It wasn’t enough that Mark Gill, The Film Department, got so much of the story mixed up in his high strung remarks at the Los Angeles Film Festival recently. We can let that go. But now the New York Times wants to echo those comments and grant them its sober imprimatur. That calls for some comment.

The lack of thoughtful analysis is equally striking in both reports and that’s really a disservice to artists who work in film and video as well as their audiences. We understand that perspectives can get influenced by experience and social settings, but one would expect thoughtful perspectives to rise above that. Personally, I am left with the sense that they really don’t have a very profound understanding of either filmed entertainment or the film business. But whatever happens, let’s not let what they are talking about be confused with the strength and vitality of independent film.

First, however, let’s note that this flurry of excitement in the press was preceeded by our first blog post “Fiddling While Rome Burns” (2008-05-14) and our second “What Theatrical Exhibition Tries To Do” (2008-05-26), both of which address the economics that these two articles studiously avoid. So let’s go back over the arguments … (more…)

IndiePix has announced the formation of IndiePix Studios and has announced its location on the web at www.indiepixstudios.com. This new force and this new location on the internet will be the focal point for IndiePix’s connection with its growing number of filmmakers. We want this effort to be an online ‘virtual studio’ which will enable independent filmmakers to submit their films for distribution via IndiePixFilms.com. In addition, filmmakers will be able to monitor sales and accounting statements, review contracts, network with other filmmakers from around the world, and review news and information concerning independent film. Over 10,000 independent films are made and submitted to film festivals each year and of those only about two per cent are ever presented to consumers through theatrical screenings, DVD releases or television broadcast. The new IndiePix Studios will provide a major new production and distribution outlet for these filmmakers.

IndiePix works directly with a number of independent filmmakers every year to provide vital production and finishing funds for film projects and the new website aims to formalise this submission and financing process. (more…)

Starting from this morning and moving backwards, I will give a partial recap of my first SilverDocs up to this point (this point being a cheesy Mexican restaurant in the strip mall Disneyland that is SILVER SPRING, where I am finally able to log onto a network called “Eggspectation,” a restaurant next door.) As children dance in fountains and groups of slightly overweight families enjoy their Old Navy apparel, I am about to get my head around the last couple of days. In those last two sentences, I have written “I” three different times, which firmly positions me as “blogger” rather than “journalist.” I bring this up because it was the most interesting, and perhaps provocative, point made at the panel I attended this morning called “Film Critics: Main Street vs. The Blogosphere.” Moderated by former Washington Post critic Desson Thomson , the panelists — Indiepix friend and associate Aj Schnack of All These Wonderful Things ; my personal heroine of blogging, Karina Longworth of Spout Blog, the well-respected Anthony Kaufman , a freelancer who has contributed to Indiewire, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times ; the renowned blogeeek Scott Kirsner of Cinematech , and Sandy Mandelberger of International Media Resources . Though some of the panel retreaded old ground (”Which four blogs would you go to if you lived in a Communist country and were only allowed that many?”), there were many interesting discussions, which arose out of Mandelberger defining the dichotomy between journalism and blogging as resting on what he called “The I Factor.” As he described blogs he had seen being personal recaps such as “When I was drunk last night. . . ” (A blog style I personally have found myself falling into), I watched Karina’s face intently, eagerly awaiting her sure-to-be-witty, sharp as nails response. I was not disappointed. Without seeming angry (one must imagine that Karina deals with this strand of criticism all the time), Karina agreed that she sees herself as less of a journalist than as a stand-up comic or radio DJ, an arbiter and curator of taste whose mission is to make the audience care about film. As opposed to many other writers, Karina noted, her personality itself is a commodity that she uses to champion indie films otherwise left in the shadows of the film festival circuit. Spout, she noted, has always been committed to being transparent about the fact that they ARE people with subjectivities, rather than purporting to espouse some sort of objective truth. (more…)

In the metamorphous cosmos of the media arts, cinema has taken antecedence in the alchemical melding of artistic disciplines. Actor, welder, woodcarver, lawyer, doctor, editor, designer - and a hundred more roles come together in the composition of a narrative film. Infectious and enduring in its spidery reach, film has tainted media that existed before it, like black ink spilled on watercolor. (I continue to admire fine art students - the aspiring painters and sculptors - for choosing the road less traveled in this electronic age). When talking to a close friend about what he believed the next great artistic medium would be, he answered: “video games”. If film is the medium of the times, and the net is to be used as lubricant between the present and next big medium, the ability to “walk into” a movie should be no surprise. Yet while virtual reality may now sound like a dated (and never quite realized) concept, it is the antique artistic form - such as theater, that appears to be evolving into a strange crossbreed of past and future. Take the trailer for Grzegorz Jarzyna’s imperial stage production of MACBETH for St. Ann’s Warehouse this summer. The very fact that a stage production of Shakespeare’s darkest play is promoted with a trailer that plays (aptly) like a David Lynch film, may just be a sign of the times. Dizzying with blood, subtitled and onyx-quick, the promo adopts the lexicon not of the theater, but of the moving image; I’d be hard-pressed to distinguish it stylistically from a preview for SAW, or any number of worms oozing out of the current horror movie bag. Indeed, the production itself is stained with the beauties of multimedia; a blurb on St. Ann’s website proclaims “A dramatic two-story set, video walls, special effects, an extraordinary, layered soundscape, and a deep well of acting tradition transform Shakespeare’s web of intimacy, politics and the supernatural into a contemporary living film“. It’s Jarzyna’s brilliance as a director that will allow him to rule over the blood and drama, but I wonder, then, if The New Audience, programmed with efficient new eyes (designed by the times!)- will expect to see a “filmic play”? What will they demand to see, then, with these eyes, and what will theater, or painting, or sculpture, become in the next ten years for it? Or twenty? Or thirty…? Or…

Proving to be nearly as intrepid as postmen, the Rooftop Films staff, volunteers, and panelists ignored the torrential downpour and flood watch conditions on Saturday and still pulled off a stimulating, fun, and surprisingly packed event. Though the rain started just as the panel was scheduled to, filmlovers came out anyway, waiting patiently while the Rooftop-ers set up inside their rain space, a massive and lovely garage space. Though it started a half hour behind schedule, the panel that I had the opportunity to moderate, “Cinema and Social Justice , was honestly the best I have ever sat on. It was a broad topic, but the panelists (four of the biggest documentary rockstars I can think of — P.O.V. Executive Director Simon Kilmurry, Tribeca Gucci Fund head Ryan Harrington, Katy Chevigny, director of ELECTION DAY and mastermind behind Arts Engine, and filmmaker-activist-non-profit diva Esther Robinson (A WALK INTO THE SEA: DANNY WILLIAMS AND THE WARHOL FACTORY) all brought something new to their microphones, addressing everything from how to define a social justice film, the shifting landscape of funding, and how to react if you despise some of your interview subjects.
For more photos of the event, check out Rooftop Board Member Sarah Palmer’s fine photography here

A few days ago, Sheila Nevins (the head of HBO’s documentary production and programming unit) commented that:

“We do great box office with our docus. It’s just that our box office is in your home where you don’t have to drive, pay money for gas, find a place to park or buy popcorn. For years, I’ve had people come into my office, desperate to sit in an empty theater and watch their documentary play on the big screen. I think what we have to offer is better.” (LA Times, June 10)

The question I would like to raise is — what does “better” mean?
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