9 posts tagged “documentary”
Season 2 of This American Life TV show starts on Sunday but because of my job I have already seen the season premiere and it is really quite amazing, something that could not have been done on the radio show. Good work, TAL - looking forward to another amazing TV season!
The movie is well put together and sweet and not any longer than it needs to be.
BUT the very special thing about this movie is the fantastic story of it's distribution because it is probably one of the first feature films really suited for web distribution.
What happened (as far as I can tell ) is that they started making a video podcast about the making of the movie to get generate some interest outside of the indy filmfest scene. Great timing, because a lot of people were talking about videos on the internet and looking for something interesting, unusual, worth watching repeatedly, more than 'viral'..etc. These people loved the Four Eyed Monsters podcast. And so this film truly found it's audience by going online. The The storyline couldn't be more perfect for the videbloggers (and bloggers,YouTubers, myspacers, et al.) because it's about being young and getting frustrated by trying to communicate with eachother and the world (such classic youthful angst) with the unique addition of the uber-mediated day-to-day existence many of us now have.
People on the internets not only watched the podcast but they rallied and helped the film get some nice theatrical distribution by, well... using the internet to say they wanted to see the movie that this podcast was about. AND now, the filmmakers have made a deal with YouTube to host the entire film for a week to drive people to an online film community who will then pay them for every new member they bring in. Talk about flipping the system upside down.
Last summer I met the nice hipsters who made it and they recognized me from a video of me on the internets, and I them! That was funny because I am a very very minor internet celebrity, like D-list internet celebrity which is like Z-list for over all celebritatstic-ness. And that is what this whole online video thing is about, right? !
A few questions remain..
What is YouTube's long term strategy for feature length videos?
Will the filmmakers ever pay off their credit debt?
Will this promotion make Sprout.com the next cool online hangout?
Would it pay off for Sprout to do similar promotions for other filmmakers? and if so how many times before they start devouring their own tail?
How could other websites or content makers create similar deals?
Is being on the Z list awesome? That's an easy one - YES, it F'n Rocks!
What kind of camera(s) do you own?
SO MANY CAMERAS
TOO MANY CAMERAS!
I have one for every mood.
Many toy and plastic still cameras, super 8 film cameras, plus vintage yashica twin lense, 2 Polaroid SX70s, and a 1940 Lieca.
Yesterday I got a Flip video digital camera as a gift. it is perfect for videoblogging here is what I filmed:
The Anaheim Ballet get's it.
They produced a great series of videos specifically for YouTube and MySpace (link) promotions.
The clips are great, the production is really nice and simple. It's just short videos of their company in rehearsal spaces in rehearsal clothes just showing what makes dance so awesome -
bodies moving in space, defying gravity.
Then there's edutaining series of dancer profiles and interviews with members of the company answering your most pressing ballet questions like - What's up with men in tights?
I have always had a thing for ballet men! A number of my childhood crushes were on dancers in the Richmond Ballet company. Sigh!
Went to one of my favorite contemporary art museums PS1, today to see the art of Vic Muniz (which, of course, is great), but there are a number of other really worth while shows there right now.
I really liked the idea of the Emergency Room (I am not going to explain this well so you can look at the daily blog for more information). Essentially, it is a group of artists creating new works each day of the exhibition based on the news of the day. Sort of turned out like a live action blog.
There was a performance today for the 'birthday' of Iraq's independence with cake and readings of the names of Iraqi citizens who have died durring out occupation and prayers for them, while a trumpet played happy birthday, sounds cheezy but it was actually effecting in the space. The room where the daily exhibitions/performances take place is round. I wish this was a permanent installation. I wish there was an Emergency Room franchise, where each neighborhood or town had a round room and everyday people could come in and make something together to respond to the world and it's events as they were experiencing it that particular day.
I also saw, the photos of Tom Sandberg, really really beautiful and there was a group show which included a number of big names but what was special about it is not the works of art in themselves but the explanations by the artists of why this particular work of art is not for sale.
But what really got me was a manifesto typewritten and posted on a wall in the Jonas Mekas exhibition.
Click to read the entire Anti-100 years of cinema manifesto by Jonas MekasIn the times of bigness, spectaculars, one hundred million movie productions, I want to speak for the small, invisible acts of human spirit, so subtle, so small, that they die when brought out under the clean lights. I want to celebrate the small forms of cinema, the lyrical form, the poem, the watercolor, etude, sketch, portrait, arabesque, and bagatelle, and little 8mm songs. In the times when everybody wants to succeed and sell, I want to celebrate those who embrace social and daily tailor to pursue the invisible, the personal things that bring no money and no bread and make no contemporary history, art history or any other history. I am for art which we do for each other, as friends.
I am standing in the middle of the information highway and laughing, because a butterfly on a little flower somewhere in China just fluttered its wings, and I know that the entire history, culture will drastically change because of that fluttering. A super-8 millimeter camera just made a little soft buzz somewhere, somewhere on the lower east side of New York, and the world will never be the same.
The real history of cinema is invisible history. History of friends getting together, doing the thing they love.
I felt a little choked up when I read it in the gallery but was quickly distracted by watching the actual videos.
When I found it online this evening, I read it to my friend over the phone and wept, there is more context to it then that but I don't think i need to put any further explanation here as the writing speaks for itself.
Now go look at his films...
Jonas Mekas recently launched his own online video gallery with many of his films dating from the 60's to literally today, available for download (link).
Sexy, because glitter covered cleavage is generally considered so, and funny because this image was selected randomly when I uploaded the video. Vox is naughty!
Sexy, Funny, is also the working title for the documentary series which, I will finally get down to editing this weekend.
I cut this tease from interviews and performances of two tip-top burlesque performers, Miss Clams Casino and Little Brooklyn. The shoots were produced by myself and Ilise Carter. We'll have about a 3O min film once the individual episodes are all put together!
If you are not yet a fan of This American Life you will be. This is the weekly radio show (now podcast, and soon to be TV show !) where Ira Glass brings you amazing and true tales from Sara Vowell, David Sedaris, John Hodgman, Julia Sweeney and so many other great storytellers. The best episodes give you that feeling of sitting on a barstool listening to your most entertaining friend spin a yarn. Sometime laugh-out-loud funny, sometimes dramatic or sad I almost always find myself engrossed. When I first heard it on the radio in DC (6 years ago, maybe?), I would stay home on Saturday evening in order to make a cassette tape recording to send to my parents in Virginia, where it was not yet syndicated. But you don't have to do that because we got new fangled technology to go with our old fashioned storytelling now!!
Subscribe to the weekly audio podcast via itunes or cut and paste the following link into your RSS feed reader:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/podcast.xml
Here is the man himself, Ira (the glasses) Glass, doing what he does best, talking about something.
Photo: Richard Frank
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/podcast.xml
Sorry for all the parenthetical annotation. It's a lazy way to write, I know, but, I am tired. goodnight.
