Blind Faith: A Film About Seeing

Now on Snagfilms.

Screening at Rooftop in September

Some news: my short "Notebook on Santas and Elves" will screen September 5 in the Rooftop Films program Storms Expected at a venue on the Lower East Side. Did I mention there's an open bar?

Saturday, September 5
STORMS EXPECTED (short films)
Venue: On the Open Road Rooftop above New Design High School
Address: 350 Grand St. @ Essex (Lower East Side, Manhattan)
Directions: F/J/M/Z to Essex/Delancey
Rain: In the event of rain the show will be held indoors at the same location
8:00PM: Doors open
8:30PM: Live music presented by Sound Fix Records
9:00PM: Films
11:30PM-1:00AM: After-party: Open Bar at Fontana’s (105 Eldridge St. @ Grand) Courtesy of Radeberger Pilsner
Tickets: $9 at the door or online at www.rooftopfilms.com

Doc Challenge Film Up For Emmy

Some news from the International Doc Challenge:

"ARS MAGNA" NOMINATED FOR AN EMMY!

Believe it or not, but a Doc Challenge film has been nominated for an Emmy! "Ars Magna", made as part of the 2008 International Documentary Challenge, has received a nomination in the 30th Annual News & Documentary Emmy® Awards, announced July 14 by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS). The film, directed by Cory Kelley and produced by Sean Roach of Team Juicebox in Seattle, qualified for the Emmy's by receiving a national broadcast on PBS' POV series, a presenting partner of the Doc Challenge.

"Ars Magna," which means "great art" in Latin, is an anagram of the word "anagrams." Enter into the obsessive and fascinating world of anagrams with Cory Calhoun, who took the first three lines of Hamlet's "To Be or Not to Be" soliloquy and made them into what's been called the "world's greatest anagram." Congratulations to Cory, Sean and all of Team Juicebox - what an accomplishment for a film made in 5 days!

You can see the film here.

Last Book Read: Ralph Rosenblum

Sure, I've been away from the blog. It's true. I've been busy, sick, swamped and just plain away. And it's been quite a while. Now I'm back.

Usually, when I read, I try to do so in big chunks. I'd rather experience a book, live with it, rather than just chip away at it. That hasn't been possible, lately, though, so my reading has consisted of 10 minutes here, 5 minutes there, between and around tasks. Still, eventually you get to the end.

I've just finished Ralph Rosenblum's When The Shooting Stops ... The Cutting Begins: A Film Editor's Story.

I'm adding it to my fall curriculum -- I'll be teaching a basic editing class -- so I thought I'd re-read it. It's really a delight. As a person's life story, it's a sharply-told account that details Rosenblum's career as one of the most significant editors of his time. From the standpoint of editing, a few highlights not to miss:

• his invention of flashback techniques in "The Pawnbroker"
• his nightmares working with first-time directors -- and their egos
• his account of the changing conception of what an editor does
• his collaboration with Woody Allen, remaking the films in the edit

Best of all, at least from the viewpoint of my students: it's a theory-free glimpse over a feature editor's shoulder, letting you spend time in the cutting room of one of the pioneers of contemporary editing. A great read.

Bill McKenna, Editor of the Year

Access + Bad Times = Theatrical Doc

A while back I mentioned Guest of Cindy Sherman.

In the midst of some recent computer issues -- and then the attempt to catch up on all my work -- I've neglected to report: I've seen it, and liked it a lot.

It does open a great documentary question, though: if you tell a story from your own life, what do you do for a followup?

Okay, now back to work....

Counterpoint

I watched and enjoyed Capturing Reality: The Art of Documentary last night. The documentarians interviewed formed a serious A-list, and the material covered was just great.

You know, of course, I do have a few contrarian gripes.

1. There's a huge mismatch between the title and the content. Why use the word "Reality" in a doc about docs, in which much of the first section of the film is centered on filmmakers who use re-creations? Why use a word that's slid in meaning into "Reality TV"? Why confuse us that we're "capturing reality" when so many thoughtful books on documentary theory start with the assertion that it's a silly notion and that documentary practice is more complex than that?

2. Stop saying "It's good for you." I think the documentary field will be mature when it escapes the "boring-but-good-for-you" model of production. For one, while there are plenty of specific examples of docs "doing good" I personally would not stand by the field's record of "saving the world." (I'd choose the invention of birth control pills over documentaries on women's rights for example -- since one has had real effect and the other still can't get equal-pay-for-equal-work legislation passed.)

I think Dave Hickey's take on the art world -- that it needs to portray itself as like rock and roll or cocaine, rather than castor oil or wheat germ -- applies doubly to the doc world. So why, when interviewing so many documentarians -- with a wide range of work -- use mainly questions that emphasize the effect of serious social issue docs?

The director's statement: "I think of documentary as a highly undervalued tool at humanity's disposal — by shining light on a subject that isn’t well understood, by addressing an injustice, or by simply revealing the better part of who we are or who we can be." If we apply that thinking to painting and we imagine someone telling artists "paint! it's a tool to benefit humanity" we can imagine most artists quickly walking out of the room. Whether or not humanity can use what's produced, great artists always always always work for themselves. Don't believe any press release that says otherwise -- it's just impossible to obsess for someone else. Research Picasso's "Guernica" and you'll find it makes sense once you get past the gloss that's been put on top -- that it's "a tool to benefit humanity" -- as fueled by Picasso's usual energies, desire to prove himself a genius, obsessions, depth of visual understanding and above all else ego. The result may be universal, but the path to the production of the work is exactly the opposite.

Personally, I like works of art that complicate a subject that is well understood, or that reveal the worst part of who we can be as well. So leave off the sugar water, and let the docs be art rather than social programs.

3. Hooray, production methods? I found myself confused in the last third of the doc when the emphasis shifted to the technical production of films. I'm a perfect audience for great documentarians talking about editing, working with sound, and cinematography. But I wasn't sure how this followed from the first part of the film, or how it moved us to the ending.

As the film was wrapping up, I wondered: what if you had a set of interviews about gathering visuals, gathering sounds, and editing it all together and from that there emerged a discussion on what it means to "capture reality"? In other words, you could invert the structure of this film and make something that really would be an investigation into the subject, rather than imposing a conclusion from the beginning....

In any case, go and see the film if you are at all interested in documentary production. It's a fast and informative 90-plus minutes.

Remember, though, that in music the idea of musique concrete -- that somehow real recorded sounds were a different category than just "sounds" -- became problematic when technology brought sampling to anyone with a computer. In the age of computers and inexpensive camcorders, do we really think the essence of doc production is that we "capture reality"?

With A Bullet, Kinda

I posted previously about Docunomics.

As a followup, I'm happy to report that the International Documentary Challenge DVD (which includes one of our short films) has moved from #48,323 in sales in Movies and TV to #35,590.

That's right. It's 12,733 better.

Which, I suppose, is not bad. (I'm a little afraid to compare it to other items, because I'm sure with some careful searching you could find it's being outsold by ... well, I'm sure there's a lot of embarrassing possibilities.)

Twitter Quitter

Well, there's a lot going on. I don't have time to write it all up just now. But I thought I'd mention:

It's Not You, It's Me

Soderbergh Speaks

I posted previously about Stephen Soderbergh use of the RED camera in "The Girlfriend Experience", so here's the word from the horse's mouth in an NYT audio slideshow.

I think the slideshow makes the movie feel darker than it reads on a television screen, but it's very interesting from the viewpoint of cinematography. As well, Soderbergh's approach here is very similar to that used in documentary production.

Seriously

Know anyone looking for an intermediate photo class in NYC? My Seriously Fun Photography begins Thursday. I believe you can still register today.

Now on Netflix: Bend & Bow

The International Documentary Challenge DVD is now available on Netflix. So check it out. It's got 17 great short films, including our short documentary Bend & Bow.

RIP, Sid Laverents

I'm fascinated by the NYT obit for Sid Laverents -- a film "hobbyist" whose work is in the National Film Registry.

Sid Laverents, Auteur of Homemade Films, Dies at 100

Nine minutes long, “Multiple SIDosis” stars Mr. Laverents himself, and it begins as he opens a Christmas gift from his wife at the time, Adelaide: a recording device. For the rest of the film, Mr. Laverents puts to use not just the recorder but also his background as a one-man band, knitting together a soundtrack of several separate recordings of himself performing a jaunty Felix Arndt tune called “Nola.” He whistles, hums, blows across bottlenecks and plays instruments, including a banjo, a jew’s-harp and an ocarina.

It’s a witty performance, but what is really unusual is the imagery that accompanies the music. Using repeated exposures of the same piece of film, Mr. Laverents kept adding different shots of himself playing the different musical lines. By the end, there are 11 different Sids on the screen, including a couple wearing Mickey Mouse ears and fake whiskers.

Like Salinger, Except Reclusive

That last post on the Death of Indie Film got me thinking about those indie filmmakers who make a great low-budget film, hit it semi-big ... then disappear.

I'm thinking, for one, of Whit Stillman, maker of the Urban Haute Bourgeoisie trio: Metropolitan, Barcelona, and The Last Days of Disco. While there are rumors he'll be surfacing soon with a new film (currently listed as in pre-production), ten years is a long time away.

And I'm thinking also of Shane Carruth, who made Primer in 2004, did a few interviews, and then vanished. He surfaced a few times after -- one mention claims he was planning to make a "coming-of-age romance between an oceanography prodigy and the daughter of a commodities trader" -- but is seemingly hidden away today.

Filmmaker Magazine even wrote: SHANE CARRUTH, PHONE HOME.

Of course, they'll probably both be back. In 1998, I saw The Cruise and showed it to all my students. In fact, I did so for years -- and remember quite clearly wondering, circa 2004, where the hell Bennett Miller had disappeared to.

Death of the Indie Film?

I generally hate to point folks to Fox -- lest they begin to think torture isn't torture, the WMDs were found, and that ACORN is trying to kill Glenn Beck -- but I think it's safe to view this segment on Death of the Indie Film? featuring Ted Hope, Marina Zenovich and Reed Martin.

Fiction, Non?

One of the problems that has plagued photography since the 1980s has been the idea that celebrity photographs need to be publicist-approved.

It's made a lot of the practice of photographing famous people a joke. Or, perhaps, made it a process of "getting away with" making something that's actually better than a publicist could envision. It's turned a lot of great photographers out of the field, and led others to make making weaker work.

Can the same hold true in documentary production?

A few months ago, I watched Shine a Light -- Martin Scorsese's "documentary" on the Rolling Stones -- and was left with two reasons why I'd rather call it a "concert film" than a doc:

1. The interview material was completely safe, and completely in the well-polished control of the Stones.

2. The concert was changed by the filmmaking process -- which to me is the opposite of a "documentary" process.

I'm more excited to see what Scorcese will do with the added freedom he'll clearly have on his next -- non-documentary -- picture. I don't think there'll be any need to please the subject or a publicist or any limits put on access....

Martin Scorsese Set to Direct Frank Sinatra Biopic

A Limited Time Offer

Today marked the last show for the term in my TV production class. We've done several somewhat sophisticated, timing-critical, multiple-camera setups.

With Summer in the air, however, the class decided to do a "home shopping channel" style show. Fairly simple, kinda fun. It was still three-camera, but really easy.

Above: iPhone snap of a runthrough.

Seeing With Photography Collective in New Exhibition

Our short documentary Blind Faith: A Film About Seeing featured Victorine Floyd Fludd and the Seeing with Photography Collective back in 2007. Now work by these photographers is getting a lot of coverage.

Both are included in my friend Doug McCulloh's exhibition Sight Unseen, and now that's being covered in Time Magazine.

Glad this is going well, and I wish I could make it to the exhibition.

GFE and RED

Since I'm not 12, I skipped right past the idea of seeing "Star Trek" in a theater this weekend. (Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's good. I just think we're smothering all the new ideas by rehashing the old ones that seem comfortable and fun. I understand why people wanted that in the 1950s, after a few really tough decades, but I don't think that's where we should be now. I think we should be looking to the new.)

Instead, we took advantage of the fact that Stephen Soderbergh's The Girlfriend Experience is released on pay-per-view while it's still in theaters.

I'm not a reviewer, so I'll leave that to others. What I did want to mention, though, is that it's shot with the RED camera in a style that loosely connects to documentary: working in available light and going handheld. And it looks great, at least on television.

As Soderbergh told Filmmaker Magazine:

You know, I shot The Informant [with the Red] last spring, but I wasn’t really in a situation where sensitivity was as much of an issue as it was on GFE. So for me that [heightened sensitivity to light] was a big plus because we were shooting anamorphic and I was kind of restricted to shooting stuff at 2.8. Basically I can’t go much wider than that, stop-wise, and so I really needed that extra sensitivity. It meant I could go out on the street or be in a car, still be able to shoot available light and be really pleased with what we were getting. So, [the Red] just keeps getting better. ... There are only two shots in the film where I pulled out a light. ... And frankly I wish I hadn’t. They’re my two least favorite shots.

Above: Soderbergh talks about his experiences with the Red.

And Then The Sequel to "The Civil War"

Well, we know what Errol Morris has planned next.

And we know that PBS will be showing Ken Burns' 12-parter: The National Parks: America's Best Idea in September. But these days, you can't just rest on your laurels: sure, making 12+ hours of TV is fine, but what's going to keep him busy once that's out?

Documentary film maker Ken Burns has a sequel to 'Baseball' in the works

But as he prepared to throw a strike to the Marlins' mascot before Florida faced Atlanta, he couldn't contain his excitement about one of his next projects, a sequel to his Emmy Award-winning 1994 series, Baseball.

"We just started editing what we're calling The Tenth Inning," he said of the project that he hopes will air on PBS in September 2010 as a pair of two-hour episodes. There's so much that's gone on and we're going to really tell the story, good and bad. There's been enough water under the baseball bridge since 1992, (which) was the last action we described.''