After that fateful decision has been made, said bastard’s job to find the money, make the phone calls, and negotiate every tiny thing that can possibly be negotiated, just to get everything in place so the cast and crew can do their job. It’s never glamorous, but producers are the glue that holds the fraying ends of a movie shoot together, even as the natural forces of the world conspire to destroy their efforts....
THE LAST WALTZ (1978) Director: Martin Scorsese Why We Love It: On Thanksgiving Day 1976, Canadian-American rock legends The Band performed their very last concert at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. And Martin Scorsese, already a legend in his own right, was there with his cameras to capture the entire event. Today, The Last Waltz is hailed as one of the greatest music documentaries of all time, with intimate footage of the happenings that occurred both onstage and behind the scenes....
The word that is mostly being used to describe what is happening to the world is uncertain—as in, “these are uncertain times.” If we haven’t been directly impacted by COVID-19’s economic impact ourselves, many of our friends and family members are now experiencing emotional and financial difficulty, with the film industry—largely comprised of freelance workers—being dealt a devastating blow. Not only can we not gather to make films, people cannot congregate to watch them either....
Similar to the Kickstarter model, Tugg enables filmmakers and content providers to set up public screenings and if enough people reserve tickets to meet the minimum ticket threshold at least 5 days before the event, the screening is confirmed. “We wanted to find a way to make it truly possible for any film to play in any theater so long as there’s an audience there to see it,” explained Gonda....
MUSIC AND THE MAKING OF ‘THANKSGIVING’ One aspect of the new season that Mitchell singled out for praise was the show’s soundtrack. Much recognition was given to Zach Cowie, a music supervisor for the show, whom the panel said had a huge vinyl record collection—the result of having working in the music industry for a long, long time. “On this show, you can do so much with the right piece of music, the right song and the right image,” Yang said....
That’s right: voting for the 2017 Film Independent Spirit Awards may seem like small potatoes in light of recent historical events, but—surprise!—it’s not. Equitable media representation is core to building a more diverse, fair and functional Republic. And that idea—championing underrepresented voices in film—has always (always!) been at the heart of what the Spirit Awards are all about, ever since they began 30+ years ago. Just look at the 2016 Spirit Awards from this past January, when Tangerine co-star Mya Taylor became the first trans actress to take home a major film award (a Spirit Award for Best Supporting Female), among other diverse winners....
The panel took place September 22 at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills and was the first of two Coffee Talks events at the Festival. Interested in unpredictable conversation about the joys and woes of life in the directors’ chair? Keep reading. To see else is going on at this year’s Festival, click here. “HIDEOUS AND PAINFUL” Filmmakers have many hurdles to overcome: writing and re-writing a script for many years; realizing your film might not be selected into a prestigious festival; contending with shoddy distribution deals; and so on....
BLINDSPOTTING When You Can Watch: Now Where You Can Watch: STARZ Creators/Executive Producers: Rafael Casal, Daveed Diggs Executive Producers: Jess Wu Calder, Keith Calder, Ken Lee, Tim Palen, Emily Gerson Saines, Seith Mann Cast: Jasmine Cephas Jones, Jaylen Barron, Candace Nicholas-Lippman, Helen Hunt About: Casal and Diggs first wrote and appeared together in the 2018 feature version of Blindspotting, where the two IRL childhood buddies played best friends in Oakland, California....
Earlier this year, the companies also provided these services to Film Independent’s Project Involve short films. We spoke with cinematographer and Film Independent Fellow Ed Wu, who shot two of those films, about the benefits of working with a state-of-the-art post-production facility. How did you come to work with EFILM | Company 3? I was selected as a cinematography fellow in Film Independent’s signature diversity program, Project Involve. During the program I shot two short films: Drowning and Fractured....
Watkins, Barr and Dewey make up the core cast of the show, an intentional move by Lehmann, who didn’t want to create a cast of characters so big there was no room to really get to know them. Reitman and Estabrook, who have been working together on Reitman’s projects for several years, had been looking for a television script for a while, and when they read Lehmann’s pilot they were drawn to this aspect of Casual....
Forev rolls forward on a train of awkward silences and genuine laughter before punching you in the gut with a bittersweet romance. By Wendy Chuong / LA Film Fest Guest Blogger Forev finds twenty-something Pete (Matt Mider) and struggling actress Sophie (Noël Wells) looking for stability in the seemingly random series of events they call their lives. As neighbors and almost-acquaintances living in Los Angeles with no other real friends or family, Pete and Sophie are forced to turn to each other for solace from their loneliness....
Guests of honor: Spirit Award Best Director nominees Lee Isaac Chung (Writer/Director, Minari), Emerald Fennell (Writer/Director, Promising Young Woman), Eliza Hittman (Writer/Director, Never Rarely Sometimes Always), Kelly Reichardt (Writer/Director, First Cow), Chloé Zhao (Writer/Director/Editor, Nomadland); moderated by Josh Welsh (President, Film Independent.) Read our full recap here. TV CREATORS Guests of honor: Spirit Award Best New Scripted Series nominees Lee Eisenberg (Creator, Little America), Emily V. Gordon (Creator, Little America), Steve McQueen (Creator, Small Axe), Kumail Nanjiani (Creator, Little America), Anna Winger (Creator, Unorthodox); moderated by Wendy Calhoun (Producer/Writer; Prodigal Son, Empire....
“The visions of yesterday have all caught up to us and we must start looking towards the next visions,” stated moderator and veteran TV writer and producer Wendy Calhoun (Station 19, Empire) emphasizing a recurring theme of the June 22 Sloan Salon panel “Storytelling and Tech: Crafting Human-Centered Stories About Technology.” The online conversation delved into timely subjects such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and ChatGPT, raising ethical questions about how we represent technology in stories and highlighting some optimistic views on where it could all be headed....
For the last couple days I have been bombarded by filmmaker friends who have noticed the new Kickstarter Campaign for Potato Salad. The original goal was set for $10 and at the time of this writing, it has raised $70,924 with 4,995 backers and still 23 days to go. As I scrolled through this project’s Kickstarter page reading the rewards for each donation level, I could not help but wonder whether this is a joke or savvy social satire....
Today we’re beyond thrilled to announce the Opening Night film of the 2018 LA Film Festival: Andrew Slater’s new documentary Echo in the Canyon—an in-depth chronicle of how groups like The Byrds, Beach Boys, Buffalo Springfield, The Mamas & the Papas and more gave birth to a musical movement that still endures to this day. “We’re committed to showcasing documentaries,” said LA Film Festival Director Jennifer Cochis. “I’m so proud to be opening the Festival with a love song to Los Angeles....
Then again, there’s nothing commonplace about the career of Scottish auteur Lynne Ramsay or her latest: the hyper-violent hitman thriller, You Were Never Really Here. The film—which earned star Joaquin Phoenix the Cannes Best Actor prize alongside Best Screenplay for Ramsay—is now in limited release, expanding on April 20. So gird your stomachs accordingly. On April 5, You Were Never Here screened at Film Independent at LACMA, at a free Members-only event, followed by an in-depth Q&A between the enigmatic Ramsay and program curator Elvis Mitchell....
Tell us a little about your background. How did you get involved with filmmaking? I always loved working with actors and I went to Yale where there were a lot of opportunities to direct plays. When I graduated I came to New York and started a theatre company. Through talking to the actors in the company, I started to realize that a lot of film directors were not working with their actors in the most skillful way....
But even if they’re strangers to the greater indie film world and film festival ecosystem, many of this year’s filmmakers are not, in fact, strangers to Film Independent. This year’s LA Film Festival lineup features a total of 60 individual Film Independent Members, representing 38 different projects as writers, directors, producers and panelists—what better testament to the creativity and industrious of the Film Independent community? So c’mon, let’s raise a glass (even if it’s a day earlier) and toast this year’s crop of Festival-minted Film Independent Members....
In just 11 short minutes, the ace comedy duo (and IRL besties) unleashed a hilarious, finely tuned deconstruction of Hollywood pomposity and indie film peccadillos—not to mention a few not-so-lighthearted jabs at the then-new Trump Administration (“Steve Bannon looks like if Nick Offerman drowned,” observed Kroll.) By any comedic measure the Oh, Hello duo’s turn as Spirit Awards emcees deserves its own modestly budgeted alcove in the Awards Show Hall of Fame....
Last week alone saw the release of not one, not two but three musically-inclined biopics: Miles Ahead, director-star Don Cheadle’s impressionistic exploration of jazz great Miles Davis; I Saw the Light, Marc Abraham’s Tom Hiddleston-starring portrait of late country crooner Hank Williams, Sr.; and Robert Budreau’s Born to Be Blue, featuring Ethan Hawke as yet another troubled trumpeter, Chet Baker. Taken together, this odd triptych about doomed, deceased and otherwise damaged recording artists has received a wide-ranging cross-section of reviews, from the excitable and effusive to the downcast and damning....
