The Soccer Project
Four filmmakers, three of them former top level college soccer players, set off on a journey to connect with the world through pickup soccer. Read more
Social Media in Film Class
I spoke with Duke Professor Negar Mottahedeh (@negaratduke on Twitter) about her integration of social media tools into her classes, especially her Intro to Film Studies class. Read more
NYT Withdraws Support for Doc Festival
One of the leading documentary film festival, Durham’s Full Frame loses one of its presenting sponsors. According to the Independent Weekly’s blog, The Triangulator, “The New York Times, which has provided sponsorship support for the 12-year-old festival since 2001, has withdrawn its commitment, the festival announced today, less than three weeks away from the start of this year’s event, which is scheduled for April 2-5 in Durham.”
The sponsorship consisted mainly of a full page ad in the Times, so the festival will not have the promotional boost of the paper’s readers learning about the festival in print.
What I Have Been Watching
Movies
Synedoche New York
Slumdog Millionaire
IOUSA
Special Showings in Theaters
Serenity
DVD
MI-5 Season 2
Hotel Rwanda
The Royal Tenenbaums
Children of Glory (imdb)
Trading Places (for Christmas)
No Talking at the Movies
While I don’t condone carrying concealed weapons into a movie theater, people do need to be quiet during a film.
From CNN:
A man angry that a family was talking during a movie threw popcorn at the son and then shot the father in the arm, according to police in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.James Joseph Cialella, 29, was charged with attempted murder, aggravated assault and weapons violations, a police report said.
Cialella told the family sitting in front of him in the theater on Christmas Day to be quiet, police said.
An argument ensued while others at the Riverview Movie Theatre watched “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett, according to Philly.com.
Cialella, 29, then approached the family from the left side of the aisle and shot the father, who was not identified, as he was standing between Cialella and his family, according to the police report.
The victim was taken to Jefferson Hospital with a gunshot wound to his left arm, police said.
Cialella was carrying a Kel-Tec .380-caliber handgun clipped inside his sweatpants, police said. He was arrested and taken into custody.
Synecdoche, New York
Last night I went to see the new film from Charles Kaufman, Synecdoche, New York. He is the writer of Being John Malkovich and Adaptation, and this film was his directorial debut. I went with my Indie Film movie group, which usually goes out for a drink and movie talk after the film. We don’t usually spend much time talking about the movie we just saw, but last night we did. The movie really got us thinking and talking about life, death, existence, dreams, control and many other things.
As a fun exercise (we are movie geeks afterall), we went around the table and we each had to use one word to describe the movie. Below is the list, and it is pretty wide ranging.
Laborious
Ambitious
Odd
Meta
Grey
Profound
Unsettling
Uninvolving
Consoling
Schenectady
Grim
Confused
Reflective
Frustrating
Here’s a review from The New Republic that uses quite a few words.
What I Have Been Watching
In the Theater
Traitor
Burn After Reading
Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist
Special Showings (in Theaters)
Hi Mom Film Festival
French Short Film Program
The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
DVD
10 Items or Less
Seven Up
Seven Plus Seven
Thank You for Smoking
Battlestar Galactica Season 3
Jewno
from Mahalo.com: Jewno is a short trailer parody of the film Juno. It is about a Jewish girl who gets pregnant, wants to have the baby, and give it to a Chinese family. The trailer is produced by Makor, an internal group of the 92nd Street Y to promote a Purim Festival featuring Lewis Black.
Film Directors Stage Operas in LA
Film Directors David Cronenberg, Woody Allen and William Friedkin are all directing operas in this season’s slate of performances at the LA Opera. Most notable is the staging of Cronenberg’s 1986 film, The Fly, as an opera. Read more from the LA Times.
Struggling Indie Film Business
Here’s an article from today’s News & Observer about the state of the indie film business. It is following the same path music did. When indie becomes the mainstream, and the major corporations get behind it, budgets grow, creativity suffers and the audience does not follow. The indie crowd doesn’t want their movies or music to become popular, and the average American does not need to feel hip. And in the end, everyone shops at Target.