Absolut Mango

More specifics about panels an films at Sundance in a later post, but I wanted to share some of the non-cinema highlights of the festival.

Along Main Street in Park City many storefronts are taken over by sponsors- The New York Lounge was where I saw Susan Sarandon and Pierce Brosnan as I stopped in for a bagel. The music pavilion was where I saw Paris Hilton running from photographers, and just down from the Egyptian Theater was the Queer Lounge sponsored by Absolut Mango.

The Queer Lounge was a great place to hang between shows and panels. For a small donation you could drink all the Absolut Mango vodka you wanted- too mango-y and not vodka-y enough for my taste- and meet a lot of interesting people, queer and not. We met folks from Pixar, who made a little film called Wall-E this year, and just regular film fans who stopped by for a drink.

Just like this post, the Queer Lounge was a nice place to stop and change your mind.

PeterH

Sundance Short Documentary Program

This post was lifted from an email I sent my Flashpoint Academy Documentary students after seeing the Short Doc. program yesterday.

Hello From Sundance,

I have been to six screenings so far and by far the best one was the short documentary program. There were 8 films selected out of 1200 entries. Just think about that 8 out of 1200. The only one you will be likely to see is an HBO Documentary on the actor John Cazale- Fredo from the Godfather. It was great, but it was also the longest and by far the most expensive, and it didn't seem to fit in with the other seven films as it was the most commercial.

A few trends I noticed:

Lots of graphics. Two films were originally designed for the Internet and were all graphics and/or found footage- one about nuclear weapons and the other about Internet censorship.

A third film was about a Canadian artist and they shot an interview, but the entire piece was animated. Very beautiful and poetic.

Another trend- recording dialog and interviews separately and shooting B-roll. No on camera interviews. Two films I saw- one was shot with a digital still camera and the other about people who store their belongings in public storage in Scotland- recorded their interviews on a digital disc recorder separate from shooting.

This is very interesting to me because of the emphasis it puts on the B-Roll. The Scottish storage locker film was great because of the images they shot, and perhaps because there were no talking heads or faces.

There was a fascinating film called Utopia Part 3 about the world's largest shopping mall- in China. The mall is a bust, no one goes, there are only a few stores open, but it really illustrates some of the problems China is having with growth and capitalism.

After the HBO/Cazale film perhaps the most traditional doc. was about high school kids in New Orleans post-Katrina. The filmmaker followed three students who were attending school even though they were living by themselves- their parents and siblings had moved or been taken to foster care. The filmmaker said that 20 percent of students at the school lived without their parents.

The final film- and one I hope I don't have to see again- is called Chop Off. It's about a performance artist who chops off body parts as his art. Very tough to watch- no amputations on screen- and full of medical and media ethics questions.

Those are the 8 films out of 1200 that made it. Just seeing them makes me want to explore some of these techniques and shoot more film.

PeterH

Sundance Film Festival

Hello from Park City, Utah. I am at the Sundance Film Festival with Flashpoint Academy Academic Dean Paula Froehle. It's my first Sundance experience and so far it has been a lot of fun, very informative, and we even got some business done.

Details and pictures will follow- the dumb filmmaker can't get his pictures off his camera until he returns to Chicago. Here is a quick rundown of our first 36 hours.

• Two film screenings- a bad collection of shorts, and great Korean documentary called Old Partner about a farmer and his 40 year old ox.
  
• Two very interesting panels- one on new ways independent filmmakers can self-distribute their films, the other hosted by Variety and the Illinois Film Office- 30% tax breaks to shoot in Illinois!- about 10 directors to watch.
• Lots of hanging out talking film, talking film business.
• A great debate, about the film Doubt, though I think it was determined (I determined) that Betsy Steinberg, head of the Illinois Film Office, and I were right about what happened to Phillip Seymour Hoffman's character and everyone else is completely wrong.
• Celebrity sightings: Pierce Brosnan, Susan Sarandon, Perry Farrell, Paris Hilton, Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
  

More later, more specifics and pics.

PeterH

Got Film If You Want It

As Chair of the Film/Broadcast Department at Flashpoint Academy it has been a personal mission of mine to have our students shoot film. Typically we shoot HD, but this fall, thanks to Kodak, our advanced cinematography students shot some super 16mm. After seeing the rushes I felt confident that we could shoot our own film, so last Wednesday production began on October Surprise, Flashpoint Academy's 3rd Production-in-Action.

October Surprise is a film set in a TV news room on the eve of a presidential election. Some mysterious photos of the leading candidate have appeared and there is a rush to see if they are real or fake.

Our advanced students are doing the heavy lifting on this film. Supported by key professional crew members, our students are shooting film. Production wraps this Thursday, then a much deserved winter break. More details and photos to follow.

PeterH

BTW Got Live If You Want It was the name of the Rolling Stones first live record, so I borrowed the title for this post for our first film.

Studs

Studs died.

Jesus wept.

Hello again, it's been awhile, give me a break I have been busy. I'll give you a recap of life since September in another post, but first a few words about Studs Terkel.

I met Studs when he agreed to read a children's version of Icarus and Daedalus for my TV show Rainbow Soup. http://www.rainbowsoup.tv/video.html
We shot him in his house- like everyone did the last years of his life. A few brief memories:

1) He left a message on my answering machine, "Peter, this is Studs. Sure, I'll read the story, let's set it up." I was in a parking lot in Baltimore checking my messages when I got it. I must have played it back a dozen times just to hear, "Peter, this is Studs."

2) I was at his house a short time after his wife died. His phone rang and it was a solicitor asking for his wife. He explained she had recently died, the solicitor didn't miss a beat and started to pitch Studs on whatever he was selling. Studs politely declined and hung up. He turned to me and said, "That happens all the time. They don't hear me say she is dead."

3) Just as we started rolling he was telling a story, I don't recall it, but the only part we have on film is Studs saying, "Wilt Chamberlin, Harold Washington and me- what an unholy trinity." I have no idea the context, but I laughed and you can hear me off camera.

4) At the end of the piece I asked Studs advice he would give young people. He thought for a moment an said, "Read. Read Twain and Shakespeare."

Good advice, thanks Studs.

PeterH

Peter Gabriel- Witness

When I met Peter Gabriel at the Womad Festival back in 2001 he rounded a corner wearing a loose windbreaker and was carrying a small video camera. We shook hands and the entire time he kept filming me. It was very disconcerting and more than a little odd. But it kept me honest- it is a true document of our first meeting.

After a moment I looked at the camera and then at him and said, "Do you have permission to do that?" He didn't laugh, but instead asked if I was going to stop him.

That was my introduction to Peter Gabriel.

In addition to all his great music, Gabriel is known for pushing the envelope of technology- both music and film. Look at those videos from 20+ years ago, they are amazing today. He is also known for being a human rights advocate. He has combined both of those passions to promote the idea that the camera tells the truth and can (and has been) be used to help prevent human rights violations.

He can say it much better than I can, so watch this 14 minute long presentation if you care at all about telling the truth.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/peter_gabriel_fights_injustice_with_video.html

PeterH

The Suits

There was a really depressing article in Friday's Wall Street Journal about how Warner Brothers- in part based on the success of the last two Batman films- is going to make fewer, more expensive films, and are going to mine DC Comics for characters. Warner Brothers currently produces 25 t 26 films per year, and will cut back to 20 to 22 films a year- with as many as eight "tent pole" films to be based on DC Comic characters.

Oy.

Is this short sighted? Warners recently closed its two art house labels- Warner Independent Pictures and Picturehouse. Evidently the films produced by the these entities: Goodnight and Good Luck, Before Sunset, In the Valley of Elah, La Vie en Rose, The Notorious Betty Page, Pan's Labyrinth didn't fit the new Warner's model. Maybe if Edith Piaf and Edward R. Morrow had been comic book characters things would be different.

Read the article and weep.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121936107614461929.html?mod=2_1168_1

PeterH