Collected Data
Watch: "How Star Wars was saved in the edit"
Two points that I think are worth adding; ALL Rough Cuts suck and EVERY film is saved in edit.
Watch "Mohamed Fahmy: Half Free" Sunday Oct 1 at 9pm on CBC-TV
Set against the spectre of growing global terrorism, and in an era of vicious attacks on press freedoms around the world, Mohamed Fahmy: Half Free is a character study of a Canadian-Egyptian journalist who went from covering one of the biggest stories in the world to becoming the story. It’s every reporter’s nightmare – jailed for pursuing the truth.
Mohamed Fahmy: Half Free
Sunday, October 1, 2017 at 9 PM on CBC-TV
UPDATE: Watch Mohamed Fahmy - Half Free
Watch: "Unsound Preview"
The internet has transformed the world, but there are unintended consequences. Now that people expect everything on the internet to be free, what are the consequences? As the music industry collapses from the consequences of FREE, so too has journalism. What are the impacts on society when all culture becomes free? Find out who really is benefitting from the so-called free internet.
Watch: "The Science of Editing: Just Instinct?"
Watch: "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story - Celebration Reel"
Watch: "DARTH BY DARTHWEST”
Watch: "Jaron Lanier: You Are Not a Gadget"
Jaron Lanier;
"FUNDING EDUCATION OR CULTURE THROUGH ADVERTISING IS LIKE TRYING TO GET NUTRITION BY CONNECTING A TUBE FROM YOUR BUTT TO YOUR MOUTH"
via Network Awesome
"Mr. Baillie creates a film that represents less the world as it seems to exist than one that’s been refracted through his being."
Manhole Dargis for the NYT;
In many respects, the image is perfectly ordinary, the kind that you chance on if you’re driving along, say, a California road, as Mr. Baillie was when he popped out of a car, seized by inspiration. Yet, as the camera continues to float left and Fitzgerald begins singing (“All my life/I’ve been waiting for you”), something magical — call it cinema — happens in the middle of the first verse. As the words “My wonderful one/I’ve begun” warm the soundtrack, a splash of red flowers on the fence suddenly appears, as if the film itself were offering you a garland.
Bruce Baillie, a Film-Poet Collapsing Inner and Outer Space
Watch: "The Husbands of River Song: Official TV Trailer - Doctor Who Christmas Special 2015"
Watch: "Cutting the Edge: Freedom in Framing"
A few thoughts;
While the author acknowledges that mixing aspect ratio’s predates digital, they under play how old of an idea it is. Cinematographer Robert Richardson was experimenting with this in the early 90’s. Long before even digital editing was the norm.
How many films today mix aspect ratios as a reality of having limited access to the IMAX format? IMAX is very expensive. Most American films that shoot IMAX only do so for select scenes.
Watch: "Noël Carroll on the paradox of horror"
There are entire industries dedicated to delivering frights, thrills and gross-outs. So why do audiences line up and pay up in droves to experience horror and disgust – two emotions almost universally thought of as negative? In this Aeon Interview, Noël Carroll, distinguished professor of philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY), dissects why horror fiction gets its hooks so deeply into audiences despite putting them in states of discomfort.
Noël Carroll on the paradox of horror
Watch: "Everything is a Remix Remastered"
Kirby Ferguson;
In the five years since the series launched, Everything is a Remix has been viewed over two million times and produced a popular TED Talk. Amazingly, Remix continues to change the way people think about creativity, originality, and copyright.
Watch: "Where To Invade Next" Trailer
Watch: "Chaos Cinema Parts 1 - 3" by Matthias Stork
The video essay Chaos Cinema, administered by Indiewire's journalistic blog PRESS PLAY, examines the extreme aesthetic principles of 21st century action films. These films operate on techniques that, while derived from classical cinema, threaten to shatter the established continuity formula. Chaos reigns in image and sound.
Watch: "Young Harlan Ellison Speaks"
Paul Gallagher;
In every generation there is a moment when some writer, artist, politician or whatever comes forward to announce that their generation is at the start of a revolution—some seismic shift in culture and society that will change everything for the better—forever. It’s rather like the way each generation appears to think it is the first to discover sex or sexuality and flaunts it through clothes, songs or horrendously written books.
A case in point is this roundtable discussion with a young Harlan Ellison from sometime in 1969-70, when the author declared “We’re in the midst of a revolution.”
HARLAN ELLISON IS REVOLTING: SPECULATIVE FICTION AND THE REVOLUTION OF THE MIND
Part 2, Part 3
Watch: "Sitting Down with the Director of 'Mad Max: Fury Road'"
Mad Max Fury Road is amazing.
Watch" Do Not Track" by Brett Gaylor
Do Not Track Press Kit;
Do Not Track is a personalized documentary series about privacy and the web economy. If you share data with us, we’ll show you what the web knows about you.
This documentary series will explore how information about you is collected and used. Every two weeks, we will release a personalized episode that explores a different aspect of how the modern web is increasingly a space where our movements, our speech and our identities are recorded and tracked.
We want to explore what this means to you, your family and your friends. From our mobile phones to social networks, personalized advertising to big data, each episode will have a different focus, a different voice and a different look.
Do Not Track
"Lipsett’s filmmaking opened new directions and possibilities"
A Trip Down Memory Lane by Arthur Lipsett, National Film Board of Canada
Brett Kashmere;
When Lipsett, fresh out of Montreal art school, was hired to work in the Unit B’s animation department in 1958, an independent avant-garde cinema did not exist in Canada. In the absence of tradition, Lipsett blazed a new trail. His pioneering collage films imparted exciting possibilities for handcrafted, personal, cameraless, and found footage filmmaking, both in his time and in the present day.
Inventing a Tradition: Arthur Lipsett and the NFB’s “Studio X”
Arthur Lipsett was a genius.
Watch: "Squarepusher Discusses his Ufabulum Live Show"
Squarepushers Damogen Furies is out today.
Surprisingly, Pitchfork didn’t hate it, but did give it a generic review.
Watch: "MESSAGE OF GREETINGS: PRIX SUISSE / MY THANKS / DEAD OR ALIVE" by JLG
More information and a transcription/translation…
Jean-Luc Godard's First 2015 Film: "MESSAGE OF GREETINGS: PRIX SUISSE / MY THANKS / DEAD OR ALIVE"
Watch: "Errol Morris Week"
Six new short Errol Morris films.
Also, a great interview…
The Grantland Q&A: Errol Morris
Watch: "The Science of Anti-Vaccination"
Watch: "Animal vs Rich"
From Season 5 of the Muppet Show. It aired in 1981. Buddy Rich was 64.
Watch: "Sätta Ljus - On the lighting of The Sacrifice/Offret"
via Cinephilia and Beyond.
Sven Nykvist;
A personal motto of mine is “It is never too late.” Many, as they reach the age of sixty start to feel as if they are at the end of themselves, the official retirement age is fast approaching. Thanks and goodbye. But, those of us who are freelance and rather independent often do not think along those lines. Creativity surely doesn’t cease at a certain age. Many artists, composers, authors, and filmmakers are still active will into their eighties—not to mention actors and actresses. The fact is that I received some of my most exciting assignments, and did some of my best movies, at an age usually associated with retirement. It began with Andrej Tarkovski’s The Sacrifice
Watch: "Reunion of Giants" Trailer
Watch: "Empathy, Neurochemistry, and the Dramatic Arc: Paul Zak at the Future of StoryTelling 2012"
Watch: "Old Dog, New Tricks" Timber Kings Season 2, Episode 1
Timber Kings - Old Dog, New Tricks
The video above is a Teaser for Season 2. To watch the episode, follow the link above.
Watch: "Baker's Best - 40 Years of The Fourth Doctor"
Watch: "The Beast of Turin" Trailer
Watch: "Drunken Master 2"
Cantonese audio but who cares. Just watch Jackie Chan move.
Released in North America as The Legend of Drunken Master.
Watch: "Jackie Chan - How to Do Action Comedy" by Tony Zhou
Tony Zhou;
The 9 Principles of Action Comedy
1. Start with a DISADVANTAGE
2. Use the ENVIRONMENT
3. Be CLEAR in your shots
4. Action & Reaction in the SAME frame
5. Do as many TAKES as necessary
6. Let the audience feel the RHYTHM
7. In editing, TWO good hits = ONE great hit
8. PAIN is humanizing
9. Earn your FINISH
Jackie Chan - How to Do Action Comedy
Jackie Chan, Buster Keaton and Gene Kelly are the three masters of physical action in film. No one else even comes close. You don’t edit a good action scene; you film it.
Watch: "Mummy On The Orient Express" Next Time Trailer - Doctor Who Series 8 Episode 8
"I’m not saying I’m like, ALLOWED to do this, I’m just saying this is what I do when I try to learn about staging,"
this filmmaker forgot more about staging by the time he made his first feature than I know to this day (for example, no matter how fast the cuts come, you always know exactly where you are—that's high level visual math shit).
Raiders
Raiders is a great film.
Watch: "Human Highway" Trailer
Human Highway (Director's Cut) Trailer from Shakey Pictures on Vimeo.
The original version of this film is horrible, except for this...
(via exclaim!)The flick features a (...) collaborative version of "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" with Devo (and Booji Boy).
Which is brilliant. I’ve been dreaming of soundtrack release for years.
Watch: "Inner Rush" by Christopher Romeike
Watch: "November 22, 1963" by Errol Morris
In a short film, Josiah “Tink” Thompson, who has been investigating the Kennedy assassination for nearly 50 years, looks to the photographic evidence. Will we ever know the truth?
‘November 22, 1963’
Errol Morris is brilliant.
Watch: "Infinite Schwarzenegger" by Rob Beschizza
Watch: "Situationist International"
Watch: "Very Nice, Very Nice"
Watch: "Am I a Good Man?" Dr Who Series 8 Trailer
The “feature length” first episode airs on August 23rd.
RIP Wolf Koenig
Documentary pioneer Wolf Koenig (pictured), who spent 47 years working at Canada’s National Film Board (NFB), has passed away at the age of 86.
Doc pioneer Wolf Koenig passes away
Mr Koenig was brilliant. He helped redefine cinema.
Lonely Boy by Wolf Koenig& by Roman Kroitor, National Film Board of Canada
Rest in peace.
Watch: "Twenty One in One"
Twenty One In One from movies4machines on Vimeo.
A mash up of the 21 videos made as part of Project 53.
movies4machines