EXTRA CRITICUM

Meanwhile on Filmmaker Magazine: An Article About Web Series

An article I wrote for Filmmaker Magazine, Five Different Roads to a Web Series, is now online and ready for your eyeballs. I interviewed five filmmakers who turned their films (and a TV pilot) into web series. One of those filmmakers is Jacob Hensberry, whose Kickstarter campaign for his film, Planet X, was covered here and here.

Tis Not So Sweet Now As It Was Before

A million years ago I was in a community theater production of 12th Night.

Enter DUKE ORSINO, CURIO, and other Lords; Musicians attending.

I was one of the attending musicians--the only one, really. Duke Orsino delivered the famous passage that starts with --

If music be the food of love, play on...

--and I'd play this.

Apocalypse, Now? Serenity Now! A Clip

Apocalypse, Now!

The other night I was on the subway, on the way to meet with filmmaker Peter Olsen, who is directing a jaw-droppingly beautiful documentary The Singing Wilderness about nature writer Sigurd Olson, when a man of about thirty-five sat next to me. He put his earbuds in, took out his portable Playstation, and began playing some first person, military shoot ‘em up game. (I’m not a gamer at all.) I looked at the tiny monitor as his digital self found cover behind walls and blasted away at his digital nemesis.

Meanwhile on Filmmaker Magazine: The Up Films

Michael Apted's Up films are a great inspiration on my work. When I heard that the latest in the series (56 Up) was coming out this year, I had a brainstorm. What would it be like to watch all of those films (total running time, 13 hours) in 24 hours? I pitched the idea to Filmmaker Magazine and they liked it. 

Panic! Is It a Valuable Part of the Process?

Some of you may know that I'm making a documentary, A Life's Work. Currently, I'm editing. On the film's blog I've written quite a bit about the editing process, but I thought this post might be something some performing artist's could relate to. Am I right on this? Let me know.

In Search of Lost Time with Ross McElwee

I’ll be honest, when I first encountered Ross McElwee’s work I was less than thrilled. It wasn’t his fault. Well, maybe that’s not entirely true. It was his film, Sherman’s March, that I was responding to after all, but my response had more to do with where I was as a viewer at that time, and as John Landis said, “Everything about a movie is who you are and where you are when you saw it.”

Book Review: Zombie Movies: The Ultimate Guide

They come from Canada, the U.S., Mexico, Spain, Hong Kong, Japan, Italy (a LOT come from Italy), Pakistan and many other places around the world. They can be giant productions, like the upcoming Brad Pitt vehicle World War Z, reportedly costing more than $170 million, or made for practically nothing, such as Colin, which supposedly cost $70! (I’m sure that doesn’t include P&A.)

 

Interview with Filmmaker Kathy Leichter on Filmmaker Magazine

Over on the Filmmaker Magazine web site you can find an interview I conducted with documentary filmmaker Kathy Leichter. Kathy's film, Here One Day, was born out of grief, as was A Life's Work. Though our inspiration may have been the same, we made two very different films.

Let’s Get Creepy: Brothers Quay at MoMA

There’s really no point in me trying to convince you that the Quay Brothers exhibit at MoMA is worth your time and money. Either you find them deeply disturbing and you like them or you find them deeply disturbing and you don’t like them. However, since they are not a household name, I thought it might be useful to design a little quiz, a litmus test, really, so that you can decide whether or not they’re right for you.

"HUMBLE BEAUTY: Skid Row Artists" A Different Kind of L.A. Story

Full disclosure: I’m working as the Social Media & Crowdsource Consultant for the film HUMBLE BEAUTY: Skid Row Artists. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s move on to the interview with the directors, Judith Vogelsang and Leititia Popa Schwartz.

DL: Tell me a little bit about HUMBLE BEAUTY: Skid Row Artists. 

Judith: HUMBLE BEAUTY is the true story of how art saved the lives of talented homeless and very indigent men and women -- fine arts painters -- in the worst area of Los Angeles.

Take My Advice, Don't Take My Advice

Here's a recent email exchange I had with Andy Bowley, one of the fine, fine cinematographers who worked on my documentary, A Life's Work. How we arrived at this point in our back and forth doesn't matter. What matters is the content of this excerpt, which I think fits in nicely with the theme of the film and the blog.

Pulled from the Archives: Biz & Money Questions

Every few months or so, the editors at E.C. take a stroll through our archives and pull a group of interesting posts that are loosely related in theme to offer up to our readership for a second read. If you have a favorite post you'd like us to "pull from the archives," just email us and we'll try to locate it for you. Or, you could also just use the handy Search box in the right sidebar.

 

$146,500 for a Development Consultant?! by Rolando Teco

A Brave ACT at the Box Office by Duane Kelly

The Future of Independent Film Financing by David Licata

I Should Be So Lucky by Sara Pauley

There's a downside to operating "in the black." by Rolando Teco

New Straight Plays Bleed Red Ink on Broadway by Duane Kelly

How Steely Dan Is Helping Me Edit My Film

A while back I was chatting with a friend about A Life’s Work and I said music influenced  it, and all my work, in a big way. My friend asked me to elaborate and I couldn’t really articulate it at the time, but here’s an example of what I mean, with apologies to those of you who can't stomach Steely Dan. (I do understand why some folks hate this band, I really do.)

In May I stumbled upon a TV show called Classic Albums  and watched an episode devoted to Steely Dan’s Aja album. (My relationship with Steely Dan has been tumultuous: loved them in the 70s, hated them in the 80s, 90s, 00s, appreciate them now.) When it came time to talk about the guitar solo in Peg, my ears perked up. The studio solo by Jay Graydon is possibly my favorite rock and roll-fusion-jazz-whatever 26-seconds of guitar ever put down on vinyl. I would have said that no matter what decade I was in.

The Slasher Movie Book!

I had seen films in the theater before I was 17 years old, and I’ve even written about that experience here once before, but when I was 17, a perfect storm blew into my life. I finally had my driver’s license and a car, I lived in the suburbs and hung out with a group of bored, like-minded, teenage boys, and the Golden Age of the slasher film was about to begin. In the fall of 1978, John Carpenter unleashed Michael Myers on the world and the gruesome genre was born, big shiny knife in hand.

Meanwhile, on the Filmmaker Magazine Blog

In 1976 Werner Herzog hypnotized his cast of actors and directed one of the strangest narrative films in the history of cinema, Heart of Glass. Alan Greenberg, then a young writer, aspiring filmmaker, and Herzog disciple, was on the set, and thirty-odd years later he, and Herzog, would like to tell you all about it. Hence, Every Night the Trees Disappear: Werner Herzog and the Making of “Heart of Glass” (Chicago Review Press).