From Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the Oscar-winning filmmakers of “The Times of Harvey Milk” and “Common Threads: Stories From the Quilt,” the documentary “Taylor Mac’s 24-Decade History of Popular Music” is something of a CliffsNotes version of the performance artist’s mammoth, Pulitzer Prize-shortlisted day-long musical revue that encompassed 246 songs culled from 1776 to 2016. Filming took place during its world premiere between Oct. 8 and 9, 2016, at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, N.Y. Since then, the piece has been staged as four 6-hour shows.
“Maybe you noticed, this is my subjective take on history,” Mac said during the live set. “I am not interested in this show being about history as much as I am interested in it being about all of us in this room have a lot of history on our backs and we’re trying to figure out what to do with it.”
This little nugget...
“Maybe you noticed, this is my subjective take on history,” Mac said during the live set. “I am not interested in this show being about history as much as I am interested in it being about all of us in this room have a lot of history on our backs and we’re trying to figure out what to do with it.”
This little nugget...
- 6/15/2023
- by Martin Tsai
- The Wrap
It's the final episode as Manuel has worked his way through all the Lgbt-themed HBO productions.
I began this project because, after watching and recapping Looking here, I became fascinated with the idea that, with that Andrew Haigh show, the cable network had somehow reached peak gay TV even as it also managed to alienate the very viewers it was trying to coax. I wanted to, in a way, put Looking in context by watching everything HBO had produced and aired that had tackled Lgbt issues.
This required a lot of scavenging—despite their shiny HBOGo and HBO Now ventures, a lot of the network’s older and more obscure TV movies and shows remain unattainable. And so I reached back and watched a lot of not so great TV movies from the early 80s, caught up with key “very special episodes” of their most well-known dramas and comedies, and...
I began this project because, after watching and recapping Looking here, I became fascinated with the idea that, with that Andrew Haigh show, the cable network had somehow reached peak gay TV even as it also managed to alienate the very viewers it was trying to coax. I wanted to, in a way, put Looking in context by watching everything HBO had produced and aired that had tackled Lgbt issues.
This required a lot of scavenging—despite their shiny HBOGo and HBO Now ventures, a lot of the network’s older and more obscure TV movies and shows remain unattainable. And so I reached back and watched a lot of not so great TV movies from the early 80s, caught up with key “very special episodes” of their most well-known dramas and comedies, and...
- 5/11/2016
- by Manuel Betancourt
- FilmExperience
Last week we enjoyed the eloquent musings of one Stephen Sondheim and quibbled over whether Todd Haynes’s intentionally queasy and dizzying take on “I’m Still Here” was worth including in James Lapine’s documentary on the Broadway composer. This week we’re taking a break from our regular programming and going back in time to celebrate one of HBO’s earliest Oscar victories.
As you may or may not know, films produced by HBO have won over 20 Oscars. Last year alone, HBO dominated both documentary categories with Citizenfour and Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 emerging victorious in their respective categories. And so, let us travel back to March 1990 when Robert Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (discussed here) won the Best Documentary Oscar. [More...]...
As you may or may not know, films produced by HBO have won over 20 Oscars. Last year alone, HBO dominated both documentary categories with Citizenfour and Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 emerging victorious in their respective categories. And so, let us travel back to March 1990 when Robert Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (discussed here) won the Best Documentary Oscar. [More...]...
- 1/13/2016
- by Manuel Betancourt
- FilmExperience
People of a certain age (i.e. “Old”) will remember when in the early days of HBO, a weird ,wild animated film called Twice Upon a Time made the rounds. Many paid it heed because it was executive produced by George Lucas, currently in the process of imprinting our childhoods with a new mythology. But except for a laserdisc and VHS release, the film rather fell off the table, save for dedicated maniacs who remembered it fondly.
Warner Archives, print-on-demand masters of unearthing lost bits of cinema and making them available to the masses, have achieved the impossible and presented the world with a brand new release of the film, unearthing both audio tracks, and getting many of the animators together for a commentary track, including Henry Selick, who has gone on to great things like Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas, and in that order.
Warner Archives, print-on-demand masters of unearthing lost bits of cinema and making them available to the masses, have achieved the impossible and presented the world with a brand new release of the film, unearthing both audio tracks, and getting many of the animators together for a commentary track, including Henry Selick, who has gone on to great things like Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas, and in that order.
- 9/30/2015
- by Vinnie Bartilucci
- Comicmix.com
Manuel is working his way through all the Lgbt-themed films & miniseries produced and distributed by HBO.
Last week we looked at the quietly touching film Tidy Endings (1988), written and starring Harvey Fierstein and a must-see for Stockard Channing completists. We’re not going far this week, since much of HBO’s early Lgbt output tried to grapple with the AIDS epidemic that had dominated the cultural conversation about gay men in the 1980s.
Did you know that films produced by HBO have won over 20 Oscars? This past year alone, HBO dominated both documentary categories with Citizenfour and Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 emerging victorious. It has been a stealth awards run which Sheila Nevins (currently the president of HBO Documentary Films but her involvement stretches back to 1979) has all but nurtured herself.
Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (1989)
Written & Directed by: Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman (based on the book, The...
Last week we looked at the quietly touching film Tidy Endings (1988), written and starring Harvey Fierstein and a must-see for Stockard Channing completists. We’re not going far this week, since much of HBO’s early Lgbt output tried to grapple with the AIDS epidemic that had dominated the cultural conversation about gay men in the 1980s.
Did you know that films produced by HBO have won over 20 Oscars? This past year alone, HBO dominated both documentary categories with Citizenfour and Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 emerging victorious. It has been a stealth awards run which Sheila Nevins (currently the president of HBO Documentary Films but her involvement stretches back to 1979) has all but nurtured herself.
Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (1989)
Written & Directed by: Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman (based on the book, The...
- 5/27/2015
- by Manuel Betancourt
- FilmExperience
By Michelle McCue and Gary Salem
On Wednesday, the Academy featured the 2014 Oscar-nominated films in the Documentary Short Subject and Documentary Feature categories.
Clips from the nominated films were screened, and nominees for all 10 films took part in panel discussions, talking about their own films and sharing insights on the craft of documentary filmmaking and the greater issues their nominated films explore.
Two-time Oscar winner and Academy documentary branch governor Rob Epstein opened the evening with the documentary shorts.
Epstein won the Oscar for documentary feature in 1984 for The Times Of Harvey Milk and in 1989 for Common Threads: Stories From The Quilt. His other credits include Lovelace (2013) and the TV documentary “And The Oscar Goes To…” (2014)
During his opening remarks, Epstein said the theme that ran through the nominated shorts were “life beginning and life ending.”
All the filmmakers conceded the Cinéma vérité was what was so powerful, so intimate.
On Wednesday, the Academy featured the 2014 Oscar-nominated films in the Documentary Short Subject and Documentary Feature categories.
Clips from the nominated films were screened, and nominees for all 10 films took part in panel discussions, talking about their own films and sharing insights on the craft of documentary filmmaking and the greater issues their nominated films explore.
Two-time Oscar winner and Academy documentary branch governor Rob Epstein opened the evening with the documentary shorts.
Epstein won the Oscar for documentary feature in 1984 for The Times Of Harvey Milk and in 1989 for Common Threads: Stories From The Quilt. His other credits include Lovelace (2013) and the TV documentary “And The Oscar Goes To…” (2014)
During his opening remarks, Epstein said the theme that ran through the nominated shorts were “life beginning and life ending.”
All the filmmakers conceded the Cinéma vérité was what was so powerful, so intimate.
- 2/20/2015
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
©A.M.P.A.S.
In the week leading up to the Academy Awards, movie fans in the Hollywood area will get an up close look at the nominees from six of the categories competing at the 87th Oscars.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will present their annual series of public programs celebrating this year’s nominees in the Animated Feature Film, Documentary Feature, Documentary Short Subject, Foreign Language Film, Makeup and Hairstyling, and Short Film categories.
See the full list of nominees here.
The various hosts chosen for each symposium have all earned their Oscar street cred by being involved with Oscar nominated or winning films and all events will be held at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
If you’re in the Southern California area, check out the Oscar Week schedule:
Oscar Week: Shorts
Tuesday, February 17, 7 p.m.
Hosted by Sean Astin.
In the week leading up to the Academy Awards, movie fans in the Hollywood area will get an up close look at the nominees from six of the categories competing at the 87th Oscars.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will present their annual series of public programs celebrating this year’s nominees in the Animated Feature Film, Documentary Feature, Documentary Short Subject, Foreign Language Film, Makeup and Hairstyling, and Short Film categories.
See the full list of nominees here.
The various hosts chosen for each symposium have all earned their Oscar street cred by being involved with Oscar nominated or winning films and all events will be held at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
If you’re in the Southern California area, check out the Oscar Week schedule:
Oscar Week: Shorts
Tuesday, February 17, 7 p.m.
Hosted by Sean Astin.
- 2/4/2015
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
By Anjelica Oswald
Managing Editor
For almost 30 years, Mark Landis forged artwork and passed it off as his own to various museums around the country. It wasn’t until Matthew Leininger, a registrar at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, investigated the pieces in 2008 that the forgery was exposed. Leininger dedicated his time to investigating Landis further, and the scale of forgeries was revealed in 2012. Both men are featured in Art and Craft, a documentary about Landis, directed by Jennifer Grausman and Sam Cullman and co-directed by Mark Becker. Because Landis never sold his work to the museums, only donated the works in what he calls acts of “philanthropy”, he was never prosecuted.
The Hollywood Reporter’s John DeFore said, “The film will appeal to art lovers, but some viewers who can hardly tell their Cezannes from Chagalls will find the story fascinating as well.”
The film was picked by...
Managing Editor
For almost 30 years, Mark Landis forged artwork and passed it off as his own to various museums around the country. It wasn’t until Matthew Leininger, a registrar at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, investigated the pieces in 2008 that the forgery was exposed. Leininger dedicated his time to investigating Landis further, and the scale of forgeries was revealed in 2012. Both men are featured in Art and Craft, a documentary about Landis, directed by Jennifer Grausman and Sam Cullman and co-directed by Mark Becker. Because Landis never sold his work to the museums, only donated the works in what he calls acts of “philanthropy”, he was never prosecuted.
The Hollywood Reporter’s John DeFore said, “The film will appeal to art lovers, but some viewers who can hardly tell their Cezannes from Chagalls will find the story fascinating as well.”
The film was picked by...
- 12/19/2014
- by Anjelica Oswald
- Scott Feinberg
By Anjelica Oswald
Managing Editor
Where feature filmmakers head into a project with a script and a plan, the path for documentarians is unpredictable. They follow real subjects and real issues often in real time — and sometimes for years at a time — and piece everything together as the footage comes along. Sometimes, things fall apart or the subject has to change, such as it with Alex Gibney’s The Armstrong Lie (2013). Though different skill sets go into the distinct film forms, some documentary filmmakers choose to transition to narrative features and vice versa, such as Spike Lee, whose next release will be a documentary titled Go Brasil Go!.
Rob Epstein and Jeff Friedman have made the jump from documentaries to feature films and have said that they intend on continuing to make both types of film. Epstein and Friedman won an Oscar for their first co-directed documentary, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt...
Managing Editor
Where feature filmmakers head into a project with a script and a plan, the path for documentarians is unpredictable. They follow real subjects and real issues often in real time — and sometimes for years at a time — and piece everything together as the footage comes along. Sometimes, things fall apart or the subject has to change, such as it with Alex Gibney’s The Armstrong Lie (2013). Though different skill sets go into the distinct film forms, some documentary filmmakers choose to transition to narrative features and vice versa, such as Spike Lee, whose next release will be a documentary titled Go Brasil Go!.
Rob Epstein and Jeff Friedman have made the jump from documentaries to feature films and have said that they intend on continuing to make both types of film. Epstein and Friedman won an Oscar for their first co-directed documentary, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt...
- 9/23/2014
- by Anjelica Oswald
- Scott Feinberg
Today is Wear It Purple Day, which asks people to simply wear the color purple in support of Lgbt equality. It's appropriate then that we continue our celebration of 1989 today with a look at that year's Oscar winner for Best Documentary. Glenn is joined in a conversation by friend of The Film Experience and doco-expert Daniel Walber, writer for Nonfics and Film School Rejects.
Glenn: Daniel, thank you for joining us. While I would obviously love to hear your thoughts on the film, I think I would be just as interested to hear about how well you think Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt sits amongst Oscar's documentary history. So few films about gay issues have even been nominated, yet alone won (the only other winner of its kind is The Times of Harvey Milk, also by Rob Epstein), but does Common Threads hold up as a winner? And furthermore,...
Glenn: Daniel, thank you for joining us. While I would obviously love to hear your thoughts on the film, I think I would be just as interested to hear about how well you think Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt sits amongst Oscar's documentary history. So few films about gay issues have even been nominated, yet alone won (the only other winner of its kind is The Times of Harvey Milk, also by Rob Epstein), but does Common Threads hold up as a winner? And furthermore,...
- 8/29/2014
- by Glenn Dunks
- FilmExperience
For the five days leading up to the Oscars on March 2, the academy will showcase nominees in the Animated Feature Film, Documentary, Foreign Language Film, Makeup and Short Film categories. The events at the academy's Samuel Goldwyn theater will include screenings, film clips and discussions with the nominated filmmakers and artists. On the evening of Tuesday Feb. 25, Kevin Pollak will host a screening of the five nominees in each of the Animated Short and Live Action Short categories and lead a discussion with the filmmakers. On Wednesday evening, Oscar-winning filmmakers Rob Epstein ("The Times of Harvey Milk"; "Common Threads: Stories From the Quilt") and Barbara Kopple ("Harlan County, USA"; "American Dream") will steer a conversation with those nominated for both Documentary Short Subject and Documentary Feature awards. On Thursday evening, there will be a concert featuring selections from the no...
- 2/4/2014
- Gold Derby
The 86th Academy Awards are just 30 days away! Still deciding on your favorites? Go Here for a list of the nominees.
The Academy has announced it will present a slate of public events leading up to the 86th Oscars where they’ll be celebrating this year’s nominees. If you’re in the Hollywood area (Feb 25 – March 1) and an Oscar fan, you wont want to miss these fantastic events!
Events at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills will focus on the films nominated for Animated Feature Film, Documentary Feature, Documentary Short Subject, Foreign Language Film, Makeup and Hairstyling, and the Short Film categories.
Something new this year is the live concert at UCLA’s Royce Hall in Los Angeles highlighting the nominated musical scores and songs.
The Oscar Week schedule is as follows:
Animated and Live Action Shorts
Tuesday, February 25, 7:30 p.m.
Hosted by actor Kevin Pollak.
The Academy has announced it will present a slate of public events leading up to the 86th Oscars where they’ll be celebrating this year’s nominees. If you’re in the Hollywood area (Feb 25 – March 1) and an Oscar fan, you wont want to miss these fantastic events!
Events at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills will focus on the films nominated for Animated Feature Film, Documentary Feature, Documentary Short Subject, Foreign Language Film, Makeup and Hairstyling, and the Short Film categories.
Something new this year is the live concert at UCLA’s Royce Hall in Los Angeles highlighting the nominated musical scores and songs.
The Oscar Week schedule is as follows:
Animated and Live Action Shorts
Tuesday, February 25, 7:30 p.m.
Hosted by actor Kevin Pollak.
- 2/1/2014
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
When Turner Classic Movies (TCM) kicks off 31 Days of Oscar®, the network’s annual celebration of the Academy Awards® in February, it will be embarking on one of the most ambitious and comprehensive editions of the month-long festival yet.
Each night’s primetime lineup from Feb. 1 through March 3 will be devoted to showcasing all the movies nominated in a particular category in a given year. Meanwhile, daytime programming will focus on specific categories, with winners and nominees from multiple years.
TCM’s 31 Days of Oscar is one of several events celebrating the network’s 20th year as a leading authority in classic film. Making the 2014 edition of 31 Days of Oscar even more spectacular will be the world premiere of And the Oscar® Goes To…, a brand-new documentary tracing the history of the Academy Awards, slated to premiere Saturday, Feb. 1, at 8 p.m. (Et/Pt). CNN Films will encore the documentary onThursday,...
Each night’s primetime lineup from Feb. 1 through March 3 will be devoted to showcasing all the movies nominated in a particular category in a given year. Meanwhile, daytime programming will focus on specific categories, with winners and nominees from multiple years.
TCM’s 31 Days of Oscar is one of several events celebrating the network’s 20th year as a leading authority in classic film. Making the 2014 edition of 31 Days of Oscar even more spectacular will be the world premiere of And the Oscar® Goes To…, a brand-new documentary tracing the history of the Academy Awards, slated to premiere Saturday, Feb. 1, at 8 p.m. (Et/Pt). CNN Films will encore the documentary onThursday,...
- 1/15/2014
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
By Mark Pinkert
Contributor
* * *
This is the third article in a three-part series.
Though many Academy Award Best Picture nominees contain—or are predominantly about—sex and relationships, very few have been about sex issues in law and politics. In recent years there has been Milk (2008), the biopic of Harvey Milk, a California politician and gay rights activist, and otherwise not much else. Even in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when the AIDS epidemic was a hot button issue, few films of this genre made it to the Best Picture ticket (remember, Philadelphia was snubbed from the category in 1993). Sexual issues topics, though, have been more popular within the documentary medium: there was Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (1989), which won for Best Documentary, and which was the first AIDS-related film to win an Oscar, the The Times of Harvey Milk (1984), which also won Best Documentary, and How to Survive a Plague...
Contributor
* * *
This is the third article in a three-part series.
Though many Academy Award Best Picture nominees contain—or are predominantly about—sex and relationships, very few have been about sex issues in law and politics. In recent years there has been Milk (2008), the biopic of Harvey Milk, a California politician and gay rights activist, and otherwise not much else. Even in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when the AIDS epidemic was a hot button issue, few films of this genre made it to the Best Picture ticket (remember, Philadelphia was snubbed from the category in 1993). Sexual issues topics, though, have been more popular within the documentary medium: there was Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt (1989), which won for Best Documentary, and which was the first AIDS-related film to win an Oscar, the The Times of Harvey Milk (1984), which also won Best Documentary, and How to Survive a Plague...
- 12/11/2013
- by Mark Pinkert
- Scott Feinberg
An Original Voice
“We didn’t get mad, we got smart,” HBO CEO Michael Fuchs said about hitting The Wall, looking back at HBO stalling in 1984 from the vantage of the early 1990s. Actually, a lot of the rank and file didn’t get mad or smart; we’d seen 125 of our friends and colleagues get shown the door when the company had suddenly flatlined after eight years of phenomenal growth, and what we got was scared.
But it’s to the credit of HBO’s execs that whatever anxieties they may have had, they showed no panic or even nervousness in public. Instead, they poured any concerns into energetically and immediately addressing the question of, “What do we do now?” The world we knew had changed and there was no going back to the Gold Rush days of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The company required a humongous...
“We didn’t get mad, we got smart,” HBO CEO Michael Fuchs said about hitting The Wall, looking back at HBO stalling in 1984 from the vantage of the early 1990s. Actually, a lot of the rank and file didn’t get mad or smart; we’d seen 125 of our friends and colleagues get shown the door when the company had suddenly flatlined after eight years of phenomenal growth, and what we got was scared.
But it’s to the credit of HBO’s execs that whatever anxieties they may have had, they showed no panic or even nervousness in public. Instead, they poured any concerns into energetically and immediately addressing the question of, “What do we do now?” The world we knew had changed and there was no going back to the Gold Rush days of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The company required a humongous...
- 10/11/2013
- by Bill Mesce
- SoundOnSight
Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is gearing up to celebrate the Academy Awards® in a very special way next year. As part of TCM’s annual 31 Days of Oscar® showcase in February 2014, the network will present the world premiere of Oscar, a brand-new documentary tracing the history of the Academy Awards. Produced by Telling Pictures, Inc., in association with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (The Academy) and Hollywood Newsreel, this fascinating special will take movie lovers on a journey through Hollywood history as it tells its story of the little statuette that became the industry’s most coveted prize.
Oscar is set to have its world television premiere on TCM Saturday, Feb. 1, the opening night of the 2014 edition of 31 Days of Oscar. With the new documentary as its centerpiece, 31 Days of Oscar will be themed around the history of the Academy Awards.
Featuring more than 300 Oscar-winning and nominated films,...
Oscar is set to have its world television premiere on TCM Saturday, Feb. 1, the opening night of the 2014 edition of 31 Days of Oscar. With the new documentary as its centerpiece, 31 Days of Oscar will be themed around the history of the Academy Awards.
Featuring more than 300 Oscar-winning and nominated films,...
- 9/30/2013
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Every year Turner Classic Movies gets home audiences in an Oscar state of mind with its annual "31 Days of Oscar" showcase. Held every February, it's a month-long celebration of Oscar-winning films leading up to the annual Academy Awards ceremony, and this year, the showcase will kick off with the premiere of a brand new documentary about the awards' 85 years of history. It's called, what else… "Oscar." Directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (whose 1989 film "Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt" took home the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature), "Oscar" will feature interviews with many Academy Award-winning and...
- 9/30/2013
- by Kristopher Tapley
- Hitfix
As part of TCM's annual "31 Days of Oscar" showcase in February of 2014, the network will present the world premiere of brand-new documentary "Oscar," which traces the history of the Academy Awards.The special is co-directed and penned by filmmakers Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (“Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt”). It features extensive clips from Oscar-winning and nominated films, plus behind-the-scenes ceremony footage from the archives of Hollywood Newsreel. Much of this has never been shown before. The doc's high-profile interviewees include, among many others, George Clooney, Annette Benning, Tom Hanks, Ben Kingsley, Helen Mirren, Whoopi Goldberg, Steven Spielberg, Michael Moore and frequent Oscar host Billy Crystal.“Oscar” is set to air on February 1, the opening night of "31 Days of Oscar." Each night's lineup will feature a complete set of nominated films that faced each other in a particular category. The February 1 programming includes, asides from...
- 9/30/2013
- by Beth Hanna
- Thompson on Hollywood
Lovelace, the moderately controversial film about porn legend Linda Lovelace is making its way to Blu-Ray and DVD on November 5th. It’s a cast that’s hard to argue with, and a film that is sure to get people talking.
There doesn’t seem to be word on the bonus features yet, and that could be a wild meeting in itself. Get all the info below, and mark your calendars.
From Academy Award® winning directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (Best Documentary, Features, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, 1989) comes the harrowing true story Lovelace, debuting on Blu-ray™ and DVD on November 5th from Anchor Bay Entertainment and RADiUS-twc. The true story of fame, abuse and betrayal set against the sexual revolution of the 1970s stars Amanda Seyfried (Les Miserables, In Time) as icon Linda Lovelace and Golden Globe® nominee Peter Sarsgaard (Green Lantern, Jar Head, Flightplan) as her abusive husband,...
There doesn’t seem to be word on the bonus features yet, and that could be a wild meeting in itself. Get all the info below, and mark your calendars.
From Academy Award® winning directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (Best Documentary, Features, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, 1989) comes the harrowing true story Lovelace, debuting on Blu-ray™ and DVD on November 5th from Anchor Bay Entertainment and RADiUS-twc. The true story of fame, abuse and betrayal set against the sexual revolution of the 1970s stars Amanda Seyfried (Les Miserables, In Time) as icon Linda Lovelace and Golden Globe® nominee Peter Sarsgaard (Green Lantern, Jar Head, Flightplan) as her abusive husband,...
- 9/11/2013
- by Marc Eastman
- AreYouScreening.com
Title: Lovelace Director: Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman Starring: Amanda Seyfriedm Peter Sarsgaard, Sharon Stone, Juno Temple, Hank Azaria, Wes Bentley, Adam Brody, Bobby Cannavale, James Franco, Debi Mazar, Chris Noth, Robert Patrick, Eric Roberts, Chloe Sevigny. Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman won an Academy Award for Best Documentary with ‘Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt’ in 1989. Epstein also won an Oscar for the doc ‘The Times of Harvey Milk’ and he made an amazing job in his transition to scripted narratives, with the biopic ‘Howl’ – the award-winning film about Allen Ginsberg’s controversial poem by the same name. The director-duo has ultimately made an extremely powerful biopic on [ Read More ]
The post Lovelace Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Lovelace Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 8/9/2013
- by Chiara Spagnoli Gabardi
- ShockYa
No, your proverbial chain ain’t being yanked. You indeed heard correctly. Flying straight out of Cannes comes this latest spot of casting news. From the man behind the gushy flimflam that is Sex And The City, comes a film…of an entirely different ouvre. Based on a true story, Anita tells the tale of real life anti-gay activist Anita Bryant, and now has hot tamale Uma Thurman confirmed to star.
The devout Christian singer spent most of her life peddling anti-gay bigotry to all and sundry. Quite the driven and determined woman, Bryant successfully campaigned to repeal a gay rights bill in Florida. She had a ton of Top 40 hits, no doubt crammed full of backwards rhetoric whittling on about the demonic proclivities of gays. Needless to say, her staunch homophobia cost her the career she worked her whole life to attain. Aw…boo hoo. This also caused her...
The devout Christian singer spent most of her life peddling anti-gay bigotry to all and sundry. Quite the driven and determined woman, Bryant successfully campaigned to repeal a gay rights bill in Florida. She had a ton of Top 40 hits, no doubt crammed full of backwards rhetoric whittling on about the demonic proclivities of gays. Needless to say, her staunch homophobia cost her the career she worked her whole life to attain. Aw…boo hoo. This also caused her...
- 5/16/2013
- by Gem Seddon
- We Got This Covered
Breaking: Uma Thurman will star as controversial Anita Bryant in Anita, produced by Sex And the City creator Darren Star, Howard Rosenman, Jeffrey Schwarz and Dennis Erdman. Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman will direct from a screenplay by Chad Hodge. Those filmmakers, who most recently helmed Lovelace, won Oscars for Common Threads: Stories From The Quilt and The Times Of Harvey Milk. The film will be shopped here at Cannes. It follows the singer and orange juice spokeswoman who, after allowing a gay screenwriter into her home, confronts her past and her politics which included successfully campaigning to overturn a gay rights law in Florida. Thurman next stars in Lars Von Trier’s Nymphomaniac, and the next film by the directors is The Battle Of AmFAR, which HBO broadcasts in December. UTA Independent and Wme are co-repping domestic.
- 5/16/2013
- by MIKE FLEMING JR
- Deadline
Directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's career together began with their first documentary feature "Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt," winning the Documentary Feature Oscar in 1990. Since then they have hardly faltered with the release of multiple award winners such as "The Celluloid Closet" and "Paragraph 175." Now fresh off the Sundance premiere of their dramatic feature "Lovelace," starring Amanda Seyfried, Peter Sarsgaard and Sharon Stone, they return to their documentary roots. What it's about: When a mysterious new disease started killing gay men in the early 1980s, two women from very different backgrounds responded. Hollywood icon Elizabeth Taylor and research scientist Mathilde Krim together started the first national AIDS research foundation, amfAR, and changed the course of the epidemic, helping to bring us now to the brink of finding a cure. What else should audiences know: Our approach was to reconstruct the history of the early years of the crisis.
- 4/10/2013
- by Indiewire
- Indiewire
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) will present “Oscar’s Docs, 1955–2002: American Stories” from February 2 through February 14 at MoMA in New York City. This annual collaboration highlights Oscar®–winning and nominated short and feature-length documentary films that explore the history, culture and politics of the United States. All prints are from the Academy Film Archive’s collection. The filmmakers will be present at several screenings (visit MoMA.org for details).
The schedule is as follows:
Sat., Feb. 2, 2 p.m.
American Dream (1990)
Barbara Kopple. This stirring film depicts the effects of a mid-1980s strike by the workers of a Hormel meatpacking plant in Austin, Minnesota. 98 min.
Sat., Feb. 2, 8 p.m.
Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision (1994)
Freida Lee Mock. A profile of Maya Lin, the young artist who created the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington and other politically motivated artistic creations.
The schedule is as follows:
Sat., Feb. 2, 2 p.m.
American Dream (1990)
Barbara Kopple. This stirring film depicts the effects of a mid-1980s strike by the workers of a Hormel meatpacking plant in Austin, Minnesota. 98 min.
Sat., Feb. 2, 8 p.m.
Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision (1994)
Freida Lee Mock. A profile of Maya Lin, the young artist who created the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington and other politically motivated artistic creations.
- 1/29/2013
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) will present “Oscar’s Docs, 1955–2002: American Stories” from February 2 through February 14 at MoMA in New York City. This annual collaboration highlights Oscar®–winning and nominated short and feature-length documentary films that explore the history, culture and politics of the United States. All prints are from the Academy Film Archive’s collection. The filmmakers will be present at several screenings (visit MoMA.org for details). The schedule is as follows: Sat., Feb. 2, 2 p.m. American Dream (1990) Barbara Kopple. This stirring film depicts the effects of a mid-1980s strike by the workers of a Hormel meatpacking plant in Austin, Minnesota. 98 min. Sat., Feb. 2, 8 p.m. Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision (1994) Freida Lee Mock. A profile of Maya Lin, the young artist who created the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington and other politically motivated artistic creations.
- 1/29/2013
- by hnblog@hollywoodnews.com (Hollywood News Team)
- Hollywoodnews.com
Vol. I Issue 6
Send us links to your sizzle reels and film sites.
Note: See Issues 1, 2, 3, and 4 for reviews and clips of the Academy documentary films and short films. Additional reviews of the documentary features follow in this issue.
Best documentary feature
5 Broken Cameras Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi
The Gatekeepers Nominees to be determined *See note below
How to Survive a Plague Nominees to be determined
The Invisible War Nominees to be determined
Searching for Sugar Man Nominees to be determined
Best documentary short subject
Inocente Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine
Kings Point Sari Gilman and Jedd Wider
Mondays at Racine Cynthia Wade and Robin Honan
Open Heart Kief Davidson and Cori Shepherd Stern
Redemption Jon Alpert and Matthew O'Neill
Best animated short film
Adam and Dog Minkyu Lee
Fresh Guacamole Pes
Head over Heels Timothy Reckart and Fodhla Cronin O'Reilly
Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare David Silverman
Paperman John Kahrs
Best live action short film
Asad Bryan Buckley and Mino Jarjoura
Buzkashi Boys Sam French and Ariel Nasr
Curfew Shawn Christensen
Death of a Shadow (Dood van een Schaduw) Tom Van Avermaet and Ellen De Waele
Henry Yan England
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song) from a documentary
Before My Time from The documentary feature Chasing Ice Music and Lyric by J. Ralph
Note: *Nominees to be determined* The Documentary Brand gives the nomination to the individual(s) most involved in the key creative aspects of the filmmaking process. A maximum of two persons may be designated as nominees, one of whom must be the credited director who exercised directorial control, and the other of whom must have a producer or director credit. If a producer is named, that individual must have performed a major portion of the producing functions, in accordance with Academy producer criteria. No more than two statuettes will normally be given in the Documentary Feature category. All individuals with a “Producer” or “Produced by” credit on films that reach the semifinal round will automatically be vetted.
The Documentary Branch Executive Committee will determine which producers, if any, are eligible to receive an Oscar. In the unlikely event of a dispute, filmmakers may appeal the committee’s decision. In extremely rare circumstances, a third statuette may be awarded.
Production companies or persons with the screen credit of executive producer, co-producer or any credit other than director or producer shall not be eligible as nominees for the motion picture.
DGA Documentary Award Nominations
Kirby Dick The Invisible War
This is Mr. Dick’s first DGA Award nomination.
Malik Bendjelloul Searching For Sugar Man
This is Mr. Bendjelloul’s first DGA Award nomination.
Lauren Greenfield The Queen of Versailles
This is Ms. Greenfield’s first DGA Award nomination.
David France How To Survive A Plague
This is Mr. France’s first DGA Award nomination.
Alison Klayman Ai WeiWei: Never Sorry
This is Ms. Klayman’s first DGA Award nomination.
Two Academy Nominated Documentary Features
& One Academy Short Listed Documentary Reviewed
The Gatekeepers, directed by Dror Moreh
Documentary Feature Nominee
Six former heads of Israel’s domestic secret service agency, the Shin Bet, share their insights and reflect publicly on their actions and decisions in The Gatekeepers, a film by Dror Moreh. These six heads of the Shin Bet stood at the center of Israel's decision-making process in all matters pertaining to security. They worked closely with every Israeli prime minister, and their assessments and insights had—and continue to have—a profound impact on Israeli policy. The Gatekeepers is an exclusive account of their successes and failures.
I find The Gatekeepers remarkable. Not for its craft but for its concept and vision. Imagine
J Edger Hoover talking about his tenure at the FBI, his successes and his failures, his interactions with the Presidents and members of Congress, and his critical self-evaluation of his mission and how his agency’s work affected our nation. Imagine. Dror Moreh accomplished this feat when he convinced these six surviving members of the Shin Bet, to speak on camera.
The film provides a historical perspective of Israel that is both candid and critical of the successive governments in this rare Middle Eastern democracy. The Shin Bet was created in 1949 by David Ben-Gurion’s government to focus on the internal affairs of Israel and evolved into dealing with counterterrorism and intelligence gathering in the West Bank and Gaza.
These intelligence heads, like ours, report to the President/Prime Minister. They are not part of the military complex. It is this context that gives this work its power. We hear the story of Israel’s struggle to protect itself from both its internal and external enemies; the bombers, terrorists, agents and others who worked to destroy this small country. These men are not glamorous or like the fictional heads of the spy agencies we have seen in James Bond and Bourne films. They are bald or balding grandfather-types. Articulate, highly educated, calm and yet we know that they protected Israel from its enemies even if they had them killed.
This is one of the strongest of the nominated docs. It raises significant issues of personal responsibilities. Despite the lack of oversight we don’t feel that this is an organization gone amuck like the Catholic Church not protecting children or the Us Military not protecting its members from sexual harassment. We see these articulate men as guardians and protectors of their nation steadfastly doing their duty within the confines of their moral beliefs. What is scary about The Gatekeepers is that clearly there could have been abuses and wrongs done by the Shin Bet if these six had less character or their mission was redefined by the government without regard to moral or ethical standards. The film on reflection is troubling for regardless of how the spectator might feel about Israel it forces us to look at this conflict through the lenses of these six guardians and we can only wonder what they don’t tell us about what they did in the name of their country.
Credits:
Director: Dror Moreh
Camera: Avner Shahaf
Producers: Dror Moreh, Estelle Fialon, Philippa Kowarsky
Co Producer: Anna Van Der Wee
Sound: Amos Zipori
Sound Design: Aex Claude
Music: Ab Ovo, Jérôme Chassagnard, Régis Baillet
Editor: Oron Adar
Production Companies: Dror Moreh Productions, Les Films du Poisson, Cinephil
In Co-Production with: Mac Guff, Wild Heart Productions, Arte France, Iba, Ndr, Rtbf
With the support of: Cnc, Media, Région Ile-de-France, Procirep, Angoa, The Rabinovich Foundation for the Arts – Cinema Project
Distribution: Sony Classics
Trailer: http://www.sonyclassics.com/thegatekeepers/
The House I Live In, directed by Eugene Jarecki
Short Listed Documentary Feature for Academy Award nomination
The House I Live In looks at how America has waged war on some of its poorest citizens, costing countless lives, destroying families, and inflicting untold damage on future generations of Americans. It posits that over the last forty years, the War on Drugs has accounted for more than 45 million arrests and shows how America became the world’s largest jailer, damaging poor communities at home and abroad. Yet today drugs are cheaper, purer and more available than ever before. It shows that drug abuse is a public health issue. Despite this, it is treated by our society as a criminal matter and a vast machine has been created that feeds on the men and women who are incarcerated. Because of this, the prisoners are not offered help or a cure for their underlying problems, so they return to prison in a never ending cycle.
Eugene Jarecki, whose previous films looked at the military industrial complex (Why We Fight and The Trials of Henry Kissinger), won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at Sundance in both 2005 and 2010. The film tackles difficult material. Material that has been in scores of documentaries and television shows over the years. Yet Jarecki, using his personal experience, a wealth of interviews and strong case studies, builds a compelling case for changing the sentencing guidelines for crack (and cocaine) and for dealing with both addiction and the underlying causes of addiction. Jarecki is a skillful filmmaker who has picked a vast and complex subject and has created a work that while rich in content moves along at a good pace although it might have been stronger if it had tried to do less. The film editor Paul Frost and the composer Robert Miller do an excellent job building strong sequences with evocative music. It was nicely shot by Sam Cullman and Derek Hallquist. Richard Abramowitz’s Abramorama handled the distribution and was successful getting the work out which is never easy for such an issue oriented film.
Credits:
Director, Producer, Screenwriter: Eugene Jarecki
Producers: Melinda Shopsin, Sam Cullman, Christopher St. John
Executive Producers: Eugene Jarecki, Nick Fraser, Joslyn Barnes, Danny Glover, Russell Simmons, Roy Ackerman, John Legend, Sally Jo Feifer, Nick Fraser
Camera: Sam Cullman, Derek Hallquist
Sound: Matthew Freed, Art Jaso
Music: Robert Milller
Editor: Paul Frost
Production Companies: Charlotte Street Films, Zdf Enterprises, Independent Television Services, BBC, Aljazeera Documentary Channel, Vpro, Special Broadcasting Service Corporation, Louverture Films, Nhk
Distribution (Us): Abramorama Entertainment, Snag Films
How to Survive a Plague, directed by David France
Documentary Feature Nominee
How to Survive a Plague by writer and filmmaker David France tells the story of how two coalitions came together to lobby for effective treatments and funding for treatments of AIDS in the late 1980s when it was evident that the Us government and its health and other agencies were not being very effective dealing with the AIDS epidemic. The coalitions, Act Up and Tag (Treatment Action Group) helped to make AIDS more treatable. While there is still no cure for AIDS and thousands of people globally still die from the virus, it is now possible to prolong life with treatments that have been developed.
Despite having no scientific training, these self-made activists infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time. With access to never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and '90s, filmmaker David France puts the viewer smack in the middle of the controversial actions, the heated meetings, the heartbreaking failures, and the exultant breakthroughs. Faced with their own mortality an improbable group of young men and women, many of them HIV-positive took on Washington and the medical establishment.
While there have been a handful of outstanding films dealing with the AIDS epidemic including Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, The Broadcast Tapes of Dr. Peter and Silverlake Life, to name a few, How to Survive a Plague picks up on the story begun in the landmark Common Threads and updates the struggle, looking at the quest to find a treatment and possibly a cure for this vicious disease. The film weaves together stories of activism and shows how a small determined group can effect change not just nationally but globally. While the film is not as well made as Common Threads or Dr. Peter, it’s powerful. The archival footage manages to capture some of the key figures of Act Up and Tag showing actions as they take place. Instead of relying on talking heads to tell this amazing story, it is presented with footage shot as the story unfolded. This footage and its solid editing distinguishes this film from so many of the works that have tried to tell this story.
Few documentaries have such powerful antagonists, the government, incompetence, a lack of urgency on the part of the medical community and fear. Throw in homophobia and it is evident that the dramatic actions of these heroes saved hundreds of thousands of possible victims from this mostly sexually spread plague.
My only serious criticism of this documentary is its failure to be clearer that the plague continues, that there is no cure for HIV/AIDS and that the community continues to give a false sense of hope. Currently the Cdc states:
” ..estimates that 1,148,200 persons aged 13 years and older are living with HIV infection, including 207,600 (18.1%) who are unaware of their infection1. Over the past decade, the number of people living with HIV has increased, while the annual number of new HIV infections has remained relatively stable. Still, the pace of new infections continues at far too high a level—particularly among certain groups.
HIV Incidence(new infections): The estimated incidence of HIV has remained stable overall in recent years, at about 50,000 new HIV infections per year.2 Within the overall estimates, however, some groups are affected more than others. Msm (men who have sex with men) continue to bear the greatest burden of HIV infection, and among races/ethnicities, African Americans continue to be disproportionately affected.”
This information could have been contained in the last few minutes of this powerful work, to inspire and warn the audience that testing is critical and that safe sex is still the only way to contain AIDS.
The Filmmaker
David France, Director, Producer
David France is an award-winning journalist and New York Times best-selling author who has been writing about AIDS since 1982 and today is one of the best-known chroniclers of the epidemic. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Newsweek, GQ, and New York magazine, where he is a contributing editor, and has received the National Headliner Award and the GLAAD Media Award, among others. Several films have been inspired by his work, most recently the Emmy-nominated Showtime film Our Fathers, for which he received a WGA nomination. He is at work on a major history of AIDS, due from Alfred A. Knopf in 2013. Based on decades of reporting, How to Survive a Plague is his directorial debut.
Credits
Director: David France
Writers: David France, Todd Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk
Producers: David France, Howard Gertler
Executive Producers: Dan Cogan, Joy A. Tomchin
Co-Producer: Todd Woody Richman
Camera: Derek Wieshahn
Sound: Stuart Deutsch, Topher Reifeiss
Original Music: Stuart Bogie
Editor: Todd Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk
Production Companies: Public Square Films, Ninety Thousand Words
Distribution (Us): Sundance Selects
Short Notes and Update:
The International Documentary Association in Los Angeles presents Doc U: The Doc Reporter
Navigating the Intersection of Documentary and Journalism
Moderated by: Karin Skellwagen (The Brooks Institute)
With Panelists:
Sarah Burns (The Central Park Five)
Michael Donaldson (Partner, Donaldson & Callif)
David France (How To Survive A Plague)
For information: http://doc-u-jan-2013-la.eventbrite.com/
Sundance Announces 2013 International Documentary Competition:
Fallen City/ China (Director: Qi Zhao) — Fallen City spans four years to reveal how three families who survived the 2008 Sichuan earthquake to embark on a journey searching for hope, purpose, identity, and to rebuild their lives in a new China torn between tradition and modernity. North American Premiere
Fire in the Blood/ India (Director: Dylan Mohan Gray) — In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Western governments and pharmaceutical companies blocked low-cost antiretroviral drugs from reaching AIDS-stricken Africa, causing 10 million or more unnecessary deaths. An improbable group of people decided to fight back. North American Premiere
Google and the World Brain/ Spain, United Kingdom (Director: Ben Lewis) — In the most ambitious Internet project ever conceived, Google is working to scan every book in the world. Google says it is building a library for mankind. But some are trying to stop it, claiming that Google may have other intentions. World Premiere
The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear/ Georgia, Germany (Director: Tinatin Gurchiani) — A film director casting a 15-23-year-old protagonist visits villages and cities to meet people who answer her call. She follows those who prove to be interesting enough through various dramatic and funny situations. North American Premiere
The Moo Man/ United Kingdom (Directors: Andy Heathcote, Heike Bachelier) — A year in the life of heroic farmer Steve, scene stealing Ida (queen of the herd), and a supporting cast of 55 cows. When Ida falls ill, Steve’s optimism is challenged and their whole way of life is at stake. World Premiere
Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer/ Russian Federation, United Kingdom (Directors: Mike Lerner, Maxim Pozdorovkin) — Three young women face seven years in a Russian prison for a satirical performance in a Moscow cathedral. But who is really on trial: the three young artists or the society they live in? World Premiere
A River Changes Course/ Cambodia, U.S.A. (Director: Kalyanee Mam) — Three young Cambodians struggle to overcome the crushing effects of deforestation, overfishing, and overwhelming debt in this devastatingly beautiful story of a country reeling from the tragedies of war and rushing to keep pace with a rapidly expanding world. World Premiere
Salma/ United Kingdom, India (Director: Kim Longinotto) — When Salma, a young girl in South India, reached puberty, her parents locked her away. Millions of girls all over the world share the same fate. Twenty-five years later, Salma has fought her way back to the outside world. World Premiere
The Square (Al Midan)/ Egypt, U.S.A. (Director: Jehane Noujaim) — What does it mean to risk your life for your ideals? How far will five revolutionaries go in defending their beliefs in the fight for their nation? World Premiere
The Stuart Hall Project/ United Kingdom (Director: John Akomfrah) — Antinuclear campaigner, New Left activist and founding father of Cultural Studies, this documentary interweaves 70 years of Stuart Hall’s film, radio and television appearances, and material from his private archive to document a memorable life and construct a portrait of Britain’s foremost radical intellectual. World Premiere
The Summit/ Ireland, United Kingdom (Director: Nick Ryan) — Twenty-four climbers converged at the last stop before summiting the most dangerous mountain on Earth. Forty-eight hours later, 11 had been killed or simply vanished. Had one, Ger McDonnell, stuck to the climbers' code, he might still be alive. International Premiere
Who is Dayani Cristal?/ United Kingdom (Director: Marc Silver) — An anonymous body in the Arizona desert sparks the beginning of a real-life human drama. The search for its identity leads us across a continent to seek out the people left behind and the meaning of a mysterious tattoo. World Premiere. Day One Film
Producer’s Guild Announces Nominations for the Award for Outstanding Producer of Documentary Theatrical Motion Pictures and Non-Fiction Television:
A People Uncounted(Urbinder Films)
Producers: Marc Swenker, Aaron Yeger
The Gatekeepers(Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Estelle Fialon, Philippa Kowarsky, Dror Moreh
The Island President(Samuel Goldwyn Films)
Producers: Richard Berge, Bonni Cohen
The Other Dream Team(The Film Arcade)
Producers: Marius Markevicius, Jon Weinbach
Searching For Sugar Man(Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Malik Bendjelloul, Simon Chinn
Nominations for the Award for Outstanding Producer of
Non-Fiction Television:
American Masters(PBS)
Producers: Prudence Glass, Susan Lacy, Julie Sacks
Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations(Travel Channel)
Producers: Anthony Bourdain, Christopher Collins, Lydia Tenaglia, Sandy Zweig
Deadliest Catch(Discovery Channel)
Producers: Thom Beers, Jeff Conroy, Sean Dash, John Gray, Sheila McCormack, Bill Pruitt, Decker Watson
Inside the Actors Studio(Bravo)
Producers: James Lipton, Shawn Tesser, Jeff Wurtz
Shark Tank(ABC)
Producers: Rhett Bachner, Becky Blitz, Mark Burnett, Bill Gaudsmith, Yun Lingner, Brien Meagher, Clay Newbill, Jim Roush, Laura Skowlund, Paul Sutera, Patrick Wood
BAFTA Short and Documentary Feature Nominations (British Academy of Film and Television Arts, London)
Documentary Feature
The ImposterBart Layton, Dimitri Doganis
Marley Kevin Macdonald, Steve Bing, Charles Steel
McCullin David Morris, Jacqui Morris
Searching for Sugar Man Malik Bendjelloul, Simon Chinn
West of Memphis Amy Berg
Short Animation
Here to Fall Kris Kelly, Evelyn McGrath
I’m Fine Thanks Eamonn O'Neill
The Making of Longbird Will Anderson, Ainslie Henderson
Short Film
The Curse Fyzal Boulifa, Gavin Humphries
Good Night Muriel d'Ansembourg, Eva Sigurdardottir
Swimmer Lynne Ramsay, Peter Carlton, Diarmid Scrimshaw
Tumult Johnny Barrington, Rhianna Andrews
The Voorman Problem Mark Gill, Baldwin Li
The Broadcast Film Critics Association (Bfca)
Documentary Feature Nominations
Bully
The Imposter
Queen of Versailles
Searching for Sugar Man (Winner)
The Central Park Five
West of Memphis
________________________________________________________________________
Credits: Editing by Jessica Just for SydneysBuzz
________________________________________________________________________
Block Doc Workshops in Los Angeles February 2013 Ida Doc U
The International Documentary Association will be hosting Documentary Funding and Documentary Tune-Up Workshops with Block on February 9/10. http://www.documentary.org/news/february-documentary-producing-workshops-mitchell-block
Mitchell Block specializes in conceiving, producing, marketing & distributing independent features & consulting. He is an expert in placing both completed works into distribution & working with producers to make projects fundable. He conducts regular workshops in film producing in Los Angeles and most recently in Maine, Russia and in Myanmar (Burma).
Poster Girl, produced by Block was nominated for a Documentary Academy Award and selected by the Ida as the Best Doc Short 2011. It was also nominated for two Emmy Awards and aired on HBO. He is an executive producer of the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Carrier, a 10-hour series that he conceived & co-created. Block is a graduate of Tisch School and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business. He is a member of Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, the Television Academy, a founding member of BAFTA-la and has been teaching at USC School of Cinematic Arts since 1979. Currently Block teaches a required class in the USC Peter Stark Producing Program.
______________________________________________________________________
©2013Mwb All Rights Reserved All Rights Reserved. All information and designs on the Sites are copyrighted material owned by Block. Reproduction, dissemination, or transmission of any part of the material here without the express written consent of the owner is strictly prohibited.All other product names and marks on Block Direct, whether trademarks, service marks, or other type, and whether registered or unregistered, is the property of Block.
Send us links to your sizzle reels and film sites.
Note: See Issues 1, 2, 3, and 4 for reviews and clips of the Academy documentary films and short films. Additional reviews of the documentary features follow in this issue.
Best documentary feature
5 Broken Cameras Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi
The Gatekeepers Nominees to be determined *See note below
How to Survive a Plague Nominees to be determined
The Invisible War Nominees to be determined
Searching for Sugar Man Nominees to be determined
Best documentary short subject
Inocente Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine
Kings Point Sari Gilman and Jedd Wider
Mondays at Racine Cynthia Wade and Robin Honan
Open Heart Kief Davidson and Cori Shepherd Stern
Redemption Jon Alpert and Matthew O'Neill
Best animated short film
Adam and Dog Minkyu Lee
Fresh Guacamole Pes
Head over Heels Timothy Reckart and Fodhla Cronin O'Reilly
Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare David Silverman
Paperman John Kahrs
Best live action short film
Asad Bryan Buckley and Mino Jarjoura
Buzkashi Boys Sam French and Ariel Nasr
Curfew Shawn Christensen
Death of a Shadow (Dood van een Schaduw) Tom Van Avermaet and Ellen De Waele
Henry Yan England
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song) from a documentary
Before My Time from The documentary feature Chasing Ice Music and Lyric by J. Ralph
Note: *Nominees to be determined* The Documentary Brand gives the nomination to the individual(s) most involved in the key creative aspects of the filmmaking process. A maximum of two persons may be designated as nominees, one of whom must be the credited director who exercised directorial control, and the other of whom must have a producer or director credit. If a producer is named, that individual must have performed a major portion of the producing functions, in accordance with Academy producer criteria. No more than two statuettes will normally be given in the Documentary Feature category. All individuals with a “Producer” or “Produced by” credit on films that reach the semifinal round will automatically be vetted.
The Documentary Branch Executive Committee will determine which producers, if any, are eligible to receive an Oscar. In the unlikely event of a dispute, filmmakers may appeal the committee’s decision. In extremely rare circumstances, a third statuette may be awarded.
Production companies or persons with the screen credit of executive producer, co-producer or any credit other than director or producer shall not be eligible as nominees for the motion picture.
DGA Documentary Award Nominations
Kirby Dick The Invisible War
This is Mr. Dick’s first DGA Award nomination.
Malik Bendjelloul Searching For Sugar Man
This is Mr. Bendjelloul’s first DGA Award nomination.
Lauren Greenfield The Queen of Versailles
This is Ms. Greenfield’s first DGA Award nomination.
David France How To Survive A Plague
This is Mr. France’s first DGA Award nomination.
Alison Klayman Ai WeiWei: Never Sorry
This is Ms. Klayman’s first DGA Award nomination.
Two Academy Nominated Documentary Features
& One Academy Short Listed Documentary Reviewed
The Gatekeepers, directed by Dror Moreh
Documentary Feature Nominee
Six former heads of Israel’s domestic secret service agency, the Shin Bet, share their insights and reflect publicly on their actions and decisions in The Gatekeepers, a film by Dror Moreh. These six heads of the Shin Bet stood at the center of Israel's decision-making process in all matters pertaining to security. They worked closely with every Israeli prime minister, and their assessments and insights had—and continue to have—a profound impact on Israeli policy. The Gatekeepers is an exclusive account of their successes and failures.
I find The Gatekeepers remarkable. Not for its craft but for its concept and vision. Imagine
J Edger Hoover talking about his tenure at the FBI, his successes and his failures, his interactions with the Presidents and members of Congress, and his critical self-evaluation of his mission and how his agency’s work affected our nation. Imagine. Dror Moreh accomplished this feat when he convinced these six surviving members of the Shin Bet, to speak on camera.
The film provides a historical perspective of Israel that is both candid and critical of the successive governments in this rare Middle Eastern democracy. The Shin Bet was created in 1949 by David Ben-Gurion’s government to focus on the internal affairs of Israel and evolved into dealing with counterterrorism and intelligence gathering in the West Bank and Gaza.
These intelligence heads, like ours, report to the President/Prime Minister. They are not part of the military complex. It is this context that gives this work its power. We hear the story of Israel’s struggle to protect itself from both its internal and external enemies; the bombers, terrorists, agents and others who worked to destroy this small country. These men are not glamorous or like the fictional heads of the spy agencies we have seen in James Bond and Bourne films. They are bald or balding grandfather-types. Articulate, highly educated, calm and yet we know that they protected Israel from its enemies even if they had them killed.
This is one of the strongest of the nominated docs. It raises significant issues of personal responsibilities. Despite the lack of oversight we don’t feel that this is an organization gone amuck like the Catholic Church not protecting children or the Us Military not protecting its members from sexual harassment. We see these articulate men as guardians and protectors of their nation steadfastly doing their duty within the confines of their moral beliefs. What is scary about The Gatekeepers is that clearly there could have been abuses and wrongs done by the Shin Bet if these six had less character or their mission was redefined by the government without regard to moral or ethical standards. The film on reflection is troubling for regardless of how the spectator might feel about Israel it forces us to look at this conflict through the lenses of these six guardians and we can only wonder what they don’t tell us about what they did in the name of their country.
Credits:
Director: Dror Moreh
Camera: Avner Shahaf
Producers: Dror Moreh, Estelle Fialon, Philippa Kowarsky
Co Producer: Anna Van Der Wee
Sound: Amos Zipori
Sound Design: Aex Claude
Music: Ab Ovo, Jérôme Chassagnard, Régis Baillet
Editor: Oron Adar
Production Companies: Dror Moreh Productions, Les Films du Poisson, Cinephil
In Co-Production with: Mac Guff, Wild Heart Productions, Arte France, Iba, Ndr, Rtbf
With the support of: Cnc, Media, Région Ile-de-France, Procirep, Angoa, The Rabinovich Foundation for the Arts – Cinema Project
Distribution: Sony Classics
Trailer: http://www.sonyclassics.com/thegatekeepers/
The House I Live In, directed by Eugene Jarecki
Short Listed Documentary Feature for Academy Award nomination
The House I Live In looks at how America has waged war on some of its poorest citizens, costing countless lives, destroying families, and inflicting untold damage on future generations of Americans. It posits that over the last forty years, the War on Drugs has accounted for more than 45 million arrests and shows how America became the world’s largest jailer, damaging poor communities at home and abroad. Yet today drugs are cheaper, purer and more available than ever before. It shows that drug abuse is a public health issue. Despite this, it is treated by our society as a criminal matter and a vast machine has been created that feeds on the men and women who are incarcerated. Because of this, the prisoners are not offered help or a cure for their underlying problems, so they return to prison in a never ending cycle.
Eugene Jarecki, whose previous films looked at the military industrial complex (Why We Fight and The Trials of Henry Kissinger), won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at Sundance in both 2005 and 2010. The film tackles difficult material. Material that has been in scores of documentaries and television shows over the years. Yet Jarecki, using his personal experience, a wealth of interviews and strong case studies, builds a compelling case for changing the sentencing guidelines for crack (and cocaine) and for dealing with both addiction and the underlying causes of addiction. Jarecki is a skillful filmmaker who has picked a vast and complex subject and has created a work that while rich in content moves along at a good pace although it might have been stronger if it had tried to do less. The film editor Paul Frost and the composer Robert Miller do an excellent job building strong sequences with evocative music. It was nicely shot by Sam Cullman and Derek Hallquist. Richard Abramowitz’s Abramorama handled the distribution and was successful getting the work out which is never easy for such an issue oriented film.
Credits:
Director, Producer, Screenwriter: Eugene Jarecki
Producers: Melinda Shopsin, Sam Cullman, Christopher St. John
Executive Producers: Eugene Jarecki, Nick Fraser, Joslyn Barnes, Danny Glover, Russell Simmons, Roy Ackerman, John Legend, Sally Jo Feifer, Nick Fraser
Camera: Sam Cullman, Derek Hallquist
Sound: Matthew Freed, Art Jaso
Music: Robert Milller
Editor: Paul Frost
Production Companies: Charlotte Street Films, Zdf Enterprises, Independent Television Services, BBC, Aljazeera Documentary Channel, Vpro, Special Broadcasting Service Corporation, Louverture Films, Nhk
Distribution (Us): Abramorama Entertainment, Snag Films
How to Survive a Plague, directed by David France
Documentary Feature Nominee
How to Survive a Plague by writer and filmmaker David France tells the story of how two coalitions came together to lobby for effective treatments and funding for treatments of AIDS in the late 1980s when it was evident that the Us government and its health and other agencies were not being very effective dealing with the AIDS epidemic. The coalitions, Act Up and Tag (Treatment Action Group) helped to make AIDS more treatable. While there is still no cure for AIDS and thousands of people globally still die from the virus, it is now possible to prolong life with treatments that have been developed.
Despite having no scientific training, these self-made activists infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time. With access to never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and '90s, filmmaker David France puts the viewer smack in the middle of the controversial actions, the heated meetings, the heartbreaking failures, and the exultant breakthroughs. Faced with their own mortality an improbable group of young men and women, many of them HIV-positive took on Washington and the medical establishment.
While there have been a handful of outstanding films dealing with the AIDS epidemic including Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, The Broadcast Tapes of Dr. Peter and Silverlake Life, to name a few, How to Survive a Plague picks up on the story begun in the landmark Common Threads and updates the struggle, looking at the quest to find a treatment and possibly a cure for this vicious disease. The film weaves together stories of activism and shows how a small determined group can effect change not just nationally but globally. While the film is not as well made as Common Threads or Dr. Peter, it’s powerful. The archival footage manages to capture some of the key figures of Act Up and Tag showing actions as they take place. Instead of relying on talking heads to tell this amazing story, it is presented with footage shot as the story unfolded. This footage and its solid editing distinguishes this film from so many of the works that have tried to tell this story.
Few documentaries have such powerful antagonists, the government, incompetence, a lack of urgency on the part of the medical community and fear. Throw in homophobia and it is evident that the dramatic actions of these heroes saved hundreds of thousands of possible victims from this mostly sexually spread plague.
My only serious criticism of this documentary is its failure to be clearer that the plague continues, that there is no cure for HIV/AIDS and that the community continues to give a false sense of hope. Currently the Cdc states:
” ..estimates that 1,148,200 persons aged 13 years and older are living with HIV infection, including 207,600 (18.1%) who are unaware of their infection1. Over the past decade, the number of people living with HIV has increased, while the annual number of new HIV infections has remained relatively stable. Still, the pace of new infections continues at far too high a level—particularly among certain groups.
HIV Incidence(new infections): The estimated incidence of HIV has remained stable overall in recent years, at about 50,000 new HIV infections per year.2 Within the overall estimates, however, some groups are affected more than others. Msm (men who have sex with men) continue to bear the greatest burden of HIV infection, and among races/ethnicities, African Americans continue to be disproportionately affected.”
This information could have been contained in the last few minutes of this powerful work, to inspire and warn the audience that testing is critical and that safe sex is still the only way to contain AIDS.
The Filmmaker
David France, Director, Producer
David France is an award-winning journalist and New York Times best-selling author who has been writing about AIDS since 1982 and today is one of the best-known chroniclers of the epidemic. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Newsweek, GQ, and New York magazine, where he is a contributing editor, and has received the National Headliner Award and the GLAAD Media Award, among others. Several films have been inspired by his work, most recently the Emmy-nominated Showtime film Our Fathers, for which he received a WGA nomination. He is at work on a major history of AIDS, due from Alfred A. Knopf in 2013. Based on decades of reporting, How to Survive a Plague is his directorial debut.
Credits
Director: David France
Writers: David France, Todd Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk
Producers: David France, Howard Gertler
Executive Producers: Dan Cogan, Joy A. Tomchin
Co-Producer: Todd Woody Richman
Camera: Derek Wieshahn
Sound: Stuart Deutsch, Topher Reifeiss
Original Music: Stuart Bogie
Editor: Todd Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk
Production Companies: Public Square Films, Ninety Thousand Words
Distribution (Us): Sundance Selects
Short Notes and Update:
The International Documentary Association in Los Angeles presents Doc U: The Doc Reporter
Navigating the Intersection of Documentary and Journalism
Moderated by: Karin Skellwagen (The Brooks Institute)
With Panelists:
Sarah Burns (The Central Park Five)
Michael Donaldson (Partner, Donaldson & Callif)
David France (How To Survive A Plague)
For information: http://doc-u-jan-2013-la.eventbrite.com/
Sundance Announces 2013 International Documentary Competition:
Fallen City/ China (Director: Qi Zhao) — Fallen City spans four years to reveal how three families who survived the 2008 Sichuan earthquake to embark on a journey searching for hope, purpose, identity, and to rebuild their lives in a new China torn between tradition and modernity. North American Premiere
Fire in the Blood/ India (Director: Dylan Mohan Gray) — In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Western governments and pharmaceutical companies blocked low-cost antiretroviral drugs from reaching AIDS-stricken Africa, causing 10 million or more unnecessary deaths. An improbable group of people decided to fight back. North American Premiere
Google and the World Brain/ Spain, United Kingdom (Director: Ben Lewis) — In the most ambitious Internet project ever conceived, Google is working to scan every book in the world. Google says it is building a library for mankind. But some are trying to stop it, claiming that Google may have other intentions. World Premiere
The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear/ Georgia, Germany (Director: Tinatin Gurchiani) — A film director casting a 15-23-year-old protagonist visits villages and cities to meet people who answer her call. She follows those who prove to be interesting enough through various dramatic and funny situations. North American Premiere
The Moo Man/ United Kingdom (Directors: Andy Heathcote, Heike Bachelier) — A year in the life of heroic farmer Steve, scene stealing Ida (queen of the herd), and a supporting cast of 55 cows. When Ida falls ill, Steve’s optimism is challenged and their whole way of life is at stake. World Premiere
Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer/ Russian Federation, United Kingdom (Directors: Mike Lerner, Maxim Pozdorovkin) — Three young women face seven years in a Russian prison for a satirical performance in a Moscow cathedral. But who is really on trial: the three young artists or the society they live in? World Premiere
A River Changes Course/ Cambodia, U.S.A. (Director: Kalyanee Mam) — Three young Cambodians struggle to overcome the crushing effects of deforestation, overfishing, and overwhelming debt in this devastatingly beautiful story of a country reeling from the tragedies of war and rushing to keep pace with a rapidly expanding world. World Premiere
Salma/ United Kingdom, India (Director: Kim Longinotto) — When Salma, a young girl in South India, reached puberty, her parents locked her away. Millions of girls all over the world share the same fate. Twenty-five years later, Salma has fought her way back to the outside world. World Premiere
The Square (Al Midan)/ Egypt, U.S.A. (Director: Jehane Noujaim) — What does it mean to risk your life for your ideals? How far will five revolutionaries go in defending their beliefs in the fight for their nation? World Premiere
The Stuart Hall Project/ United Kingdom (Director: John Akomfrah) — Antinuclear campaigner, New Left activist and founding father of Cultural Studies, this documentary interweaves 70 years of Stuart Hall’s film, radio and television appearances, and material from his private archive to document a memorable life and construct a portrait of Britain’s foremost radical intellectual. World Premiere
The Summit/ Ireland, United Kingdom (Director: Nick Ryan) — Twenty-four climbers converged at the last stop before summiting the most dangerous mountain on Earth. Forty-eight hours later, 11 had been killed or simply vanished. Had one, Ger McDonnell, stuck to the climbers' code, he might still be alive. International Premiere
Who is Dayani Cristal?/ United Kingdom (Director: Marc Silver) — An anonymous body in the Arizona desert sparks the beginning of a real-life human drama. The search for its identity leads us across a continent to seek out the people left behind and the meaning of a mysterious tattoo. World Premiere. Day One Film
Producer’s Guild Announces Nominations for the Award for Outstanding Producer of Documentary Theatrical Motion Pictures and Non-Fiction Television:
A People Uncounted(Urbinder Films)
Producers: Marc Swenker, Aaron Yeger
The Gatekeepers(Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Estelle Fialon, Philippa Kowarsky, Dror Moreh
The Island President(Samuel Goldwyn Films)
Producers: Richard Berge, Bonni Cohen
The Other Dream Team(The Film Arcade)
Producers: Marius Markevicius, Jon Weinbach
Searching For Sugar Man(Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Malik Bendjelloul, Simon Chinn
Nominations for the Award for Outstanding Producer of
Non-Fiction Television:
American Masters(PBS)
Producers: Prudence Glass, Susan Lacy, Julie Sacks
Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations(Travel Channel)
Producers: Anthony Bourdain, Christopher Collins, Lydia Tenaglia, Sandy Zweig
Deadliest Catch(Discovery Channel)
Producers: Thom Beers, Jeff Conroy, Sean Dash, John Gray, Sheila McCormack, Bill Pruitt, Decker Watson
Inside the Actors Studio(Bravo)
Producers: James Lipton, Shawn Tesser, Jeff Wurtz
Shark Tank(ABC)
Producers: Rhett Bachner, Becky Blitz, Mark Burnett, Bill Gaudsmith, Yun Lingner, Brien Meagher, Clay Newbill, Jim Roush, Laura Skowlund, Paul Sutera, Patrick Wood
BAFTA Short and Documentary Feature Nominations (British Academy of Film and Television Arts, London)
Documentary Feature
The ImposterBart Layton, Dimitri Doganis
Marley Kevin Macdonald, Steve Bing, Charles Steel
McCullin David Morris, Jacqui Morris
Searching for Sugar Man Malik Bendjelloul, Simon Chinn
West of Memphis Amy Berg
Short Animation
Here to Fall Kris Kelly, Evelyn McGrath
I’m Fine Thanks Eamonn O'Neill
The Making of Longbird Will Anderson, Ainslie Henderson
Short Film
The Curse Fyzal Boulifa, Gavin Humphries
Good Night Muriel d'Ansembourg, Eva Sigurdardottir
Swimmer Lynne Ramsay, Peter Carlton, Diarmid Scrimshaw
Tumult Johnny Barrington, Rhianna Andrews
The Voorman Problem Mark Gill, Baldwin Li
The Broadcast Film Critics Association (Bfca)
Documentary Feature Nominations
Bully
The Imposter
Queen of Versailles
Searching for Sugar Man (Winner)
The Central Park Five
West of Memphis
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Credits: Editing by Jessica Just for SydneysBuzz
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Block Doc Workshops in Los Angeles February 2013 Ida Doc U
The International Documentary Association will be hosting Documentary Funding and Documentary Tune-Up Workshops with Block on February 9/10. http://www.documentary.org/news/february-documentary-producing-workshops-mitchell-block
Mitchell Block specializes in conceiving, producing, marketing & distributing independent features & consulting. He is an expert in placing both completed works into distribution & working with producers to make projects fundable. He conducts regular workshops in film producing in Los Angeles and most recently in Maine, Russia and in Myanmar (Burma).
Poster Girl, produced by Block was nominated for a Documentary Academy Award and selected by the Ida as the Best Doc Short 2011. It was also nominated for two Emmy Awards and aired on HBO. He is an executive producer of the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Carrier, a 10-hour series that he conceived & co-created. Block is a graduate of Tisch School and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business. He is a member of Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, the Television Academy, a founding member of BAFTA-la and has been teaching at USC School of Cinematic Arts since 1979. Currently Block teaches a required class in the USC Peter Stark Producing Program.
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©2013Mwb All Rights Reserved All Rights Reserved. All information and designs on the Sites are copyrighted material owned by Block. Reproduction, dissemination, or transmission of any part of the material here without the express written consent of the owner is strictly prohibited.All other product names and marks on Block Direct, whether trademarks, service marks, or other type, and whether registered or unregistered, is the property of Block.
- 1/17/2013
- by Mitchell Block
- Sydney's Buzz
Looking for a must-see list of great gay documentaries? We've got you covered. We recently asked our readers to nominate up to five of their favorite documentary films via write-in vote. Thousands responded and we tabulated the results to bring you the top 25 here. All of these films are definitely worth a look and to help you learn more about titles you might not be familiar with, we've included trailers, links to reviews, official film websites and more. Plus, for three of the titles we've even embedded the full movie thanks to the Logo Docs library.
So here they are, the 25 Greatest Gay Documentaries. Which ones have you already seen? Which ones do you need to see?
25. Saint of 9/11
Summary: Sir Ian McKellen narrates this inspiring portrait of Father Mychal Judge, a New York City Fire Department Chaplain who wrestled with his sexuality, his genuine dedication to life as a priest,...
So here they are, the 25 Greatest Gay Documentaries. Which ones have you already seen? Which ones do you need to see?
25. Saint of 9/11
Summary: Sir Ian McKellen narrates this inspiring portrait of Father Mychal Judge, a New York City Fire Department Chaplain who wrestled with his sexuality, his genuine dedication to life as a priest,...
- 9/10/2012
- by AfterElton.com Staff
- The Backlot
Oscar is doing a doc block.
The organization that puts on the Academy Awards has created a new rule aimed at narrowing awards eligibility next year to documentary films that are reviewed in The New York Times or the Los Angeles Times.
Why deputize newspaper film critics as arbiters of whether a movie qualifies for an Oscar?
It’s part of an effort to shrink the number of qualifying films and weed out movies designed primarily for TV. “The more the merrier” is not the attitude at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, where members of the documentary...
The organization that puts on the Academy Awards has created a new rule aimed at narrowing awards eligibility next year to documentary films that are reviewed in The New York Times or the Los Angeles Times.
Why deputize newspaper film critics as arbiters of whether a movie qualifies for an Oscar?
It’s part of an effort to shrink the number of qualifying films and weed out movies designed primarily for TV. “The more the merrier” is not the attitude at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, where members of the documentary...
- 1/9/2012
- by Anthony Breznican
- EW - Inside Movies
Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the filmmakers behind "Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt," "The Times of Harvey Milk" and Allen Ginsberg biopic "Howl," have the confidence of anti-pornography lawyer Catherine MacKinnon for their new project "Lovelace," the story of notorious porn star Linda Lovelace (née Boreman). Lovelace, of course, starred in the box-office smash "Deep Throat" in which she played a woman with the titular talent and the curious mutation of a back-of-the-throat clitoris. After leaving the porn industry, Linda felt she'd been exploited by a series of men who controlled her and her career. MacKinnon, who became Lovelace's lawyer after they met on the Phil Donahue Show and worked together on the anti-pornography movement of the 1980s, and now oversees Linda's estate. The attorney has provided the filmmakers with access to Linda's papers and the approval of Linda's family on...
- 1/6/2012
- Indiewire
Competing projects are a common occurrence in Hollywood. In the recent past, dueling killer asteroid, killer volcano and killer Truman Capote movies have all jostled for box office superiority. Now, we seem to have dueling Linda Lovelace flicks. (And, yes, I made up the "killer" part of the Truman Capote flicks, but wouldn't that have been awesome?)
It was announced yesterday that the lovely Amanda Seyfried will be bringing her soulful gaze and A-list esteem to bare bear in Lovelace, a film about the star of the infamous 1972 porn flick, Deep Throat. And, no, this is in no way connected to Inferno, the Lovelace movie from which Lindsay Lohan was unceremoniously fired a while back.
Of the two projects, Lovelace is shaping up to be the classier film. It is being directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the team responsible for the highly regarded documentaries Where Are We?, The Celluloid Closet...
It was announced yesterday that the lovely Amanda Seyfried will be bringing her soulful gaze and A-list esteem to bare bear in Lovelace, a film about the star of the infamous 1972 porn flick, Deep Throat. And, no, this is in no way connected to Inferno, the Lovelace movie from which Lindsay Lohan was unceremoniously fired a while back.
Of the two projects, Lovelace is shaping up to be the classier film. It is being directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the team responsible for the highly regarded documentaries Where Are We?, The Celluloid Closet...
- 11/2/2011
- by Theron
- Planet Fury
Co-directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman are well known for their documentaries addressing Lgbt issues, like their Emmy-winning 1995 doc about portrayals of gays in TV and film the Celluloid Closet, their Oscar-winning 1998 doc about the AIDS Memorial Quilt Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, and their multi-award-winning 2000 doc Paragraph 175 about the Nazi's persecution of gays from 1933-1945. In Epstein and Friedman's latest film, Howl, the duo examine Allen Ginsberg's groundbreaking poem 'Howl' and the landmark censorship trial that surrounded its publication (see my ReThink Review of Howl and discussion about it on the Young Turks here). While Howl is a departure for them as their first scripted feature -- alternating between a re-enactment of Ginsberg's first reading of 'Howl' to an audience, an interview with Ginsberg about his background and the writing of 'Howl', and the...
- 10/12/2010
- by Jonathan Kim
- Huffington Post
Chicago – The seismic shift that took place with the publication of Allen Ginsberg’s epic poem, “Howl” – which is also the title of the new movie about the verse – reverberates and inspires to this very day. The brilliantly rendered film, starring James Franco as Ginsberg, is written and directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman.
Ginsberg’s journey through the landscape that the film covers is near and dear to the hearts of these creators. The themes of alienation, industrialization and moral isolation in the poem Howl told a truth about America that no history book can convey. Epstein and Friedman use animation, true-life recreation and a landmark obscenity trial to tell the story of Howl, and the all-star cast of Franco, Jon Hamm, Mary-Louise Parker, Jeff Daniels, Treat Williams, David Strathaim and Bob Balaban move the narrative.
Epstein and Friedman are no strangers to shining a light in the controversial corners of our society.
Ginsberg’s journey through the landscape that the film covers is near and dear to the hearts of these creators. The themes of alienation, industrialization and moral isolation in the poem Howl told a truth about America that no history book can convey. Epstein and Friedman use animation, true-life recreation and a landmark obscenity trial to tell the story of Howl, and the all-star cast of Franco, Jon Hamm, Mary-Louise Parker, Jeff Daniels, Treat Williams, David Strathaim and Bob Balaban move the narrative.
Epstein and Friedman are no strangers to shining a light in the controversial corners of our society.
- 9/29/2010
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
A few days ago I attended a press round table with Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the writers, producers, and directors of the new Allen Ginsberg docu-drama/biopic Howl, starring James Franco as the legendary Beat poet. Epstein and Friedman are career documentary filmmakers, having won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for their 1989 film Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, inspired by the Names Project AIDS Memorial Quilt on the Mall in Washington DC. They spoke at length about their new project, and let slip several interesting tidbits, which I have collected below.
read more...
read more...
- 9/24/2010
- by Benny Gammerman
- Filmology
Have a question about gay male entertainment? Please send an email to aftereltonflyingmonkey@gmail.com and be sure and include your city and state and/or country.
Q: When a bromance involves a gay guy and a straight guy, is there a more appropriate/proper term than “fag stag”? I'm not bothered by the term, but are there any others we can use? – Dan, Baltimore
A: Not that I know of, although I just made up the term "'mo bro." As for "fag stag," well, I'm on record as hating the term "fag hag" – I mean, come on, insulting two groups of people with one term? – so I'm going to go on record as hating this term as well.
You know, I used to think there was no such thing as a 'mo bro – see what I just did there? I'm putting the term I just made up into circulation.
Q: When a bromance involves a gay guy and a straight guy, is there a more appropriate/proper term than “fag stag”? I'm not bothered by the term, but are there any others we can use? – Dan, Baltimore
A: Not that I know of, although I just made up the term "'mo bro." As for "fag stag," well, I'm on record as hating the term "fag hag" – I mean, come on, insulting two groups of people with one term? – so I'm going to go on record as hating this term as well.
You know, I used to think there was no such thing as a 'mo bro – see what I just did there? I'm putting the term I just made up into circulation.
- 2/16/2010
- by Brent Hartinger
- The Backlot
Updated through 1/24.
James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg in Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's Howl, which opened the Sundance Film Festival on Thursday evening and will see its international premiere when it screens in Competition next month at the Berlinale. Andrew O'Hehir in Salon: "It's a film about an archetypal American nonconformist, made by a beloved pair of indie-film veterans whose collective résumé includes two Oscar-winning documentaries, Common Threads: Stories From the Quilt and The Times of Harvey Milk (which Gus Van Sant essentially remade in fictional form as Milk). It's an affectionate and artistically audacious movie, and I wish I could tell you it lived up to its source material. But I can't."...
James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg in Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's Howl, which opened the Sundance Film Festival on Thursday evening and will see its international premiere when it screens in Competition next month at the Berlinale. Andrew O'Hehir in Salon: "It's a film about an archetypal American nonconformist, made by a beloved pair of indie-film veterans whose collective résumé includes two Oscar-winning documentaries, Common Threads: Stories From the Quilt and The Times of Harvey Milk (which Gus Van Sant essentially remade in fictional form as Milk). It's an affectionate and artistically audacious movie, and I wish I could tell you it lived up to its source material. But I can't."...
- 1/24/2010
- MUBI
- Discovering and developing talent is what they do, and judging by the high quality level of docs they are able to support and then showcase at the snowy Park City fest it makes all the sense in the world that the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program would find it advantageous to want split the atom as many times possible and fork over what I imagine is some Ben Franklins that will be well spent. Its folks like me who get to sink their teeth into these films every trip back to Sundance.This year, 25 feature-length docs and their filmmakers will receive financial grants from the fund – many of these filmmakers are familiar names to those who know more than a thing or two about contemporary doc films. Here is the list of recipients provided below. Development GRANTSRob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, $10,000Howl (Us)Using animation to explore Howl , the poetic masterpiece by Allen Ginsberg,
- 6/8/2007
- IONCINEMA.com
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