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IN HOMES FOR THE HOLIDAYS
At Filmmaker we're always interested in alternative forms of distribution, so we took note of the unusual "window-busting" release plans for Noel, Chazz Palminteri's directorial debut which premiered in September at the Toronto Film Festival. The sentimental holiday film which stars Susan Sarandon, Paul Walker and Penelope Cruz will premiere in theaters November 12 via The Convex Group, a new company headed by WebMD founder Jeff Arnold. Then, on Sunday, November 28 Noel will screen once on the TNT network. That day, the film will also become available to Amazon.com customers as $4.99 Flexplay DVDs, disks which erase themselves 48 hours after they are removed from their containers. The film will also be marketed using Lidrocks -- CDs containing movie trailers that are affixed to the lids of Cokes bought at movie theaters. Both Lidrocks and Flexplay are products owned and/or controlled by Convex, which describes itself as "a media and entertainment company that acquires and integrates unique assets to create new media networks."
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/5/2004 11:42:19 PM Comments (0)
One of the problems independent filmmakers have faced in the last decade has been the studio's co-option of the specialty film genre. Acquistions have dropped as the mini-majors have set out to make, with bigger budgets, better production values, and real stars, the kinds of quirky character-based stories that in the '80s and '90s were largely the province of independent filmmakers.
A particularly cruel example of this trend was driven home by a press release, excerpted below, I received from CineKink, an organization devoted to "the recognition and encouragement of kink-positive depictions in film and television." In order, I guess, to snag some mainstream column ink for its annual CineKink festival, the customary "awards wrap-up" release headlines not some of the genuinely kinky winners -- like Napoleon Lake's short Alice in Footland which received an honorable mention in the Audience Choice category -- but rather a studio release, Warner Independent's At Home at the End of the World, which received a Special Tribute Award for "its presentation of a polyamorous relationship and its positive portrayal of family and commitment outside of traditional monogamy." Runner's-up included HBO's Six Feet Under, Comedy Central's The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and Fox's Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story.
With the Hollywood ass-kissing out of the way, here then is the rest of the press release listing CineKink NYC's more authentically pervy winners:
"A selection of CineKink NYC audience choice and festival awards were also
announced at the ceremony, presented to filmmakers whose works appeared in
the festival in a variety of categories:
CineKink Choice - AUDIENCE CHOICE AWARDS
AUDIENCE CHOICE AWARD FOR BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE:
Born in a Barn (Elizabeth Elson, 2004, USA, 53 minutes), an intimate and
sometimes humorous look into the erotic lives of four seemingly ordinary
people and the fast-growing fetish world of ponyplay.
AUDIENCE CHOICE AWARD FOR BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE:
Slaves (Ich Bin Niemand, 2003, USA, 101 minutes) a graphic,
documentary-style profile of artist R.C. Horsch and his sadomasochistic
relationships with several different women.
AUDIENCE CHOICE AWARD - HONORABLE MENTION:
Alice in Footland (Napoleon Lake, 2004, USA, 59 minutes) follows Alice's
visit to an fetish wonderland and a new interpretation of the old classic.
CineKink Best - FESTIVAL AWARD FOR BEST SHORTS
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT:
Liberty in Restraint (Michael Ney, 2004, Australia, 35 minutes) follows
fetish photographer, Noel Graydon, showing his work in progress, a passion
for his art and its themes, and the transgressive activities of the
community he moves within.
BEST EXPERIMENTAL SHORT
Haircut (Bryan Jackson, 2004, USA, 8 minutes) depicts the close-up results
of a routine haircut taken to extreme.
BEST ANIMATION SHORT:
Dream Human (tsubasa, 2003, USA, 5 minutes) details the mechanistic
creation of a perfect erotic vision.
BEST MUSIC VIDEO:
Spanky! Spanky! (DJ Spot, 2002, USA, 3 minutes) features the original perv
pop stars, Dick-n-jayne, with an ode to spanky! spanky!
HONORABLE BEST MENTION:
I Sit on Acid (Ryan J. Wolowski, USA, 3 minutes) uses a self-held camera
to explore imagery, body, sexuality and self.
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/5/2004 11:04:15 PM Comments (0)
If you work in the film industry, there's a point every year in which you scan through your Palm Pilot or Treo or old-fashioned rolodex and realize that so many of your colleagues have left the business. Some of them you know their whereabouts; you've gotten a cheery card announcing their latest endeavors. But so many others just fade away.
Someone who hasn't faded away is former Time Warner chief Gerald Levin according to Maria Bartiromo, whose "Closing Bell" piece on Levin and his new venture I caught while channel surfing today.
Several years after the murder of his son, his divorce, and his departure from AOL/Time Warner, where he engineered the unhappy merger between the two companies, Levin has, with his ex-CAA agent fiance Laurie Perlman, opened the Moonview Sanctuary. Described by Fortune magazine as an "ultra-chic mental health clinic for high-profile millionaires," the center, as seen on CNBC, is a modish blend of New Age stylings and boutique-hotel creature comforts -- Bali by way of Brentwood. With Levin living testimony to Perlman's therapeutic skills, the center's programs are designed for stressed-out individuals with high profiles in the mass media who are experiencing life crises.
Writes Fortune's Barney Gimbel, "Perlman dreamed up Moonview some six years ago as a place where celebrities could receive treatment by people who understand the unique stresses brought on by being in the public eye.... Moonview's highly personalized approach allows clients 'to explore and begin to resolve core issues on a deeper level.' There's even a special treatment program for families of celebrities on trial (perfect for the families of Kobe Bryant or Martha Stewart, says Perlman). The 30-room facility is nonresidential: Clients stay at home or in a nearby hotel, and after their treatment return for three two-day follow-ups."
Moonview's programs include "everything from traditional psychoanalysis to acupuncture, neurofeedback and even sex therapy." The cost to join Moonview -- "a sanctuary of calm and order in a world of chaos, pressure and fear?" $175,000 a year.
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/5/2004 06:02:16 PM Comments (0)
According to SFGate.com, "The manager of the Castro Theatre quit Tuesday -- the latest of several staffing shake-ups to cause concern about the future of the venerable movie palace, mecca to film lovers in the Bay Area.
"Stacey Wisnia, who has managed the Castro for more than four years and worked there for eight, said she resigned in part to protest the abrupt firing last week of the theater's long-time programmer, Anita Monga."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/5/2004 11:20:18 AM Comments (0)
Rodney Evans's Brother to Brother, which won a Special Dramatic Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, opens at Cinema Village in NYC today. The film will open in San Francisco and Berkeley Nov. 19, and roll out through the rest of the country in December and January.The film's star, Anthony Mackie, nominated for a 2004 IFP Gotham Award for Breakthrough Actor, recently starred in Spike Lee's She Hate Me and Sucker Free City, and was featured in Jonathan Demme's The Manchurian Candidate. He is currently filming Clint Eastwood's Rope Burns, playing a major role opposite Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman.
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/5/2004 10:55:47 AM Comments (0)
Variety has launched a job board -- and it's free. Click here to begin your job search.
At the site you can upload your resume and apply to jobs at top media and entertainment companies. Over 5,000 media and entertainment jobs across the US and abroad are currently listed.
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/5/2004 10:20:12 AM Comments (0)
VAN GOGH MURDER, PART TWO
The latest news reports say Dutch police have apprehended eight more suspects as conspirators in the murder of Dutch director Theo Van Gogh (see our blog below) and also report that the alleged shooter was captured carrying a letter calling for a Holy Jihad. For those who want to see what the fuss is all about, our friends at Greg.org have posted this link to the Dutch broadcaster VPRO's site, where you can watch a few minutes of Submission, the "anti-Islam" film that provoked the Islamic community's outcry against Van Gogh.# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/4/2004 01:12:32 AM Comments (0)
WALKER WALKS... TO CAA
Via Variety comes this (subscription-only) news that agent Bart Walker has left ICM for CAA. Based in New York, Walker has for years at ICM repped high-profile independent auteurs like Jim Jarmusch, Julian Schnabel and John Turturro. In addition to negotiating director deals, he usually works actively to arrange financing for his clients' pics by combining foreign distribution and presale monies with domestic partners. Recently, Walker worked to put together the financing for Sofia Coppola's The Virgin Suicides in a manner that allowed the filmmaker to retain the film's copyright.
Directors who will travel with Walker to CAA include all those listed above plus Tamara Jenkins, Mira Nair, Thomas Vinterberg and Steve Shainberg. Walker will stay in New York and his move to CAA reps a dedicated expansion of their New York office in the Flatiron Building.
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/3/2004 11:50:41 AM Comments (1)
DUTCH DIRECTOR MURDERED
Prolific Dutch director Theo Van Gogh, known in America for the release of his 1994 phone-sex drama 06 under the title 1-900, was killed earlier today in Amsterdam. He had been receiving death threats following the television screening of his latest short film, Submission, a drama about a Muslim woman coerced into a violent marriage, raped by a relative, and then brutally punished for her adultery. The film was co-written by a Dutch right-wing politician who renounced her Muslim faith and now is a critic of the religion.
The film enraged Muslim groups after its airing and the filmmaker has been under police protection. A 26-year-old man of Dutch-Moroccan nationality has been arrested for the crime. According to witnesses, the man rode up to Van Gogh's car on a bicycle, shot the director as he exited the car, and the waited by the body to make sure he was dead. He then fled to a park where he was apprehended.
According to the Associated Press article linked to above, Van Gogh shrugged off the death threats on a recent radio interview, calling the movie "the best protection I could have."
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/2/2004 01:28:51 PM Comments (1)
As reported on indieWIRE today: "A battle has been raging in San Francisco over Proposition L, a measure on the ballot today that could give more than $10 million in city funds to a new non-profit group aimed at bolstering local single-screen movie theaters. If passed... the proposition would take 15 percent of the money raised by a local hotel tax, about $10.5 million a year, and give it to Save Our Theaters, a new private, non-profit group, for the purposes of supporting a number of single-screen theaters and also promoting local filmmaking."
So why are so many San Francisco-based arts groups, actors and filmmakers against it?
According to the San Francisco Film Society Web site: "Unfortunately, Proposition L is a simplistic scheme that would put millions of taxpayer dollars in the hands of a group that has no staff, no office and no record of operating theaters. Save Our Theaters represents neither the local film community nor the neighborhoods affected by theater closures. Their campaign has already done a disservice by spreading the misinformation that the Castro Theatre and the Balboa Theatre are in imminent danger of closing, which is not true. The passage of Proposition L can only result in an embarassing fiasco."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/2/2004 11:00:59 AM Comments (0)
BREAK ON THROUGH
The IFP/New York announced the nominees for two of its competitive sections of its newly retooled Gotham Awards, to be held December 1 and broadcast live by the IFC. Below are the Breakthrough Actor and Director nominees.
Breakthrough Actor Award Nominees:
Mos Def for The Woodsman (Newmarket Films)
Anthony Mackie for Brother to Brother (Wolfe)
Catalina Sandino Moreno for Maria Full of Grace (HBO Films & Fine Line Features)
Dallas Roberts for A Home At the End of the World (Warner Independent Pictures)
Ensemble cast of Everyday People (HBO)
Breakthrough Director Award Nominees:
Rodney Evans, Writer/Director/Producer for Brother to Brother (Wolfe)
Debra Granik, Writer/Director for Down to the Bone
Nicole Kassell, Writer/Director for The Woodsman (Newmarket Films)
Joshua Marston, Writer/Director for Maria Full of Grace (HBO Films & Fine Line Features)
Lori Silverbush, Writer/Director & Michael Skolnik, Director for On The Outs
# posted by Scott Macaulay @ 11/1/2004 11:58:31 PM Comments (0)
The Women's Film Preservation Fund of New York Women in Film & Television is again seeking proposals for the funding of restoration and/or preservation of American films in which women have had significant creative positions. Individuals and not-for-profit organizations are eligible to apply for grants of up to $10,000. Deadline: December 15, 2004.
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/1/2004 03:38:12 PM Comments (0)
The latest film by 23-year-old wunderkind Cam Archer, American Fame, Pt. 1: Drowning River Phoenix, narrated by Lydia Lunch and featuring 15-year-old Jasper Bel as River Phoenix, screens at the AFI Fest on November 10 and 13. Archer recently completed American Fame, Pt. 2: Forgetting Jonathan Brandis about the former child star who committed suicide in 2003, but so far there is no word on when or where the film, also narrated by Lydia Lunch, will premiere.
Earlier this year Archer completed Godly Boyish, a short film narrated by Joan Jett and featuring Jasper Bel and 14-year-old Cassidy Field; The Cold Ones about a sister and brother coping with their father's murder and their mother's abandonment of the family; and a music video for Imperial Teen's "Our Time".
His debut feature script Wild Tigers I Have Known, which Gus Van Sant is exec producing and Linda Barry is producing, was included in the 2004 IFP Market. Archer's bobbycrush, featuring Jasper Bel and Cassidy Field, was nominated for a Student Academy Award and screened earlier this summer on the Sundance Channel.
Each of Archer's films were shot by cinematographer Aaron Platt.
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 11/1/2004 01:10:24 PM Comments (1)
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