Please check back soon. I’m under a bit of a reconstruction of my site and blog but entries will begin again in the near future so please check back.
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Own a piece of women’s film history
November 11th, 2011 by
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Own a piece of film history by shopping the New York Women in Film and Television’s (NYWIFT) Women’s Film Preservation Fund’s (WFPF) new Cafe Press shop. Funds from the purchase of any product go to preserving films which women have had a significant creative role in the making of. From early silent era films to animation, documentaries, experimental and features, WFPF has been preserving films since 1995 when it was founded by NYWIFT in conjunction with the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). WFPF has screenings of films preserved through the fund throughout the year to pursue continued awareness of women’s cultural legacy in film. Please show your support by shopping Cafe Press now! Click here to view the shop or if you’d rather just directly donate, please click here.
Tags: New York Women in Film and Television's film preservation · NYWIFT · NYWIFT WFPF · WFPF · women in film · women's film history · Women's Film Preservation Fund · Women's Film Preservation Fund Cafe PressNo Comments.
Views from the Avant-Garde at NYFF Part II
October 31st, 2011 by
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Curious Light (2011), Charlotte Pryce
It’s been a little while since the New York Film Festival wrapped (10/16/11 to be exact) but I’m still going to add a little something about the Views from the Avant-Garde. My Part II, even if a bit late in coming.
As I mentioned in Part I, the lineup I attended was Cabinet of Curiosities, which was a program of 12 films. Each inspiring in their own right, but I’ll stick to a handful of my favorites for this entry. Please keep in mind that the following comments are from my perspective only, and experimental or avant-garde films are up for a broad range of experience and interpretation, so with that disclaimer, I’ll proceed.
Jonathan Schwartz’s Between Gold (2011), color, 16mm, 10minutes, 42 seconds, seemed to have some similarities to his Nothing is Over Nothing (2009) in that they both resemble personal, poetic travelogues of sorts. In the film’s description, Mr. Schwartz refers to a quote (or moment) from Mark Twain’s The Innocent Abroad, where a dog is resigned to acceptance of a situation he was not equal to. But The Innocent Abroad, like Between Gold, is a travelogue on the surface, yet Twain’s book is also known for exploring the conflicts between the historical and modern world.
So far I’ve only seen Nothing is Over Nothing and Between Gold at Views from the Avant-Garde but he made many more. From what I gather, Mr. Schwartz uses family imagery and travel footage in his other work as well and I’d be more than interested in seeing it. Between Gold held my attention like a fascinating, warmly hued dream you kind of try to grasp the possible meanings of, but can’t quite make sense of it all.
Mr. Schwartz does inject an audio track of a barking dog(s) under much of the film, which I found both interesting and aggravating. Nevertheless, Between Gold was a favorite. [Read more →]
Tags: Baltimore Museum of Art · Between Gold · Charlotte Pryce · Curious Light · Jhana and the rats of James Olds or 31 days/31 videos · Jonathan Schwartz · Mark Twain The Innocent Abroad · Miniatures · New York Film Festival 2011 · Nothing Is Over Nothing · NYFF Cabinet of Curiosities · Stephanie Barber · Tableaux Vivants · Views From The Avat-Garde · Vincent GrenierNo Comments.
Views From The Avant-Garde at the NYFF – Part I
October 22nd, 2011 by
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As I reflect on this year’s New York Film Festival (NYFF) which ended this past Sunday, I realize that this was a first for attending as many screenings and events that I did and there were a couple in particular that stood out. Although it was tough fitting everything between work and the rest of life, I’m glad I made the effort. Film festivals like this are truly inspiring.
This month I was able to see Crazy Horse (2011), Ben-Hur (1959), The Gold Rush (1925), A Dangerous Method (2011), Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory (2011), You Are Not I (1980) - pictured left, the Cabinet of Curiosities program from Views from the Avant-Garde, The Artist (2011) and Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel (2011). I can already pinpoint my favorite events and not all of them were screenings.
NYFF offers free forums throughout the festival that take place both at the Amphitheater located at the Elinor Bunin Monroe Film Center, and at the Apple store, up the street from Lincoln Center. The forums cater to a wide range of interests, from celebrity book signings to panel discussions. The night of October 6th a forum was held at the Amphitheater. It was a superb prelude to NYFF’s 9P.M. screening later that evening. Sara Driver’s You Are Not I (1980) was screened as one of the festival’s 2011 Masterworks.
Although Driver admitted she doesn’t necessarily consider herself an avant-garde filmmaker, she was a willing participant on NYFF’s panel, Avant Garde Influences Mainstream Movies! The panel included Driver as well as other prestigious panelists who made an excellent case as to why avant-garde films shouldn’t be separated from others, as it tends to limit the audience. I can see their point. After all, I’m a big fan of experimental and avant-garde films but they can be intimidating. You often never know what you’re going to get, or if you’re going to ‘get’ what you’re seeing, but for me that is part of the joy of the viewing experience. I understand there are those who don’t necessarily want an unexpected experience when they go to the movies, but maybe that’s sometimes because they don’t know what they’re missing. Something unexpected can be a good thing. [Read more →]
Tags: A Dangerous Method · Avant-garde filmmakers · Avant-Garde Influences mainstream Movies! · Ben-Hur restoration · Bitch-Beauty · Bitches Brew NYFF · Cabinet of Curiosities · Cabinet of Curiosities NYFF · Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel · Crazy Horse · Drake Stutesman · Filmmakers Coop · Ina Archer · Jim Jarmush · Jon Gartenberg · Ken Jacobs · Kenneth Anger · MM Serra · New York Film Festival 2011 · New York Women in Film and Television · Paradise Lost 3 Purgatory · Paul Bowles · Roberta Friedman · Sara Driver · Scorpio Rising · Seeking the Monkey King · Suzanne Fletcher · The Artist · The Gold Rush restoration · Views From The Avant-Garde · Women's Film Preservation Fund · You Are Not INo Comments.
Dark Days and its 10 year anniversary
October 8th, 2011 by
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I think most New Yorkers have heard talk about people who live in the depths of the subway tunnels. It’s hard to imagine what that would be like but few of us would be curious enough to venture down there to poke around and find out. Not filmmaker, Marc Singer, who went down into the known area, referred to as The Freedom Tunnel where he ended up taking residence. He eventually found inspiration to document it by getting a camera (camera shopCinevision supplied the camera, Kodak donated damaged film stock) and enlisted his fellow tunnel friends and neighbors as production crew. What transpired was a stark but humanistic look at not just what it’s like down there, which is for sure fascinating, but a deeper view into who the tunnel inhabitants were and some understanding of what got them there.
Dark Days (2000) was filmed in beautiful grainy 16mm black and white back in the nineties, but this past Tuesday at IFC theater’s Stranger Than Fiction night, I watched it for the first time off a 35mm print. I had wondered about homeless people I’d heard were living down there. I know there are fires often caused by people in the tunnels, but I certainly hadn’t imagined it would be as revealed in this documentary. [Read more →]
Tags: Dark Days documentary · DJ Shadow · Ian Ashbury · Marc Singer · Stranger Than Fiction IFC · The Freedom TunnelNo Comments.
Frederick Wiseman’s Crazy Horse
October 6th, 2011 by
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The nature of burlesque performance inspires a certain level of voyeurism from it’s audience and Fredrick Wiseman’s latest offering gives us a peeping Tom’s view of the on-stage and backstage happenings at Le Crazy Horse de Paris theater, as it prepares for a new 60th anniversary revue.
Crazy Horse, (2011) played to a sold-out audience on Monday night, which was the Special Event at the New York Film Festival for the evening. Unfortunately the filmmaker was not present for an introduction or post Q&A. Apparently he is in Paris, but nonetheless, his presence was felt through his signature style of filmmaking.
Through Crazy Horse, Wiseman takes in the artistic process by witnessing the creatives and talents behind the erotic Parisian cabaret and he does so thoughtfully. Crazy Horse’s dancers, crew and production members rehearse and argue to make the new show, Desire, to be about just that. As Andrée Deissenberg, Managing Director of the Crazy Horse, claims the new show depicts varying levels of desire including restraint and it shows in the performances. The numbers aren’t stripper club raunch, but artistically beautiful. Interestingly cinematographer, John Davey chose extreme close-ups of the dancers torsos and other anatomical areas for certain performances. Davey and Wisemen linger on some of these shots without so much as a face or head attached. Some felt almost uncomfortable because of that, but never without beauty. The camera made the most of a show which relies heavily and effectively on gel lights and shadow.
And all that being said about the actual performance numbers, I felt Crazy Horse isn’t so much about the end product as it is about the getting there. Some of the most fascinating scenes are between Ms. Deissenberg, Philippe Decouflé, the Production Director and Ali Mahdavi, the Creative Director. Whether it was heated discussion over artistic vision versus the voice of the financiers or conveying that vision to the press in promoting the upcoming revue, these are the moments that make theater and film one of the few truly important collaborative art forms in existence, and in my mind why they are so powerful. Also riveting to watch. [Read more →]
Tags: Ali Mahdavi · Andrée Deissenber · Crazy Horse documentary · Frederick Wiseman · Frederick Wiseman Crazy Horse · John Davey · Le Crazy Horse de Paris · New York Film Festival 2011 · NYFF Crazy Horse · Philippe Decouflé · The Crazy HorseNo Comments.
Warner Bros. 8k restoration of Ben-Hur at NYFF
October 4th, 2011 by
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Saturday morning the New York Film Festival brought its audience a spectacular restoration of the epic spectacle from 1959, Ben-Hur. And it still is a spectacle but in the best of ways. Seeing this film only confirms my belief of how important it is to screen films like this in theaters, on a big screen as they were originally intended. Ben-Hur couldn’t possibly be the same experience on television and although with this incredible restoration, Warner Bros. is releasing a Blu-ray that will no doubt be beautiful, it is quite an experience to see this William Wyler directed story at Alice Tully Hall, which seats 1,000 plus.
A special treat was the film’s introduction by Wyler’s daughter Catherine Wyler, and Heston’s son, Fraser Heston. Ned Price of Warner Bros. was also on stage and spoke briefly about the lengthy restoration process which lasted more than a year.
The 8k video format has a resolution of 8192 × 4320 pixels and it is stunning. The colors and the detail are glorious in a film like this. There are many aspects of Ben-Hur that contribute to what makes it interesting. Charlton Heston won an Oscar for his portrayal of Judah Ben-Hur. I know a lot of people joke about his over acting, but I thought he was quite good as Ben-Hur and didn’t hear any real snickering from the audience. People were respectful and despite it’s full 3.5 hour running time and a few set backs (the theater was quite freezing and the film had to be stopped to fix a pretty bad sync issue) people remained until the bitter end. It helped that the famous chariot race doesn’t show up until after intermission, but although amazing, that’s not the only awe inspiring scene. The battle at sea among others are jaw dropping considering CGI wasn’t around yet. The costumes, although not necessarily totally true to period (and combined with late 50′s hair and make-up) are brilliant and here is where the richly restored color pops off the screen. The continuity and design cohesiveness between the costume and set department’s are so apparent and on the mark. There is much to see and hear (I can’t forget Miklós Rózsa’s score) and if you missed this weekend’s screening, I think it’s worth a look at the upcoming Blu-ray which marks Ben-Hur’s 50th anniversary.
Tags: Ben-Hur · Ben-Hur 1959 · Ben-Hur restoration · Catherine Wyler · Charlton Heston · Fraser Heston · Ned Price · New York Film Festival 2011 · New York Film Festival Ben-Hur · Warner Bros · Warner Bros. Home Video Ben-HurNo Comments.
Createasphere at The New Yorker
September 26th, 2011 by
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I was only able to make it to a few of the Post Production Master Class sessions, brought to us by Createasphere, this past Thursday and Friday but the panels I did get to were worth the trip to midtown. The Master Class was part of this year’s Entertainment Technology Expo New York. The expo took place last Tuesday and Wednesday (9/20 & 9/21) and continued with the Createasphere Post Production Master Class option on Thursday and Friday afternoon.
I had never been to any of the expo before but had been curious. For me, this time had to be limited because of my work schedule but it did give me a taste of at least what some of the Thursday and Friday panels were like. Next year I’ll check out the expo itself, which is actually free of charge.
Since I attended a handful of the The Post Production Master Class events, I’ll just cover the highlights here. The two afternoon sessions on Thursday, which were each about an hour and a half long were good. The Experts Panel consisted of studio post heads, facility leaders and organization leaders. They discussed the current climate of technology and the challenges they face within it.
Richard Friedlander, Co Founder and VFX Producer at Brainstorm Digital, Joe Beirne of PostWorks NYC and Orbit Digital, Terry Brown, CTO at Mega Playground and Michel Suissa of The Studio, B&H all gathered and spoke about everything from the qualitative difference between consumer and professional filmmaking and how cutting costs at the production stage, more often than not, costs more money at the post stage.
There were a couple of themes though that seemed to run through this session and those were how acquisition has changed because of all the recent developments in camera technology and how essential production communication is between its players. Also how these two subjects are intertwined. [Read more →]
Tags: createasphere · Ed Lachman · Entertainment Technology Expo · Joe Beirne · Michel Suissa · Mildred Pierce · Richard Friedlander · Sam Daley · Technicolor · Terry Brown · Todd HaynesNo Comments.
Idealism is a movement
September 22nd, 2011 by
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I attended this event last night at CUNY Graduate Center on 5th. Ami Dar, Idealist’s Executive Director spoke about their new Idealist Network, which hopes to be a movement and if anyone can galvanize people who want to better the world, why not them? It helps that they have a good motivator in Ami Dar too. New York is the pilot project city. Folks who attended last night were all over the map, from artists to humanitarians to people who just want to save Victorian housing in upstate New York. Take a look and if you’re inspired, they want you.
Tags: Ami Dar · Ami Dar Idealist · CUNY Graduate Center · Idealist · Idealist Network New YorkNo Comments.
Alice Tully celebrates new “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” restoration
September 16th, 2011 by
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Last night New York welcomed the newly restored print of the 1961 iconic film Breakfast at Tiffany’s at Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center. The line wound around the block as ardent fans (some dressed in Hubert de Givenchy inspired creations) awaited the big screen viewing of Blake Edwards tale of three lost souls (gotta include ‘Cat’ of course) in Manhattan.
The event was scheduled to begin at 7p but crowds weren’t fully seated until almost 7:30p. Amid flickering camera flashes, elegant Julie Andrews took the stage to discuss her late husband’s film that, although wasn’t exactly a hit when released, became a pivotal career move for Mr. Edwards at the time. Ms. Andrews described some of her favorite moments of the film which include, Audrey Hepburn’s famous line accompanying a breathtaking close-up, “How do I look?” as well as what’s often considered one of the greatest party scenes in cinema history, and of course Ms. Hepburn’s opening scene where she enjoys her croissant and coffee in front of Tiffany’s as dawn breaks on what was then a quiet New York City morning on 5th Avenue. The subject of casting came up as well and Ms. Andrews mentioned Truman Capote’s wish for Marilyn Monroe to play the character Holly Golightly, which would have resulted in a different film indeed.
The movie, which has become better known than Truman Capote’s novella of the same title, is definitely lighter fare than Capote’s version and would fall under the category of “loosely based on the book…”. Screenwriter George Axelrod danced around the subject of prostitution, which was probably his only option in 1961. The film never gets too dark. This is definitely a stylized romantic comedy that only Blake Edwards could do. Capote’s Paul Varjack is an unnamed narrator in the book and there are implications that his narrator is gay. Part of why the book works is that the Varjack character doesn’t want Ms. Golightly for romantic reasons, unlike her other male relationships, and this is what forms the bond of trust between them. In the film, the characters are bonded by their understanding of what one another does to get by (i.e. they are vetted by wealthy suitors). Both work, but in my opinion Capote’s book is better in that respect. I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of a nice romantic Hollywood ending, however. Also, Capote had described his Holly Golightly as more of an American Geisha than a prostitute. Ms. Golightly was an escort for dinners with well-to-do men with the expectation that they would give her gifts of funds or jewelry in exchange for her company. There wasn’t necessarily an expectation of anything more. In that sense, Mr. Axelrod portrayed Ms. Golightly true to Capote’s story. Mr. Capote claimed Ms. Golightly’s character was based on many New York women he befriended over the years. [Read more →]
Tags: Alice Tully Hall · Audrey Hepburn · Blake Edwards · Breakfast at Tiffany's · Breakfast at Tiffany's 50th Anniversary · Buddie Epson · Edith Head · George Axelrod · George Peppard · Henry Mancini · Howard A. Smith · Hubert de Givenchy · Julie Andrews · Marilyn Monroe · Martin Balsam · Mickey Rooney · Patricia Neal · Richard Shepherd · Truman CapoteNo Comments.