FILM PROGRAMMER AARON HILLIS BUYS BROOKLYN VIDEO STORE

While in Cannes I bumped into critic and programmer Aaron Hillis, who told me about the new Brooklyn-based endeavor he’ll be starting upon returning home — running a video store. Hillis, who already programs reRun, the independent cinema and gastropub located in Filmmaker’s building in DUMBO (and currently playing Contributing Editor Brandon Harris’s debut feature, Redlegs), recently bought the established Cobble Hill business Video Free Brooklyn. At a time when the independent film world is obsessed with VOD, downloads and streaming, Hillis is time-traveling back to the world of plastic cases, late fees, and, on the more positive side, savvy clerks who know you, your tastes, and are vocal in their recommendations. I’ll let him fill you in on the rest.

Filmmaker: So, you bought a video store?

Aaron Hillis: I did buy a video store. I have this bad habit of getting into failing industries. I started in print journalism in 2002, got into DVD distribution with Andrew Grant in 2006, then theatrical exhibition in 2010 and, here we go, I’m buying a video store in 2012.

Filmmaker: Tell me about the store.

Hillis: It’s called Video Free Brooklyn, and it’s been a real staple, an institution in my neighborhood of Cobble Hill, Brooklyn for the last decade. The owner, Dan Wu, has lived in Kentucky for a few years and wants to pursue another endeavor. And, basically, the store has been sustainable. Like I said, it’s a neighborhood institution, it’s in a well-trafficked area, and it caters to a media-savvy [clientele] — a community that needs to be served with a well-curated video store. My favorite fun facts are that not only does Nick Flynn, who wrote Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, have an account, but so does Paul Dano, who plays him in the movie [Being Flynn]. And even though it’s 375 feet, about twice the size of my living room, there’s potential to make it something even cooler, like a boutique.

Filmmaker: What sort of reactions have you gotten from your colleagues in the independent film world?

Hillis:… Read the rest

THE ‘BLUE VELVET’ PROJECT: CONFESSION REDUX

May 28
The Blue Velvet Project will resume with post #119 on May 30th. In the meantime, this is a re-post of the April 23 confession, with a new confessional update at the bottom of the post.

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As author of The Blue Velvet Project—which owes a moral debt to the Dogme 95 movement, whose practice of constraint was an inspiration—I feel obligated to make this public statement of confessions regarding the rigors of the project. This is done in the spirit of Thomas Vinterberg’s confession regarding his film The Celebration.

Despite the fact that I promised Mr. Macaulay, Filmmaker Editor-in-Chief, that I would compose each entry “well ahead of time,” I confess that the following posts were composed the day of posting:

#12
#27
#28
#77
#93

I confess to posting—out of unreasonable affection for the frame in question—on the same frame twice, concocting the flimsy ruse of “part 2” as a means to justify this selfish act.

I confess to the desire to “step frame” the DVD forward to avoid Jeffrey’s eyes being closed in post #73. However, I resisted this temptation.

I confess to knowing well ahead of time that I would use the Comolli and Narboni quote in post #25. In fact, no matter what frame post #25 would have revealed, I was prepared to use that quote, thereby jeopardizing the spirit of surprise and spontaneity that characterize the project.

I hereby declare that all previous Blue Velvet Project entries up to this point have been created following both the letter and the spirit of the agreement between myself and Mr. Macaulay, and that I will endeavor to remain faithful to this agreement for the remainder of the project.

Pleading for absolution, I remain

Nicholas Rombes

UPDATE, May 28: Backslider and deeply flawed person that I am, I have failed to remain faithful to the agreement. In fact, in the very post that followed my confession–post #106 on April 25–I quoted again from two authors I have over-used in this project, Brian Evenson and Haruki Murakami. I did this with full knowledge … Read the rest

DO ANCIENT ROMAN ARTIFACTS REVEAL THE WORLD’S FIRST MOTION PICTURE PROJECTOR?

Presenting evidence from a “speculative archaeological find” in Zadar, Croatia, “Ancient Cinema” is a multimedia installation and transmedia project by Canadian artist Henry Jesionka scheduled to debut in Zadar in June. The piece’s premise — that ancient artifacts recently retrieved from Zadar point to the existence of the world’s first motion picture project.

Jesionka explains his Indiegogo project:

Based on this speculative evidence, “Ancient Cinema” will present a working recreation of an ancient Roman movie projector, projecting the world’s first animated “films.” Along with this groundbreaking discovery, the installation will feature a short documentary about the sourcing and analysis of the artifacts, a comprehensive Website examining the precedents for the Roman projector and other proto-cinematic innovations in the ancient world, and the evidence itself: the original artifacts “discovered” in the flea market. The installation Website will also feature replicas of the ancient Roman coin and glass “animation frames”.

Check out the video below and consider contributing to Jesionka’s campaign, which ends in five days. (The rewards are very cool.)

… Read the rest

CANNES PRESIDENT ADDRESSES ABSENCE OF FEMALE DIRECTORS

In an interview published yesterday in The Guardian, Cannes Festival President Gilles Jacob addressed the issue of the 2012 edition’s lack of female directors in Competition, saying, “I am sure that next year the chief selector, Thierry Frémaux, will look more carefully to find films by women.” Countering critics, he said that the festival does aim for some sort of gender balance in its selections. “The job of feminists and of people like me who like the work of female film-makers is to say to [Frémaux]: ‘Are you sure there isn’t somewhere a film by a woman that deserves to be competing?’ That is always the conversation we have here.”

However, Jacob’s comments get a bit dicier when he blames some of this year’s criticism on the expectations generated by the presence of four women directors in last year’s Competition.

From The Guardian:

“That was maybe a wrong move,” he said. “Now everyone this year was expecting five films, then six, then seven. In France nowadays, they speak of parity. They want parity in government, parity everywhere, so why not at the Cannes film festival?”

Last Monday at Cannes I moderated a panel on American Pavilion panel on U.S. film festivals featuring reps from the New York Film Festival, Sundance, the Los Angeles Film Festival and Tribeca. I asked the panelists to comment on the criticism directed at Cannes about its lack of female representation, and a number of points were raised. (I won’t quote anyone directly because it’s near-impossible to take notes on a panel you are moderating, and I’m not able to get a transcript.) One point was that the true extent of this year’s omission won’t be known until Venice and Toronto, at which point we’ll see films by female directors that may have been submitted to and rejected by Cannes. We discussed issues like female representation on selection juries, whether quotas are an appropriate response to the issue, and the specific identity of the Cannes Official Selection which, by highlighting a specific variety of highbrow “author cinema,” often by returning Cannes masters, may automatically … Read the rest

“AMOUR,” “BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD” WIN AT THE CANNES FILM FESTIVAL

Michael Haneke picked up his second Palme d’Or in a row today when the Cannes jury awarded the Austrian director the festival’s top prize for Amour (pictured), his tale of an elderly couple dealing with the wife’s catastrophic health issues. The award was surprising only in its lack of surprise — while the preceding prizes had been unanticipated choices, Amour, to be released later this Fall by Sony Pictures Classics, was easily the consensus pick of critics and Competition viewers. In other awards, the Camera d’Or for Best First Film went to American independent Benh Zeitlin for his Beasts of the Southern Wild. (Selected for our 2008 25 New Faces list, he’s our first such selection to win the Camera d’Or.) Relative surprises were the directing prize to Carlos Reygadas for his perplexing and personal experimental left-turn, Post Tenebras Lux, and the Grand Prix (Runner-Up) to Matteo Garrone for Reality, a drama about a Sicilian fisherman obsessed with the possibility of being on the Big Brother series that received mixed response from critics. Another surprise was Best Actress, for which the jury passed over strong performances by veterans like Emmanuelle Riva (Amour) and Marian Cotillard (Rust and Bone) for the two young newcomers in Cristian Mungiu’s Beyond the Hills.

A complete list of awards follows, with further wrap-up coverage here at Filmmaker this week.

Best Short: Silence, directed by Rezan Yesilbas.

Camera d’Or (Best First Film): Beasts of the Southern Wild, directed by Benh Zeitlin.

Prix de Jury: The Angel’s Share, directed by Ken Loach.

Prix du Scenario (Best Screenplay): Beyond the Hills, Cristian Mungiu.

Prix de la mise en scene (Best Director): Carlos Reygadas, Post Tenebras Lux.

Best Actor: Mads Mikkelsen, The Hunt.

Best Actress: Cosmina Stratan and Christina Flutur, Beyond the Hills.

Grand Prix: Reality, directed by Matteo Garrone.

Palme d’Or (Best Picture): Amour, directed by Michael Haneke.… Read the rest