting a blow job in a toilet.'" (Laughter)

JV (laughing): "See, whenever I do an interview with Dusty, I’m getting upstaged.”

DH (deadpan): Well, I’m sure my memory is, um, somewhat faulty.”

THE TIMES OF MIDNIGHT COWBOY, AND ITS POWER:

DH: "Back then there was no language of hits or indies. We were just trying to make a movie, and stay true to it, and naturalistic. Those were good days. We were experiencing the residue of the New Waves. The French, the Italian, the British, were all coming into the Thalia, the other New York theaters."

JV: "The studio system had gotten stale. Stars were fading, films were not making money, but all these new artists were coming up at the same time, all eager to make films more real, to express what we were seeing. Some of those talents broke through; it was a very interesting time."

"This movie has a moral force to it. It’s a very rough film, but it has a tremendous love for humanity in it."

# posted by Jason Sanders @ 6/26/2009 05:17:00 PM Comments (1)

The trajectory of careers can be pretty fascinating. I remember when G.G. Allin was a Lower East Side punk rock performance freakshow, cutting himself on stage, fighting with audience members and threatening/promising to kill himself during one of his performances. Todd Phillips was attending NYU Film School at the time and while a junior there made his debut feature, a documentary portrait of the performer entitled Hated: GG Allin and the Murder Junkies (1994). He also, with Andrew Gurland, founded the New York Underground Film Festival, would go on to make with Gurland the controversial college hazing doc Frat House (1998) and then, just two years later, would make the very successful comedy Road Trip. There was also Old School (2003) and now, of course, The Hangover, which is shaping up to be one of the summer's biggest hits (and probably the most profitable one).

In an interview with Erin Broadley at Suicide Girls, Phillips discusses how the seeds of his filmmaking can be found in Hated.

EB: Well, you also talked about how with documentaries you almost have to create characters as well. What were some of the problems or strange rewards you found with the Murder Junkies crew, developing the characters within the bounds of this documentary?

TP:I think what I meant was that, to me it was never a big leap to go from documentaries to features. I think a good documentary has a beginning, middle and an end. A good documentary is storytelling and has character development so you know, in this film, in Hated it was the same thing, it was like, okay, you build your movie around your main character GG but you have this sort of circus that follows him around…like Unk the fan or the ex-guitarist who’s thrown out of the band. He’s sort of the antagonist of the film.

EB:Chicken John?

TP:Yeah, and you kind of just let stuff come out slowly just like you would a regular narrative film. I don’t think Hated does it flawlessly because there’s not too much of a narrative thread through it. But a movie like Some Kind of Monster they do do that so perfectly and when it’s done in a documentary, to me it’s just the best.

EB:One thing you are noted for is the level to which you are right in there in the action, participating in your documentaries. Where do you draw the line between being a filmmaker and becoming too much a part of your subjects’ lives?

TP:For me, I grew up watching Nick Broomfield documentaries. You know Nick Broomfield? He did a great documentary about Heidi Fleiss. He did one about Aileen Wuornos. Yeah, Nick Broomfield -- he’s like Michael Moore even before Michael Moore, but not so much political, more just character [driven] pieces. This was very much our approach with Hated and the movie I did after that called Frat House. I don’t know if you’ve seen it. That one takes that concept even further. To me documentaries are basically about the journey, not the destination. So much about the documentary journey is the process of making the film and you see a little bit of that in Hated and much more of that in Frat House, but I do think that came a lot from my seeing Nick Broomfield movies. There’s no rule about what’s in it, how much of that or how little, it’s just whatever serves the story.

From today until a week from now you can watch Hated for free, courtesy of Pitchfork TV at this link.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/26/2009 10:52:00 AM Comments (2)

Here's actor, writer and director Keith Gordon's (pictured) second post from the Sundance Directors' Lab. For his first post, click here.

OK, so the weather isn’t great so far (lots of rain), and the food is, well, it’s kinda like being at summer camp. (That’s why I always bring some cereal and cans of soup from home). And that’s all I can come up with to complain about. This place is magic, and I’m thrilled to be back in it’s grip.

I unpacked in my cozy little condo, and headed down to the Sunday reception for us "new folk." I was very happy to see lots of old friends among the staff and my fellow advisors.

The next morning we saw the scenes from the first week (all of which show talent, but also the work left to be done), and got the update from Gyula, Michelle, and the wonderful Joan Darling who comes up every year before the production week's start, to work with the fellows on acting, becomes an advisor for the first production week, and then stays to fill in the 2nd week advisors on what she’s seeing with each of the fellows and what she thinks they could use from us.

Joan is quite an amazing teacher — warm, loving, inspiring, and endlessly enthusiastic. She’s able to be critical when needed, but in a way that never could be misinterpreted as belittling or hurtful. Over a couple of weeks she becomes every fellow’s wise mother.

The scripts this year range from very good to VERY, VERY good. And no, I’m not saying which I think is which. All were written by their director, except one. In alphabetical project order;

All Fall Down – Jonathan Wysocki. (USA) Thank god I really liked this script, since Jonathan is good friends with a close friend of mine, and we live about two blocks from each other (in spread out LA, that’s like living in the same apartment building in NYC). It’s a bittersweet look at how 9/11 effects a family in a small town, the Halloween right after the attacks. It has a gently satirical eye for small town life, without ever being condescending or judgmental. It’s also very touching, sad and real about family dynamics and national fears.

Beasts of the Southern Wild — Behn Zeitlin (co-writer/director), Lucy Alibar (co-writer). (USA) I guess one could call this alternately hysterically funny, and tragic film "magical realism," but that’s somehow too simplistic. This is one of those unique scripts that’s not like anything else I’ve come across. A portrait of a bayou town slowly sinking into the water, it deftly combines poetry in it’s language, fantasy elements, subtle politics, Beckett-like absurdity, and deep humanity. It’s a fairy tale meeting the earthiness of Mardi Gras.

Goodnight Moon — Elgin James. (USA) A carefully observed, sometimes terrifying view of adolescence, as two 14 year old girls escape their poor, but sheltered existence near California’s Salton Sea for a couple of stolen days in L.A., where they end up getting into events way over their heads. A bracing and moving in its portrait of teens growing up, and apart, in the modern world.

My Brother the Devil — Sally El Hosaini. (UK/Egypt) We’ve all seen gang-related dramas, but this portrait of two brothers of Arab descent growing up on the tough streets of London transcends cliché into something deeper, richer, and more emotional. One of those rare scripts where I literally had no idea how things would work out, which puts it ahead of 99% of what I read in Hollywood. Again, great attention to the details of life, something that gratifyingly runs through many of the scripts here.

The Narrow Frame of Midnight — Tala Hadid (Morocco/USA). This tremendously affecting script about the human search for connection, follows two separate stories that intersect, a young girl kidnapped to be sold into slavery, and a man searching for his disappeared brother. It reminded me (favorably) of one of my favorite films of the last few years The Edge of Heaven by Fatih Akin.

Porfirio — Alejandro Landes(Brazil/Ecuador). The is true story of a wheelchair bound man,; living in poverty, waiting for government help, trying to raise his son, maintain his love relationship and keep his dignity, who finally explodes. Deeply moving and disturbing, like many of the scripts here, it takes you inside the mind of someone you never thought you’d be able to identify with, across barriers of culture and class.

On the Ice — Andrew Okpeaha MacLean (USA). This is a deceptively simple (but emotionally complex) tale of two Inuit best teen-age best friends who end up in deep trouble. It captures a culture foreign in it’s details, but familiar in it’s humanity, and in its themes of guilt, loyalty and responsibility. This script will be a challenge at Sundance — it’s so much about the visually icy world of the far north. But seeing Andrew’s amazingly shot short film, it’s clear that he can handle that element, and his work at Sundance can focus on bringing the richness of his script to his actors’ performances.

The Story of Ram — Ritesh Barta (USA/India). Another hard to classify but easy to love script, this, like the totally different Beasts of the Southern Wild combines elements of magical realism, and fantasy with deeply rooted realism. A young, poor Indian man makes a powerful friend on his ham radio, changing his life, and the life of his town. It made me smile a lot, and kept me wondering what would happen next.

While I’m doing lists, here are this years advisors. Week one was (I think) Michael Almereyda, Joan Darling, Caleb Deschanel, Suzy Elmiger, Ed Harris, Peter Medak and Joan Tewksbury (our week 2 group arrived just after group 1 left, so I’m going off hastily scribbled notes… hope they’re right).

My group has Lisa Fruchtman, Randa Haines, Catherine Hardwicke, Michael Lehmann, Rogier Stoffers and Alfre Woodard. I know almost all of them, having either spent previous labs together and/or actually working on a film as I did with Alfre. It’s a great bunch. Funny, insightful, eclectic. We’re all over the map in terms of energies and style, but we quickly bond.

One of the interesting new challenges this year is that a couple of projects are not being shot in English. And indeed, my first "assignment" is to work with Alejandro while he’s rehearsing a scene for Porfirio. When I get to rehearsal I find that not only is the scene being played in Spanish, but his leading man speaks no English, so all directions are given in Spanish as well.

This makes for an interesting quandary. Not only do I not know exactly what the actors are saying (although I do have a translated script), but I have no idea how Alejandro is communicating with his actors, how he’s translating his ideas to them, etc.

It makes for an exercise in Zen. I find that if I stop telling myself "I don’t understand," I can get much more than I expected by watching people’s eyes and body language during the scene. I’m able to see whether it seems "alive," and follow the arcs of each characters’ emotions. It’s a powerful reminder of how universal human experience is.

On the other hand, when Alejandro is quietly directing them, I really can’t tell what’s going on. He could be calling me "the idiot in the corner" for all I know. ☺ But I am able to see the effect that his direction has, and that’s what matters.

I come in mid-rehearsal and watch. The scene is the father and son silently eating, when the father’s girlfriend returns home late, quietly stoking the father’s sense of impotence and jealousy, and the son’s anger.

I point out to him that the way the scene is playing there’s no real turning point. The mood is so somber from the start, that there’s no room for the energy to change when the girlfriend walks in late, so we don’t really get the dynamics of the scene.

Alejandro is going for a minimalist, understated style with his actors, and he’s afraid of too much emotion being displayed, but I reassure him he can keep it as ‘small’ as he wants, but still have real behavior in the silences, real relationships and change, even if it’s only a small nod, or moment of eye contact.

He speaks quietly in Spanish to his actors for a few moments, and when they do the scene again it’s immediately very different. Now the father and son look at each other, there’s a sense of ease between them, even if no words are spoken. So when Vicki the girlfriend enters, you can feel the tension suddenly rise, and the room get chilly, well before anything is said.

I encourage him to keep experimenting in that direction, and over the next few times through a world of life, all in tiny moments, opens up between the father and son; a little smile at a burp, a nod of thanks, to the son having made the food. This connection in turn, sets up a father-and-son versus the intruder dynamic when the girlfriend becomes part of the scene. It’s all still very quiet and underplayed as per Alejandro’s style, but now it feels like life, with something at stake, and situations evolving for everyone involved.

With the scene playing well, we take a break and play some basketball. I immediately tweak my knee. It’s official, I’m getting old. (sigh…)

At night we see a screening of Catherine Hardwick’s amazing Thirteen, and afterwards she answers lots of questions about how she was able to do such an terrific job, with so little time, so little, money, and one of her three leading actresses having never acted before. She talks about her careful preparation, her getting the house they were going to shoot in early, so the actors could work in, and even sleep in the place they’d be using as "home," etc. She speaks with such enthusiasm and excitement that it’s impossible not to caught up in the joy of her process, and ends the long day with a jolt of energy.

So far, so good… — Keith Gordon

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/25/2009 12:32:00 AM Comments (4)

I've been slow on the blog and behind on posting my notes on day two of the Open Video Conference because we're trying to finish the Summer issue and get it off to the printers before the July 4th holiday. It's our annual "25 New Faces" issue, so it's a tougher one to pull together than usual. Anyway, one person I won't be writing about when I get that OVC Day Two post up is keynote speaker Clay Shirky — because he wasn't there. Travel difficulties derailed his presentation but for those who want to hear him anyway, here's his talk on open source, activism and creative practice delivered two days before at Upgrade New York. (Hat tip: The Change You Want To See.)

Upgrade NY: Clay Shirky on Forking, Failure, and Open Source (Part 1) from Not An Alternative on Vimeo.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/25/2009 12:24:00 AM Comments (0)

At last year’s FIND Film Financing Conference in Los Angeles, Mark Gill told us the sky is falling. This year’s keynote speaker, Endgame Entertainment CEO James H. Stern, had a more optimistic message. Referencing Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers, Stern reminded the crowd, “We are lucky enough to be at the right place at the right time for great opportunities.” Stern encouraged the crowd of filmmakers to not just make better movies, but smarter ones that keep a film’s audience — and how to reach it — in mind well before the cameras roll, not just after the film is complete. He cited distribution execs Bob Berney and Ira Deutchman as conceptual thinkers on the cutting edge of the new independent film business, and took lessons from football hero Herschel Walker, who infamously turned to ballet for his off-season training so that he could learn to use a completely different set of muscles to improve his game. Stern reminded us that, as producers, it’s time for us to do the same in our business.

The biggest muscle producers need to flex, it was implied in the panel discussions that followed Stern’s keynote, is harnessing the power of the internet. During “Independent Financing Models,” Paradigm Consulting distribution strategist Peter Broderick touted the success of “crowd-funding” films, or raising production money in small donations via Facebook, websites and other social networks. He used documentarian Robert Greenwald’s Iraq for Sale and the filmmakers behind The Age of Stupid as successful examples of films that not only raised six-figure budgets online but built critical relationships with their respective fan bases even before they began shooting. In these cases, Broderick pointed out, the filmmaker’s mailing lists were their most valuable assets.

The discussion continued in the “Digital Distribution” panel, during which SnagFilms’ CEO Rick Allen, Oscilloscope Laboratories' David Fenkel and New American Vision co-president Orly Ravid helped the audience of producers navigate the tricky waters of online distribution models, and figure out how to make them even modestly profitable. Allen boasted that the producers of the 800 or so films on SnagFilms.com get a check every quarter because of his company’s unique sub-distribution model (according to Allen, SnagFilms has partnered with nearly 25,000 niche websites to market films to their target audience online, and that they also help push traditional DVD sales). Fenkel and Ravid countered that in spite of the rapid growth of online distribution platforms, iTunes and NetFlix still capture the lion’s share of the business, and both have a very high barrier to entry. All concurred that there is no one-size-fits-all model, and that each film has to be evaluated individually and producers must create a tailor-made distribution and marketing plan for their product.

The irony of discussing the future of independent cinema—in which very few films will actually be seen projected in 35mm in traditional movie theaters—while sitting in the plush stadium seating at the Landmark wasn’t lost on anyone. Nor was the fact that, by 6pm, attendees were hastily ushered out of the theater to make room for moviegoers lined up to see The Proposal.

For all the cautious optimism, the earnest plans and the crystal-ball predictions of the future, the critical question of whether independent film is doomed to become just another commodity remains unanswered. Perhaps a worthy topic for next year’s keynote. — Smriti Mundhra

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/22/2009 02:55:00 PM Comments (1)

I'm still typing up my thoughts on day two of the Open Video Conference, but in the meantime, here is an example of open video in action. At his Mind Flip blog, Jay Cousins writes about "augmented content" as being a potential driver for video monetization on the web. He gives an example of the technology at play by embedding the below video which demonstrates some of the functions of Firefox's new version 3.5, which supports Ogg video. Check it out.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/22/2009 10:23:00 AM Comments (1)

Tonight our first Filmmaker/Apple "Meet The Filmmaker" event takes place at the Apple Store in SoHo at 8pm (103 Prince St.). Nick Dawson will be interviewing our Spring cover director Kathryn Bigelow about her new film, The Hurt Locker, which opens this weekend.

The event is open to the public.

Following the first 38 days of army bomb expert Sgt. Will James (Jeremy Renner) in Iraq, The Hurt Locker (pictured) is a trademark Kathryn Bigelow film. Like Near Dark, Point Break or Strange Days the action is non-stop and includes a breakout performance by Renner. Check out what we mean below.

# posted by Jason Guerrasio @ 6/22/2009 09:00:00 AM Comments (0)

The surprise guest at the conclusion of this weekend's Open Video Conference was Peter Sunde of The Pirate Bay, which bills itself as the "world's largest BitTorrent tracker." As many of you know Sunde and three of his colleagues were recently convicted in a Swedish court and were sentenced to a year in jail and a $3.6 million fine. They have accused the judge of bias and are now battling the verdict on appeal.

The Open Video Conference organizer introducing Sunde, who appeared via Skype from Sweden, acknowledged the controversial nature of his activities, particularly for the content creators in the room, and noted the group's political activism as well as its influence on the creation of the Pirate Party, which recently won a seat in the EU Parliament. Also noted was The Pirate Bay's support of Iranian critics of the country's election. The site changed its logo to "The Persian Bay" in support of the Iranian protestors and reported that it helped a group of Iranians set up an anonymous internet site allowing users to uncensored and tracked web surfing.

BoingBoing's Xeni Jardin moderated the Q&A. At one point, after a discussion of how Hollywood must change its business model to survive in a post-censorship world, an audience member asked about independents. He described himself as an independent film and videomaker and said he didn't have an MBA or the business skills to envision a new business model that would allow himself to make a living. Sunde's response to him is below.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/21/2009 07:58:00 PM Comments (0)

In a "things are tough for everyone" reminder, Peter Bart and Michael Fleming in Variety report that Columbia Pictures' Amy Pascal has put the new Steven Soderbergh movie, Moneyball, starring Brad Pitt, into "limited turnaround" just three days before it was due to begin filming.

From the piece:

The move came after Pascal read the final draft delivered last week by Steven Zaillian and found it very different from the earlier scripts she championed. Pascal was uncomfortable enough with how Soderbergh’s vision had changed that she applied the brakes.

Soderbergh and Pitt’s CAA reps spent the weekend attempting to get another studio to play ball.

If a new financier doesn’t emerge by today, Columbia will re-examine options that include replacing Soderbergh (and hoping Pitt doesn’t ankle), delaying the film until Pascal and the filmmaker find themselves in synch on the script or pulling the plug.

According to the piece, either Warner Bros., the studio of the Oceans movies, or Paramount, which just saw the departure of John Lesher and Brad Weston from the executive suites, is hoped to provide a home for the film.

Soderbergh discussed Moneyball briefly in our interview about The Girlfriend Experience:

I remember hearing that you had been working on The Girlfriend Experience for a while, but, nonetheless, it did strike me as a kind of “zeitgeist film.” I thought of your K Street HBO series. Both that project and this one seemed to have a certain kind of elasticity in terms of being able to quickly absorb things going on in the broader culture. How do you create something that has that kind of space within it, or that is able to absorb things from the outside during shooting and postproduction?

It’s kind of a continuation of an idea that I started being enamored of around the time of Traffic actually, which was this fusion of real people and real stories with a fictional story. K Street was another attempt to smash these two ideas together, Bubble was a continuation of it and The Girlfriend Experience is another attempt. And Moneyball, the movie that I’m about to shoot this summer, is, I think, actually going to be the most extreme attempt at what I’ve been playing around with for almost a decade now. I guess it’s something that grows out of my frustration with the norms of cinema narrative storytelling and the fact that I’m convinced that the gains that can be achieved through presenting something that seems like it really is happening in front of you are more significant than the gains you get from something that doesn’t seem as real but is better constructed. That may just be a reflection of my personal taste, but I’m pushing harder and harder to try and get some of these projects into this area where they are almost like designed documentaries. Bubble, GFE and K Street — [on all of these] we literally worked from outlines that just described who’s in the scene and gave a very, very loose description of what the scene is about. They’re all controlled improvisations.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/21/2009 05:05:00 PM Comments (2)

Artistic director, Sky Sitney, and team put together a very sophisticated program this year with lots of challenging and cinematically beautiful nonfiction work on exhibit for local audiences, visiting artists and industry guests in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland.

Late last night, the hardworking juries finished their deliberations and in an intimate and very emotional ceremony this afernoon, the winners of the 7th Annual AFI Discovery SILVERDOCS Documentary Festival Sterling Awards, with a total of $70,000 in combined cash and in-kind prizes, were announced:

The Cinematic Vision Award given to a feature film that exhibits excellence and innovation in storytelling presented by sponsor, Alphacine, went to Lee Chung-ryoul's Old Partner.

The Writers Guild Screenplay Award presented to the writers of a feature-length film demonstrating excellence in screenwriting went to Nicole Opper and her subject, Avery Klein-Cloud, for Off and Running.

The Witness Award (in memory of Joey R.B. Lozano), awarded to a theatrical doc about human rights violations or social justice issues went to director, Landon Van Soest and producer, Jeremy Levine for Good Fortune. This was also the film's world premiere.

The Music Documentary Award presented to a nonfiction feature that incorporates music most effectively went to an exuberant Luciano Blotta for festival fave Riseup. He posed in ferociously proud rock-star fashion with his brand-new guitar donated by Gibson as part of his prize. Even though it was a hard struggle to complete the film--five years shooting in Jamaica--Blotta said that he's now dedicated to making nonfiction: "The best characters and the best stories are already out there." The music jury also awarded an Honorable Mention to Jeffrey Levy-Hinte's Soul Power for outstanding use of archival footage.

The Sterling Short Film Award also gave an Honorable Mention to Michael Angus' and Murray Fredericks' 28-minute Salt from Australia, and the first prize went to Danish filmmaker Andreas Koefoed's 12 Notes Down. He's just graduated from film school--a fine start to a promising career.

Jurors Geoffrey Smith, Esther Robinson and Karina Rotenstein bestowed the Sterling World Feature Award to Mugabe and the White African by Lucy Bailey and Andrew Thompson.

And finally, jurors Margaret Brown, David Kwok and Cian Smyth gave the Sterling US Feature Award to Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher for their feature début, October Country.

Audience awards will be announced tomorrow on the last day of the festival.

# posted by Pamela Cohn @ 6/20/2009 07:11:00 PM Comments (0)

Yesterday wrapped up the first day of the Open Video Conference, a two-day event being held at New York University Law School featuring speakers, screenings and events all centering around the topic of Open Video. The conference, which can be livestreamed on its website, is produced by the Participatory Culture Foundation, the Yale Internet Society Project, the open source video platform Kaltura, iCommons, and the Open Video Alliance.

What is Open Video? Quoting from the website:

Open Video is a broad-based movement of video creators, technologists, academics, filmmakers, entrepreneurs, activists, remixers, and many others. When most folks think of “open,” they think of open source and open codecs. They’re right—but there’s much more to Open Video. Open Video is the growing movement for transparency, interoperability, and further decentralization in online video. These qualities provide more fertile ground for independent producers, bottom-up innovation, and greater protection for free speech online.

YouTube and other online video applications are rightly celebrated for empowering end-users; however, online video lacks some of the essential qualities that make text and images on the web such powerful tools for free speech and technical innovation. Email, blogs, and other staples of the open web rely on ubiquitous and interoperable technologies that have low barriers to entry; they are massively decentralized and resistant to censorship or regulation. Video, meanwhile, relies on centralized distribution and proprietary technologies which can threaten cultural discourse and innovation.

Open Video is about the legal and social norms surrounding online video. It’s the ability to attach the license of your choice to videos you publish. It’s about media consolidation, aggregation, and decentralization. It’s about fair use. In short, it’s about a lot of things, and that’s why this conference is going to be so exciting!

At its simplest level, then, this conference draws together technology folk, artists, filmmakers, legal scholars and cultural theorists who all believe in the desirability of an open source culture and non-proprietary standards when it comes to the publishing and dissemination of video on the web. But at the next level, there are diverse groups who share this common belief but who also have separate, overlapping, or sometimes even competing agendas. At the conference you can find those who aggressively critique existing copyright laws and trade practices alongside others looking for Open Video standards to decrease the cost of doing business while they find ways to monetize their own original, copyrighted content. There are idealists and business people, and then there are artists who belong to what Lawrence Lessig calls a “remix culture,” who seek greater authority and more efficient tools to cut-up and otherwise transform the raw materials of our culture into new works.

The first day was a fascinating one, well programmed with back-to-back presentations, many of them nicely modest in length. (One great idea: “lightning rounds" in which presenters had about six minutes to get their thoughts out before turning the dais over to the next speaker.) Here are some quick notes on some of the talks I attended.

The day opened with a keynote by Yochai Benkler, Professor of Harvard Law School and Faculty Co-Director, Berkman Center for Internet and Society. He talked about distributed action and innovation being essential to both the development of businesses as well as a more participatory and democratic public sphere. “The rate of innovation and learning is the core competitive necessity” today, he said, observing that “the smartest, most creative people never work for the same companies. Open innovation platforms allow innovation to speed up.” Benkler’s talk was quite smart in acknowledging the trade-offs inherent in the embrace of open platforms. While he said that the diversity offered by open platforms and the resulting weakening of what he called proprietary regimes would ultimately lead to greater innovation and did not represent an “opposition between market and non-market” forces, his talk also seemed to acknowledge open platforms' disruptive effects on traditional content businesses like Hollywood film and the record industry. Rather than pretend that we are living through some kind of interregnum after which traditional content industries will flourish again, implicit in his argument was an acknowledgement that there's a trade-off happening that must be accepted because it will lead to the greater social good. The unleashing of human creativity through these collaborative systems “is at the expense of more structured production — it threatens 20th century models and their legal systems of control," he said.

Next I attended a seminar by Ross Harley, “From Open Circuits to Open Video,” in which he argued that the “radical challenges to television, art and culture made by video artists in the 1960s and '70s find their echo today in the principles of Open Source, Creative Commons, Open Content and other emerging principles of participatory culture.” Starting with quotes from Nam June Paik and moving on to a discussion of the online UbuWeb (“More than mere promotion of artists' work, it is a global distribution outlet that increases the value of the work,” he said), Harley’s argument was curiously framed. His premise wasn’t really debatable, but his conclusions, in which he circled back to argue that video artists can increase their audience by embracing the technological forces their creative ideologies presaged, seemed too simple for me. He quoted Lessig, saying, “The more you share something, the more valuable it becomes,” and while that dictum is indeed central to the thinking of many artists, there’s another group that believes differently. There wasn’t enough discussion of the role of scarcity in the creation of some video art’s value, the role of the viewing environment in constructing its meanings (most specifically with regards to site specific work and videos intended to be viewed in gallery environments), and the way in which a mode of distribution can form part of its actual content. Harley seized on the stated political ideology of a generation of video artists without really examining their social practices, in some cases ingrained Luddism, and, for some, their resistance to upending traditional support structures. On a more practical note, Harley advocated against YouTube and its corporate terms of use, saying “FLOSS platforms give artists more freedom” and “creators need to use the publishing services that work best for them.”

Next was a useful discussion of fair use as it applies to online video by Anthony Calzone, Fair Use Project at Stanford Law School, and Corynne McSherry of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Calzone pointed out that because of the 2 Live Crew court case, which employed a “parody” defense, too many people believe that a fair use defense is dependent on the creators' deployment of satire, parody, or cultural or political commentary. People forget that fair use applies when there’s been a creative or transformative use of the source material. “Fair use not limited to situations when you have something to say about the work,” he said. “You can say something else about the world around you even if you what you say is not that obvious." He also spoke about common misconceptions regarding the purpose of copyright law: “People think the purpose of copyright is to ensure authors get paid. That’s wrong. The point is to reward the authors so they create stuff. It’s an incentive. We like creativity, and the Supreme Court has said this again and again.”

McSherry began her remarks by noting the good news/bad news scenario of today’s user-generated video world: “The good news is we have the tools to use fair use. The bad news? It’s easy for our work to be taken down by others.” She pointed out that the Digital Millenium Copyright Act creates incentives for service providers to take work down but not incentives for them to consider creators' possible fair use defenses.

What can you do if your work is taken down? McSherry recommended considering the reasons why and then taking appropriate action:

1. How did it get taken down? By a filter? You can submit a dispute.

2. If it was for a Terms of Service violation, request a review.

3. DMCA takedown? Ask for copy of the notice and find out who’s complaining. Find out what are they complaining about? Consider filing a counternotice. McSherry said too few people file a counternotice. Also, consider a lawsuit under 17 U.S.C. 512(f) — suing for misrepresentation.

Next was Lizz Winstead, co-creator of The Daily Show and Shoot the Messenger. Because newspapers are folding and networks like MSNBC have no investigative journalism, using instead commentators from the traditional media, she predicted “that there will be an amazing opportunities for new media journalists to get on these shows.” Noting that she has a green screen in her house in order to make on-the-fly pieces, she also said, “Politics is personal, so get together with people you know” to make critical video work.

I attended a short press event in which reps from the Wikimedia Foundation, Mozilla, Kaltura and Blip.tv discussed the web’s gradual move towards Open Video. Erik Moeller from Wikimedia discussed Wikipedia’s upcoming inclusion of video content. “We hope to see new types of video content on Wikipedia,” he said. “No dogs on skateboards. We want to get into the same space as public television and educational video.” He also noted that upcoming browsers like Firefox 3.5 and Google Chrome are embracing Open Video standards. When asked what type of content Open Video will enable, Mozilla’s Chris Blizzard answered, "The killer app for Open Video will come once the environment is created. Mozilla won’t create it.” Ron Yekutiel, Chairman and CEO of Kaltura, discussed the needs other than just video publishing that users of open video standards will have. “Today video needs to be a custom process,” he said. “Controlling content, manipulating metadata, configuring playlists, doing different workflows, enabling users to upload content, adding advertising, syndication.” Kaltura is open source, giving away both its client side code but also its backend, but it’s still a commercial company, selling support, advice, and also itself as a service provider. “There is no dissonance between doing good and doing well,” he said.

After lunch was Matt Mason, author of The Pirate’s Dilemma (which can be downloaded from his website for a voluntary donation or else purchased in bookstores). Mason gave a great, focused talk in which he traced the creative work of cultural and business pirates ranging from the industrial innovators who ignored European intellectual property laws in order to jumpstart the 19th century American industrial economy to the pirate radio stations of the U.K. in the ‘60s, who served to introduce bands the mainstream stations were too conservative to play. For Mason, industries can innovate when they both compete against pirates but also find symbiotic ways to work with them — so-called “virtuous circles, where the pirate co-exists with the traditional entity.” “Pirates create problems but also solutions — they are some of the best innovators on the face of the earth,” he said. “One of the best ways to grow your business is to give pirates the space to do things you can’t do or don’t think of." He offered some ideas of things content creators can do to fight the pirates (“If pirates are giving something away for free, then you can beat them by selling something that can’t be copied,” and, “Give consumers more things to pay for, more options to monetize”). Along the way were interesting examples, like the story of a London designer who designed and sold his own unauthorized versions of Nike’s Air Force One sneakers, following which Nike released their own editions inspired by his and bought shares in his company. He also talked about a future in which 3D printers hooked up to the internet will allow everyday consumers to pirate copy physical goods. “You can either fight piracy, go after pirates with the law, but if the pirates are adding value to an ecosystem in way that you are not, you can’t fight them through the law,” he concluded. “You have to compete with piracy with a new model.”

In a lightning round, Tribeca’s Brian Newman gave a thumbnail history of the internet and suggested that we are entering what theorist Gregory Ulmer called “electracy” — a movement from written literacy to a facility with hypermedia and new media that will be as momentous a shift for the broader culture as the transition from the oral tradition to the written word was — before listing what he said were the roadblocks to electracy, which included “lack of vision” and “lack of sustainable and real business models.” “People like to talk about the old media as the dinosaurs,” he said. “I would argue they are vicious mean bloodsucking beasts fighting to maintain their way of life. They are coming up with business models to keep their interests in control. We need to come up with our business models. Not just ‘open, open, open,’ but new business models.”

Later or tomorrow... day two.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/20/2009 01:35:00 AM Comments (0)

Now in its 15th year, the Los Angeles Film Festival has grown quite a bit since its days sharing the 2nd floor of a Hollywood mall with a Crunch Gym and a Virgin Megastore. Now settled into its relatively new Westwood digs, flanked on all sides by an impressive array of theaters (the Majestic Crest, the Mann Village and Mann Festival, and the Regent, to name but a few), and boasting enough star-studded galas and red-carpet events to jazz up even the most Gawker-fueled Angeleno, the festival begins its newest edition tonight with the screening of the indie comedy Paper Man, starring Jeff Daniels as a creative writer caught between deadlines, middle-aged frustration, a wife’s expectations, and oh yes, a spandex-clad imaginary “super hero” who pops up now and again to offer advice.

If Paper Man finds the festival safely in Sundance-approved American indie-comedy mode, its Gala events promise a slightly more, well, Hollywood approach to cinema. The phrase “film festival” and “Michael Bay” are rarely seen in the same sentence together, but this year LAFF continues its partnership with the mega-millioned director by snagging the premiere of his newest popcorn-moving blockbuster, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Tuesday night’s Centerpiece Gala continues the summertime throwdown, with the world premiere of Michael Mann’s Public Enemies, starring Johnny Depp as gangster John Dillinger and Christian Bale as the FBI man hot on his trail.

There could easily be criticism levelled at the festival for the inclusion of such mega-watted works, who don’t exactly need a festival launching-pad to help either the films or their directors succeed. On the other hand, there’s no “Independent” in the Los Angeles Film Festival; just like Cannes, Toronto, Berlin and others, LAFF relies (or hopes to rely on) such higher-profiled works to bring out more audiences (and press), and hopefully triggering a spillover effect for other films. This year’s LAFF offers plenty of newer, more intriguing works as well, including the Narrative and Documentary Features Competitions, a spotlight on the innovative independent Mexican festival Ambulante (championed by Mexican stars Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna, both of whom will appear at the festival), and an extremely strong International Features line-up. The latter boasts the L.A. premieres of such acclaimed films as Claire Denis’ 35 Shots of Rum, Miguel Gomes’ road-trip ramble through the Portuguese countryside Our Beloved Month of August, Argentine director Martin Rejtman’s newest comedy Elementary Training for Actors (perfect for Hollywood audiences), and notorious Japanese political/pinku director Koji Wakamatsu’s United Red Army, which tracks the last days of a radical Japanese political group. The festival's spotlight on preservation works offers up a new print of Curtis Harrington’s Night Tide (preservation by the Academy Film Archive, The Film Foundation and Milestone Film & Video), an eerie psychological horror film set along the Santa Cruz boardwalk, with Dennis Hopper in his first starring role. There’s also a throwback to the L.A. of decades past, with a series of fabulous hot-rod movies, including the immortal Hot Rods to Hell.

Transformers, hot rods, Japanese political radicals, Mexican documentaries, Johnny Depp, and Gael García Bernal: Hollywood in the summer, indeed, and the LAFF for the next eleven days. We’ll be posting more as the festival continues. For more info, visit the festival's website at http://www.lafilmfest.com/2009/

# posted by Jason Sanders @ 6/18/2009 08:23:00 PM Comments (3)

It's June, so that means it's time for the Sundance Labs, where emerging writers, directors and composers hone their skills in preparation for their next films. This year, we'll be featuring a number of Lab participants blogging from the Sundance Institute, and to launch the series we're really happy to have actor and writer/director Keith Gordon (A Midnight Clear, Mother Night, Waking the Dead) conveying his experiences as an advisor to the Directing Fellows. In this first post, penned in the middle of his drive from L.A. to Utah, he writes about the reasons he goes back to Sundance year after year. Check back regularly this month for more reports.


I’m writing this from a Comfort Inn motel in St. George Utah. This will be my ninth or tenth summer at the lab (I can’t remember which!), and part of my personal tradition is driving from L.A. instead of flying. The road trip allows me to slow my brain, and shed my preoccupations with my own work. I love driving through the California desert, and southern Utah’s red rocks, before arriving at the verdant beauty of the northern Utah mountains where the Sundance lab takes place. I stop in St, George as a halfway point.

Before I heading up to the lab, I do my prep work; basically reading the eight scripts for the summer’s projects, and looking at the earlier short films or features made by the directors. I try to take careful notes on both; what I liked in the scripts and shorts, and what seem like potential problem areas. For example, if a script relies heavily on naturalistic acting, and the short is weak in that area, or just isn’t applicable, like a documentary, I make note to keep an eye on that area with that project.

Obviously I’ll personally respond to some scripts more than others, but I try hard to separate personal taste from recognizing the quality of the work. Sundance chooses very carefully from hundreds of submissions, so it’s very, very rare that I ever think a project is truly mediocre (maybe 2 or 3 out of the 80 or so I’ve been involved with).

And sometimes, delightfully, I get fooled. A script that didn’t grab me on the page, comes alive in a talented young director’s hands.

I look forward to being an advisor at the lab the way a kid looks forward to Christmas. It’s literally my favorite week of the year, For many reasons…

First, in working with these young, passionate filmmakers, (called ‘fellows’ at Sundance) I’m reminded of why I want to make movies myself. Their lack of cynicism, and their focus on the art of film, not the business, helps me regain my own sense of perspective and priorities.

There’s also the joy of mentoring talented people in something you both love. Being able to share your knowledge and experience with the next generation is a wonderful, fun and challenging way to give back, I only got to be a director because others were kind enough to help me learn and grow, I feel a need to pass that tradition on.

Also, as I often say only half jokingly, I learn more than I teach, Watching and listening to the other advisors – some of the world’s best actors, writers, directors, editors and cinematographers – as they work with these young filmmakers is an incredible experience for me as well. If a young filmmaker wants to hear what Ed Harris has to say about rehearsing a scene, or Bob Elswit about how to shoot it, well so do I!

Besides, the people who run and work at the lab, and the other advisors are some of the nicest, kindest, most interesting people you could hope to meet and spend time with.

All this in a spectacular mountain setting of breathtaking beauty. Man, I’d do this as a full time gig, if I could.

Basically, as advisors, we work with the fellows as they rehearse, shoot, and edit a few scenes from their feature projects. The scenes are done in a rudimentary way, shot on video, with modular, theatrical sets so the focus doesn’t become on trying to produce something ‘slick’. We then screen the scenes and give criticism and feedback. We’re always trying to walk that fine line of giving advice and sometimes actively challenging how the fellows are working, without taking over their scenes, or not letting them follow their own vision, and make their own mistakes.

Indeed, failure is an important part of the Sundance process. As Gyula Gazdag, the lab’s kind, wise Zen master of an artistic director often points out, the fellows often learn more from scenes that don’t work than those that do. And failure is protected. The scenes shot here kept from public view, so the fellows will be willing to work outside their comfort zones, stretch themselves, and experiment with new ways of dealing with actors, script, camera, and editing. Every filmmaker here is talented. But letting them just show off what they already know how to do would be pointless. So we push them to the areas that scare them, to the places in the process that are the least comfortable for them.

It’s very different what works best with each filmmaker, and it often evolves as the lab goes on. Some need a very gentle hand, some thrive with more active collaboration, and some need a tough, almost confrontational approach to get them out of ruts or pre-conceived ideas.

Part of the genius of Michelle Satter who runs the lab, is the range of personalities she carefully pieces together in the groups of advisors. There are nurturers, and more tough minded advisors, good cops and bad cops, and everything in between, and Michelle and Gyula are always acutely aware of what each fellow needs, and tries to make sure they get time with the advisors that will best fit their challenges,

There are advisors from across the spectrum of creative movie jobs, so a young filmmaker who has a lot of confidence with the camera, but less with cast might tend to get more advisor time with actor advisors, or directors. A fellow who’s very comfortable working with their actors, but less sure of how to use the camera to tell their story might get more time with cinematographer and editor advisors. And this keeps changing throughout the lab, depending on what each filmmaker is grappling with.

Every morning the advisors meet, and we report what we’re seeing with each filmmaker; their struggles and their triumphs, where they’re making progress and where they’re stuck. Although I imagine some of the filmmakers are paranoid about these sessions, thinking we’re sitting around gossiping and bitching about them, it’s just the opposite, The empathy factor here is huge,; we always speak with care and understanding about what we see them going through. Because we’ve all been through these kinds of artistic struggles ourselves.

Based on this discussion, Gyula and Michelle will suggest which advisors might be most helpful to each filmmaker that day, and we divvy up who will go spend time with director A in rehearsal, director B who’s shooting, and director C in the editing room. We also chime in if there’s someone who’s problems we feel we have an understanding of, and would like to try and help.

Usually the day is designed so we spend a good part of the day with one filmmaker. This includes a lunch meeting, away from the time pressures of shooting or rehearsal, where we can privately discuss what we’re observing. Then we usually move onto another filmmaker the next day, so no filmmaker gets overloaded with one point of view,

One of the great beauties of the lab is the diversity of voices and opinions the filmmakers will hear, Sometimes it can be maddening for them, since they get so much advice, some of it contradictory. But that encourages them to develop their own sense of truth, to learn to listen for what speaks to, and works for them. It also makes it clear that the advisors have no monopoly on truth, just informed opinions.

For that same reason, there are whole different teams of advisors each week. As one group leaves on Sunday, the next group arrives. So there is really a whirlwind of input. But, Michelle and Gyula are there to provide continuity, and to fill in the incoming advisors on where each of the fellows are at.

In the evenings there’s a communal dinner in a big tent (all meals are group meals, adding to the world’s-greatest-summer-camp-for filmmakers’ feel. Then the day ends with either the screening of one of the advisor’s films, followed by a Q+A, or the reading of one of the screenplays being worked on, giving the film makers (and the rest of us) the chance to hear the projects in a complete way. They’re full long exhausting, rewarding days. We start with breakfast at 8:00 and I usually don’t get back to the little condo I’m staying in until 10 or 11 pm.

This only gives a basic feel of how the whole dance that is Sundance works. I could probably write a book about it all. There’s a magic to it that’s hard to define. But there’s a reason so many of us come back year after year for a chance to be part of a truly pure, creative, and kind artistic process. — Keith Gordon

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/17/2009 03:19:00 PM Comments (5)

The sublime--and creatively slimy--excesses of Japanese provocateur Sion Sono’s Love Exposure (pictured), a logic-defying battleground between spirit and flesh, sainthood and transgression, introduce us to what some consider de rigueur for inclusion in the New York Asian Film Festival (June 19-July 5), brought to you for the seventh year by the high-energy boys from Subway Cinema. (Most play the IFC Center, some, the Japan Society; www.subwaycinema.com for more information.) The NYAFF celebrates pop culture, youth, iconoclasm.

The hype, as well as the showmanship behind the scenes and in front of the screen, highlight a camp-cum-hip fun-athon of films from Asia that frequently tickle our funny bones. “Asian films are go!!!” has been their motto since they started at Anthology Film Archives, one of the only events in this town that could get my bony tuchus on chairs that could double as waterboarding. And yet…there’s Hajimi Kasoi’s Vacation, also from Japan, which is as meticulously sober and introverted as Love Exposure is beyond the pale. Not all of the festival’s 50 features (plus shorts) can be squeezed snugly into the category of over-the-top. Grady Hendrix, he of the notorious pink jacket, may warm his audience up at the IFC Center with raffles, giveaways, and other high-spirited audience manipulation tactics, but a number of the movies are serious enough to move the feeling in another direction. (He is one of four directors of Subway Cinema, the others being Marc Walkow, Goran Topalovic, and Dan Craft.)

Vacation is austere, unfussy, precise, as spiritual in a Bressonian small-details way as Love Exposure is in a baroque Catholic fashion. A soft-spoken death-row guard, engaged to be married to a young single mother, is conflicted over whether to accept the “unclean” task of catching and holding an inmate’s legs after his execution by hanging—the convict was his friend—in exchange for a week’s holiday for a honeymoon.

The films—and almost all, being products of Asian culture, involve powerful familial affinities—are mostly unknown here. Only a few are curated from the droppings of other festivals and exhibitions, making this one of the best, and certainly most original, film events in the area. The New York Film Festival shows validated fossils, New Directors/New Films ransacks Sundance, Tribeca seems to program by drawing straws. The NYAFF should be on the tip of every cinephile’s tongue. The best of the fest comes from Japan, with Korea in second place, but there are also new works from Hong Kong to Malaysia, Indonesia to Thailand. Asian films are Go!!, indeed.

Love Exposure is four divine hours of startling direction. A young man (the phenomenal Takahiro Nishijima, as gorgeous as he is agile) sins in order to satisfy the confessional needs of his insatiable priest father, even embarking on a career as a clandestine Peek-a-Panty photographer, yet never forgetting his vow to save himself for his “Maria,” inspired by feverish visions of his beloved dying mother and a statue of the Blessed Virgin. His father’s stepdaughter fits the bill, but she is programmed by an aberrant Christian cult to give up her will. In the meantime, he tries to control the boners he gets only in her company, with the zealots threatening to cut off his offending member. This will never play on the Hallmark Channel.

Vacation is more, shall we say, manly, a story of male loyalty and codes of conduct in an institutional setting. Here it is a prison, but it could just as well be a military installation or a private sports club. When can men show affection to one another, let down their guard? What is worth more, male bonding or a tight relationship with wife and kids? Would you give up one for the other? This is rewarding slow roast, for the gourmet.

The third excellent Japanese film, All Around Us, by Ryosuke Yashiguchi (Like Grains of Sand), is a study of a young couple struggling to make a go of it, especially after the death of their infant daughter. There is little clutter, only the profound observation of a passive court illustrator and the controlling artist wife who keeps heading toward the edge of sanity. On a whole other plane is the fascinating if necessarily revolting Children of the Dark, by Junji Sakamoto. Set mostly in Thailand, it follows a journalist investigating illegal organ purchases that save rich Japanese kids but leave Thai urchins and child prostitutes without hearts. He and some activist women forge the connection between the plentiful children’s brothels in Bangkok and the trade in body parts. This is not a great film but an admirably courageous one, not only in topic but in the choice of harrowing on-screen images of prepubescent boys and girls just before and after sex or, alive and covered with AIDS lesions, dumped in garbage bags.

It’s very strange that in the esteemed Korean director Kim Ki-Duk’s Dream, a famous Japanese actor speaks his own language while the rest of the cast speaks only Korean. Asian star system and/or economic considerations? I like the film, which blurs the distinction between dream and reality but not for one person: the protagonist’s dreams become the sleepwalking lead actress’s reality. The fellow, Jin (Japanese superstar Joe Odagiri), generates dreams that he believes are real, like witnessing a late-night car crash, but in fact he sleeps through them. She, Ran (Lee Na-Young), awakes and lives them out, but doesn’t remember anything afterward. Both are in turmoil over their most recent relationships, and their actions toward their exes are inconsistent with what they verbalize. The mind does work in wondrous ways; repression is one of our most powerful guiding forces.

You can’t get less oneiric than the potent, relentlessly gritty, and ultraviolent Korean film Breathless, directed by and starring Yang Ik-june. Yang’s gangster Song-Hoon is irredeemably addicted to violence, some stemming from childhood trauma—he hates his father, who killed his mother—but much of it is a matter of choice. He meets high-school girl Yeon-hee (Kim Khonni), another fearless victim of a dysfunctional, aggressive household, and the two loners find comfort in each other’s presence. Her brother, an aspiring thug himself, treats her poorly; their dad is bonkers after a stint in Vietnam. The narrative is symmetrical. Song-Hoon has a sister, a single mom, with whom he has the opportunity of maintaining some semblance of a family unit. Tragic hero Song-Hoon is too rough and tarnished to survive, but he does plant the seeds of a reinvented family among those who remain behind, including his newly reformed underworld boss, now a barbecue restaurateur.

How weird is that? But then, Asian films are Go!!

# posted by Howard Feinstein @ 6/17/2009 02:01:00 PM Comments (0)

In the upcoming issue of Filmmaker, Howard Feinstein covers the Cannes Film Festival and has high praise for Bahman Ghobadi's No One Knows About Persian Cats (pictured), which played in the Un Certain Regard section. He calls the film, which is about two musicians trying to form a band after being released from prison, "a love/hate letter to Tehran itself." Ghobadi, who now lives in Berlin, has recently seen his fiance, journalist Roxana Saberi jailed (she was recently released) and he himself was imprisoned for a week when he returned to the country recently to visit his mother. He speaks to Allison Benedikt in the Village Voice about his country and the disputed election.

An excerpt:

When you were making the film, did you get a sense that young people in Tehran were ready to burst?

I had a feeling that things were about to happen. They were so tense, they were so agitated, in a revolting state of mind. I wanted to use the film to scream against the situation, scream like all the members of the bands I worked with. I wanted to scream along with them, making this film as a statement against the brutal situation we were all under.

And now?

I haven't seen anything like this in 30 years. I believe there was mishandling of the vote, without a doubt. I'm perplexed that no country has taken a firm position, publicly denouncing the voting irregularities. According to the laws and principles of the nations around the world, it is the duty of the governments to serve the people and now it is completely the other way around.

What we've seen on television in the last two or three days, I have never seen anything like it. This shows the weakness of the government. This shows how fearful the government actually is. How terrible a big lie has been told to the people. If the government wasn't afraid, they would have complied with the wishes of the people and at least let people count the vote. It is now clear for the people of Iran that the government is not as tough as it wants to seem. It is not. Now the people are convinced of that, and now they want to take it back, to take the power into their own hands.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/16/2009 12:55:00 PM Comments (0)

Since you've already read Scott Macauley's fascinating interview with The Windmill Movie's Alex Olch in the Spring issue, you will definitely not want to miss the hilarious, genuine and provocative documentary-within-a-documentary premiering at Film Forum on Wednesday. Special Q & A's with Olch, Bob Balaban, Wallace Shawn & Susan Meiselas will follow several of the screenings. It's worth it simply for the knock-out technicolor shots of high-society bottoms on the 1980's Montauk beach, let alone the Big Ideas and Small Moments that comprise Olch's quest to honor his teacher's memory.

The Film Society of Lincoln Center, in anticipation of the film's release, is also showing a retrospective on Rogers' life this week: REMEMBERING DICK ROGERS – A rare look at three documentary masterworks. The films are each under 30 minutes and illustrate the work of a true "filmmaker's filmmaker," a man to-the-manner-born whose fraught relationship with his own success didn't stop him from finishing these gems, luckily: Elephants: Fragments of an Argument (1973), Moving Pictures: The Art of Jan Lenica (1975), an 226-1690 (1984).

# posted by Alicia Van Couvering @ 6/15/2009 06:17:00 PM Comments (0)

Filmmaker James Longley (the excellent Iraq in Fragments) is in Iran working on his new documentary film, which includes coverage of the current disputed election. He's been blogging at Doug Block's D-Word doc forum, and over the weekend posted an amazing series of bulletins about the election, which include his thoughts on what it means for Iranian politics and then a gripping description of his being detained while his translator was beaten. A.J. Schnack has collected these posts in a single blog entry here.

From one of the earlier posts:

If this outcome is allowed to stand, we now have a situation where tens of millions of Iranians will be going through the next four years believing that the president was installed by force in a coup de etat, whereas in the past there was merely a sensation of creeping, teeth-grinding dissatisfaction with the antics of those in power. The difference may seem academic, but it is fundamental. In history, Iranians have always eventually brought down governments which were regarded as not respecting the will and needs of the people to an unbearable degree. But only time will tell what the real consequences of all of this are.

From the later section describing their being apprehended:

As we reached the Ministry of Interior building they separated us and dragged my translator by his arms across the floor and down a flight of stairs; he eventually regained his footing on the second two flights of stairs leading downward to the holding cell, where about twenty people who had already been grabbed off the streets were kneeling on the floor in the darkened room with their hands tied behind their backs.

All during this process my translator was being kicked and sworn at. The police told him how they "would put their dicks in his ass" and how "your mother/sister is a whore" and so on. At one point he was beaten with a belt buckle. At another moment, they beat him with a police truncheon across his back, leaving a nasty welt.

My translator kept on insisting that he was an officially authorized translator working with an American journalist – which is perfectly true.

At this time I was above ground, in the entrance to the ministry, yelling over and over at the police to "Bring me my translator!" It was clear that they didn't intend to beat me – although they may have wanted to – because I was a foreigner.

After a few minutes they relented and sent someone off to retrieve my translator from their holding cell, three floors down in the Ministry of Interior building.

They came into the holding cell and shouted "Where is the translator?!" and then, when he identified himself, they beat him again for "not telling them he was a translator."

An English-speaking riot policeman tried to sweet-talk me, saying that in a riot situation anything can happen. I might have taken him more seriously had a riot actually been taking place when we were arrested. He also asked my translator to convince me not to report what had happened.

The complete posts can be found at the link. (Hat tip: Spout Blog.)

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/15/2009 06:13:00 PM Comments (0)

When we last checked in with producer and director Tommy Pallotta, he was talking about distributing his latest documentary, American Prince, through BitTorrent for free download by filesharers... but he hadn't done it yet. Now he has. You can download the torrent uploaded by the filmmaker himself here at Mininova. And here's the description on the page:

In 1978, director Martin Scorsese turned his camera on his friend and roommate, Steven Prince, with his lost documentary American Boy. Best known for his role as the gun salesman in Taxi Driver, Prince was a true-life raconteur, actor, ex-drug addict, and road manager for Neil Diamond. To Scorsese, Steven's life was more fascinating than what any screenwriter could dream up, it had to be captured in celluloid. To Tarantino, one of the most memorable scenes in film history is an homage that actually happened to Prince in real life. Three decades later, filmmaker Tommy Pallotta draws out Steven Prince to recount his days since American Boy and to compose the next chapter of his story.

Pallotta has also given an interview to TorrentFreak in which he discusses his love of BitTorrent and his reasons for uploading his movie:

TF: Why did you decide to release American Prince for free on BitTorrent and what do you expect from it?

Tommy: Scorsese’s American Boy has been and is still generally unavailable for over 30 years, yet so many filmmakers have been influenced by it. The way we saw it is through multi-generational VHS tapes. Now with BitTorrent, there is a whole new audience and generation ready to be influenced by that film and I hope mine. Steven Prince is a gold mine of future cinema scenes and I hope a whole new generation of filmmakers will understand how he has influenced American cinema. My biggest expectation is that the most people possible will watch my film! Also, I would really like to encourage people to talk about the film, with each other as well as on the Internet. It would make me happy to see Wikipedia entries and IMDB boards as well as Internet sites. I would love for people to get together and have screenings of it with their friends, or for universities to suggest to their class for the students to watch it. I look at American Prince as the film school I never had, what I always imagined film school to be.

TF: Do you think that the Internet and file-sharing technology will play an important role in shaping the future of film distribution?

Tommy: I absolutely believe how we watch and share movies will shape the future of film distribution. I believe it will have such a profound influence that it will even change how movies are made. I think it is a win-win for the filmmakers and the viewers. Filmmakers will have a more direct reach with audience and viewers have more to choose from. I wanted to release this film in support of file sharing and to prove to myself and others that it can have a profoundly positive effect.

Related: Tommy Pallotta on leaving Facebook.

# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 6/15/2009 03:56:00 PM Comments (1)

Head over to Festival Ambassador to see Mike Jones's coverage of the festival (part 1, part 2 & part 3), which wrapped over the weekend with Kyle Patrick Alvarez’s Easier With Practice winning the Grand Prize of $10,000.

Other winners include:
Best Documentary: Douglas Tirola’s All In: The Poker Movie
Best Short: Destin Daniel’s Short Term 12
Special Grand Jury Prize for Directing: Justin Nowell’s Acting for the Camera
Special Documentary Jury Prize for Artistic Vision: Jessica Oreck's Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
Robert Saitzyk (director) and Cory Knauf and Joseph McKelheer (screenwriters) Exceptional Artistic Achievement Award for Godspeed
Filmmaker to Watch Award: Jeff Mizushima's Etienne!

# posted by Jason Guerrasio @ 6/15/2009 11:48:00 AM Comments (0)