tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-70564537325625010482010-03-16T19:00:37.229-04:00Webmasterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03643468321632241172noreply@blogger.comBlogger104125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-25070372852684861762009-12-31T12:13:00.008-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.869-05:00

To try to recall your favorite films from an entire decade (and then to limit them to only ten titles) is to immediately set yourself up for uncertainty and ridicule: first off because it's hard enough to remember what you saw ten days ago, much less ten years ago, and secondly because to limit the list to ten is to leave hundreds of excellent films out, titles that you'll undoubtedly get

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-35744846008939147562009-12-30T16:27:00.004-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.869-05:00

It was the aughts, and I went to (and made a few) movies. I did it mostly for pleasure, sometimes for distraction, often to see what others thought of the wild world around us; by the end, I did it simply because it was the only way I saw fit to make a living (sort of). It was a bell curve of sorts, a graph of this burgeoning obsession, this ecstatic object of study, of debate, of joy. By the

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-76172071634009491382009-11-17T22:13:00.004-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.870-05:00

I'm at the Edinburgh Film Festival, jetlagged bad, and I'm asked for emerging filmmaker advice by some kid. He says, in particular, he wants to know about making art films and being a writer/director. Oh boy. I try to find something to say, but it's disingenuous and the kid knows it. I go back to the hotel room and roll around in the bed, can't sleep. The only thing on the T.V. is Michael

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-12104914492621895772009-11-13T18:11:00.007-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.870-05:00

When I attended the Future of Music Conference this year I heard a lot of talk about all of the opportunities that exist today for indie musicians to create and distribute their products via digital media on the web. Later, at the Flyway Film Festival I heard former Tribeca CEO Brian Newman speak on similar topics in relation to indie filmmakers. The central theme to all of it is that indie

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-86204995246752719212009-10-27T22:06:00.000-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.870-05:00

Aw man, I am thinking. Last Thursday’s New York Times is up on my computer screen and I’m looking at the virtual front page, just below what would be the fold. The headline: INDEPENDENT FILMMAKERS DISTRIBUTE ON THEIR OWN. It’s turf I’ve become increasingly familiar with in the last couple of months since I started plotting a DIY course for my documentary Strongman and I dig in to the article.

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-86308205410375071372009-10-26T08:02:00.004-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.871-05:00

Here's Part 2 of Jamie Stuart's look at Apple's new Final Cut Studio, which he used to make his short film, Isn't She?.... Read Part 1 of Stuart's review in the Fall issue. A week before I was set to resume shooting Isn't She?..., I installed Apple's new OS Snow Leopard. I proceeded to spend the entire week flipping out, losing hair, sending dozens of freaked out e-mails to Apple. The cause

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-21063999506958357992009-10-18T00:45:00.001-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.872-05:00

For the past three years, we’ve been pursuing a noble goal: to try to talk about movies and meaning in a way that might interest someone other than ourselves. We do this over at The Film Talk, and want our work to be an ongoing conversation about the movies and how they intersect with our lives. You’re welcome to join the conversation. Sometimes it’s difficult enough for us to interest each

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-20810793390188241052009-10-08T00:01:00.001-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.873-05:00

Susan Seidelman's landmark 1982 debut feature, Smithereens, recently made its Cable VOD debut on Cinetic's FilmBuff channel. It will soon be made available on iTunes, Amazon VOD, and more. Seidelman reflects on the origins of her Manhattan indie classic as it finds new audiences today. I moved to New York City in the mid 1970s, to go to NYU film school. At that time the grad school was housed in

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-37101598899120037752009-10-04T20:01:00.008-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.873-05:00

Filmmaker, critic and Filmmaker magazine writer Shari Roman died in Manhattan on Wednesday, September 9. The following is a reprint of the last piece that Shari wrote for us, published in Summer, 2007. In the piece she surveys a number of young visual artists using film and film installation as a medium. For more on Shari and her life and work, visit the blog post on her passing.When Matthew

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-85542583481660296602009-09-19T17:39:00.003-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.873-05:00

Sometimes people ask me how I went from living in Los Angeles, writing a studio film like 40 Days & 40 Nights, to living in Minneapolis, directing an independent comedy like nobody. It’s a fair question but it seems there’s a subtext here, too. Many people think independent film is a step down from the studio system. And I’m sure it is — for some people. But let’s go back. 40 Days & 40 Nights is

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-60562054598522294532009-09-03T21:35:00.006-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.873-05:00

In A Dog Year, the feature film directed by George LaVoo from Jon Katz's memoir, Jeff Bridges plays Katz, a midlife crisis-stricken writer who, impulsively and in an act of near-deliberate emotional self-destruction, adopts a rambunctious and unsocialized border collie, flying him cross country to his family's split-level home and their two other dogs. And while Lavoo's movie has its share of

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-4258266752621182372009-08-26T17:11:00.007-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.874-05:00

In my last post on our distribution strategy for Kirt Gunn's Lovely by Surprise I mentioned that I’d try to write a follow-up post when appropriate. It seems that time has come sooner than expected, and for one particular reason.Part of our DIY release for Lovely By Surprise has been focused on digital messaging platforms, particularly Twitter and Facebook. They have been great tools for

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-38269603092808090502009-08-26T09:00:00.001-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.874-05:00

A connoisseur of longing and remembrance who brings great sensitivity to each of his reflective fables, Japan’s Hirokazu Kore-eda should be better known in the States, as his films extend the tradition of world-class artists like Naruse and Ozu. Enthralled with the operation of memory and the impact of grief on the lives of everyday people, Kore-eda has created a body of work that’s as rich with

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-4968737179869791802009-07-29T14:56:00.004-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.874-05:00

There’s something to be said about not being eager to please. Chris Fuller’s Loren Cass is an aggressively confrontational debut, all the more so because it is so resolutely restrained in its approach. So seemingly oblique is Fuller’s approach that one feasibly could make it through the entire film and not realize that its subject matter is the aftermath of the 1996 St. Petersburg riots; but on

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-69460262507954329632009-07-06T23:46:00.002-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.874-05:00

As I settle back in from a wonderful July 4th get-away, I am reminded of a mantra we used to chant at InDigEnt all the time (we were a spiritual bunch). It was about how the digital revolution in filmmaking truly is a democratizing factor in production and distribution. I believed it then and I believe it now. While that phrase has been thrown around to mean all kinds of things, what it

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-77814148540893690562009-03-12T00:12:00.006-04:002010-02-25T15:30:42.874-05:00

A graduate of Bard College, filmmaker Tony Stone’s first feature, Severed Ways: The Norse Discovery of America, unleashes an almost-new genre – the indie historical drama. It might also be the ultimate heavy metal video. Based on historical research, Severed Ways follows two Vikings stranded in medieval America, encountering both Native Americans and monks, everyone trying to survive. It is

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-2182922418727659822009-01-30T18:23:00.006-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.875-05:00

In connection with the Film Society of Lincoln Center's new series "Mavericks and Outsiders: Positif Celebrates American Cinema," Jamie Stuart spoke recently with Positif's editor, the noted French film critic and author Michel Ciment.FILMMAKER: I probably know you best from your Kubrick book. What was that like, having the ability to interview him over the years?CIMENT: Well, it came very

Scott Macaulayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04728573558664904533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-63978628544009317532009-01-21T10:08:00.010-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.875-05:00

Opening this year’s Rotterdam International Film Festival is Michael Imperioli’s directorial debut, The Hungry Ghosts, a gripping look at five New Yorkers all struggling to satisfy their physical and spiritual needs while facing down their own – and society’s – flaws.Best known for his Emmy-winning portrayal of Christopher on The Sopranos, Imperioli has over the course of his 20-year career

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-11876698611279976892009-01-20T10:00:00.000-05:002010-02-25T15:30:42.875-05:00

For Terrence Davies, his youth -- his early years in Liverpool, his relationship with his mother, and his feelings about being gay in that working-class town -- have always provided the raw material for his filmmaking. His celebrated “Terrence Davies Trilogy,” a collection of shorts, and later features like Distant Voices, Still Lives and The Long Day Closes summon up for the viewer an interior

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-68694681397665864642009-01-19T16:00:00.000-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.532-05:00

Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. Nick Dawson interviewed Waltz With Bashir writer-director Ari Folman for our Fall '08 issue. Waltz With Bashir is nominated for Best Foreign Film.It’s been said that the job of the filmmaker is to put on screen things that have never been seen

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-17245482199557916182009-01-19T15:50:00.000-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.533-05:00

Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. Jason Guerrasio interviewed Vicky Cristina Barcelona star Penélope Cruz for our Gotham Independent Film Awards special section in the Fall '08 issue. Vicky Cristina Barcelona is nominated for Best Actress (Penélope Cruz).Talking over the phone

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-77383171780447224292009-01-19T15:44:00.000-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.533-05:00

Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. Scott Macaulay interviewed Frozen River writer-director Courtney Hunt for our Summer '08 issue. The film's lead, Melissa Leo, was also interviewed in a sidebar to the piece by Jason Guerrasio. Frozen River is nominated for Best Actress (Melissa

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-38409607068292348212009-01-19T15:43:00.001-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.533-05:00

Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. James Ponsoldt interviewed Happy-Go-Lucky writer-director Mike Leigh for our Web Exclusives section of the Website. Happy-Go-Lucky is nominated for Best Original Screenplay (Mike Leigh).Picking a favorite Mike Leigh film can be a frustrating and

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-20626800411426261112009-01-19T15:42:00.000-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.533-05:00

WERNER HERZOG AND D.P. PETER ZEITLINGER CAPTURE ANTARCTICA IN ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD. COURTESY THINKFILM.Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. Nick Dawson interviewed Encounters at the End of the World director Werner Herzog for our Director Interviews section of the

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7056453732562501048.post-45805136969539533802009-01-19T15:41:00.000-05:002010-02-25T16:12:08.534-05:00

Leading up to the Oscars on Feb. 22, we will be highlighting the nominated films that have appeared in the magazine or on the Website in the last year. Peter Bowen interviewed Milk director Gus Van Sant for our Gotham Independent Film Awards special section in the Fall '08 issue. Milk is nominated for Best Picture, Best Director (Gus Van Sant), Best Original Screenplay (Dustin Lance Black), Best

Jason Guerrasiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14958031172216065142noreply@blogger.com2