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Doc Briefs | St. Clair Bourne Tribute At STF; New Face At Hot Docs

[Mark Rabinowitz] Once again, it's time for a few doc news nuggets. Stranger Than Fiction pays tribute to the late filmmaker St. Clair Bourne on October 28th and Hot Docs names a new director for the Toronto Documentary Forum.

stclair.jpgStranger Than Fiction To Tribute St. Clair Bourne
Next Tuesday, weekly doc screening series Stranger Than Fiction is guaranteed to be a special experience for all attending. A Tribute to St. Clair Bourne, will feature a special screening of Bourne's documentary "Making 'Do the Right Thing'" and guest speakers Danny Glover, Bourne's sister Judith Bourne and editor Sam Pollard. Saint, as his friends called him, passed away quite suddenly of a pulmonary embolism last December at the age of 64. Those of us lucky enough to have known him were and still are shocked by his untimely death and I urge you all to try and attend this special evening.

At the risk of getting a little too personal here, Saint was an old friend and comrade of my mother Joanne Grant from the days of the Movement and was, for a while, producing a documentary project she was directing. She passed away, also before her time, in January of 2005. Tickets can be bought here.

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Doc Linkage | State Of Russian Indies; EFA Doc Nods; Vérité Fest Winds Up

[Mark Rabinowitz] I trolled hither and thither amongst all the myriad ones and zeros to bring you, my doc faithful, this three very special international edition of Doc Linkage. Included are a look at the current state of Russian independent cinema, the nominees for the EFA's doc award and the wrapping up of this year's Cinéma Vérité Festival in Tehran. I hope you like them!

A Look at the State of the Russian Indie Landscape
Albina Kovalyova, writing for Russia Profile presents a revealing look at the current state of Russian independent cinema, laying out some of the obstacles to indie filmmaking in a country with a rich cinematic history. It turns out that the modern film funding and distribution bodies are not exactly excited about indies or experimental films and this includes most of what we would call creative docs. Much of the article is comprised of descriptions of three festivals, the second of which is hosted by Kinoteatr Doc. Kovalyova describes the festival as focusing on "Russian documentaries that differ from the majority of television reportage often thought of as defining the genre. Unlike the narrator-driven television documentaries, here the emphasis is placed on telling a story from the perspective of the protagonists."

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"Snag The Vote" Launches At SnagFilms

[Mark Rabinowitz] SnagFilms (the co-presenter of this blog) recently launched the “Snag The Vote: Elections ‘08 Film Festival”, a 60+ collection of "election-themed" films, including the world premiere of "Inside The Bubble," director Steve Rosenbaum’s insiders’ view of the 2004 Kerry campaign. While the press release refers to the films as "election-themed," a more accurate description might be "issue-oriented" or simply "topical," as the films are not all directly related to the 2008 or any other election. What the series does do, however, is break the films up into eight categories, including: Economy, National Security & Iraq War, Healthcare, Education, Environment, Electoral Process, Government Ethics & Partisanship, Immigration and Individual Rights. In the lead up to what is arguably the post important election in more than 70 years, it would behoove us all to educate ourselves about the pressing issues of the day so that we can make an informed decision and help others to do the same!

Some of the films included are Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern's latest film "The End of America" (2008, available 10/21), "Call It Democracy" (Matthew Kohn, 2005) and Steve Rosenebaum's "Inside the Bubble" (2008). For more on these and the rest of the slate, head on over to SnagFilms.



Doc Linkage | "Front Runners" Review; Vérité Fest In Iran

[Mark Rabinowitz] A collection of some of the doc goings on around the web, including a review of Caroline Suh's "Frontrunners" and a preview of a doc fest in Tehran.

"Frontrunners" Review
The folks over at indieWIRE, courtesy of Reverse Shot (and I have been known to, erm...disagree with their tastes at times, have run a pretty good and fair review of Caroline Suh's "Frontrunners." Of course any election-themed film, even if it does take place in a high school, takes on extra resonance during election time but even if you have a little bit of election fatigue, I suggest you see this film. It's a pretty interesting look at just how much of a miniaturized mirror of adult life high school can be.

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Doc Linkage | Top Doc Schools; Newman's Docs; Brush Leaves Full Frame

[Mark Rabinowitz] As Public Enemy one said: What goes on? Well, first up is a piece from The Independent on some of the top school programs specifically for docs. Then we move on to a couple of pieces from AJ Schnack: One about the history of Paul Newman's involvement with documentaries and a second about another vacancy at a doc festival. Carry on, faithful readers!

Top Doc Shops
The Independent (Yes, that Independent) Magazine has a recent post in which Caitlin Graham writes about the top schools for documentary studies, writing "Although many of the best programs present opportunities to learn a bit about non-fiction filmmaking, it is rare to find one that focuses solely on the craft." Her list includes the Duke Center for Documentary Studies, The Documentary Center at George Washington University, The New School - Documentary Media Studies and the Maine Media Workshops' Documentary Filmmaking courses. The list of ten is presented un-ranked and rather artificially (it seems) split between university degree programs and non-degree instiututions. Why not top ten of both? I mean, does un-ranked mean that Graham picked the top 5 of each type? From what I can see, there are 7 programs located at universities/colleges and 3 that are not. My relatively minor criticisms aside, it's nice to see someone doing the research and maybe kick-starting a more in-dept listing.

» Continue reading "Doc Linkage | Top Doc Schools; Newman's Docs; Brush Leaves Full Frame"


Doc Linkage | Stewart's NYFF Vids; Ogilvie Moves Shop

[Mark Rabinowitz] Some of the things that are piquing my interest around the 'Net, lately. I think they're cool or interesting or noteworthy so therefore, so should you. My blog (sorta), my rules. Word.

Loving the Jamie Stewart Videos
Jamie Stewart's short videos are one of the things I most look forward to during the New York Film Festival. Omnipresent with his camera and skull cap, Stewart's films are highly imaginative, mixing in a bit of his life (real and imagined) with audio and video footage of the various press conferences and can always be counted on to entertain. Many times I've sat, slack-jawed and muttered "how'd he do that?" under my breath. Then again, I'm a bit of a slack-jawed yokel when it comes to creative video editing. I can't even figure out how to overlay credits on my clips in iMovie. Check out Jamie's videos from this year at FILMMAKER Magazine and his films from previous years at his company's site, Mutiny Company.

Liz Ogilvie Moves To Indiepix
Veteran doc fixture (and all around fun Scot) Liz Ogilvie is moving from Docurama to Indipix, continuing that latter company's series of high profile moves, or so says AJ Schnack. She will kick off her gig as Indiepix Head of Marketing at the upcoming Hamptons International Film Festival, according to Schnack. First free drink in East Hampton is on me, Liz!



Doc Linkage | New Indian Doc Market; Update On Samuel George; Pittsburgh Docmaker

[Mark Rabinowitz] A few stories bouncing around the Interweb, today. A new market for docs, a call to help colleagues in trouble and spotlight on a Pittsburgh filmmaker.

Doc Market To Launch In Panaji
According to Indiaglitz.com, the upcoming International Film Festival of India (IFFI) is setting up a market especially for the buying and selling of short films and docs. According to the site, the market will be run by the Indian Documentary Film Producers Association and the festival's organizers, Entertainment Society of Goa. The festival runs in the Goan city of Panaji from November 22 through December 3.

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Fictional Documentaries: Is There Such An Animal?

[Mark Rabinowitz] The North Texas blog Art and Seek has a post by Greg Brown, the managing director of AFI Dallas International Film Festival who gives his thoughts about the Thin Line Film Fest that kicked off last night. "I love documentary films. They can inspire, teach and entertain," begins Brown. "Often, they are the gems to discover at a film festival." Too true, Greg! Brown goes on to say that "for me, a film festival dedicated to documentaries is an embarrassment of riches." I agree, completely." The fest looks like it has a lot of interesting docs to screen as well as a weekend industry conference called "Between the Lines."

That's all great, but the festival's "about us" page includes the following: "We celebrate the documentary as an entertaining art form without consideration for the factuality of content. In fact, not only do we screen traditional documentaries, but also mockumentaries, and even 100% fictional documentaries."

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Varda Tops iW Doc Poll At TIFF

[Peter Knegt]indieWIRE took a poll of film critics and bloggers regarding their thoughts on the Toronto International Film Festival. Critics and bloggers were asked to list their top three choices in each category -- best film, best performance and best documentary. First choice selections were given three points, second choice received two points and third choice received one point. We tallied the results, and given the nature of this blog, I figured a more in-depth look at the choices for documentary was warranted.

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Doc Linkage | Berends Still In Custody; Finneran Leaving AFI; Prolific TIFF Doc Blog

[Mark Rabinowitz] Ah yes, another collection of ones and zeros masquerading as news about documentaries and the doc world. Berends still in custody, Finneran moving on and the TIFF doc blog goes into overdrive.

Berends Still In Custody
Filmmaker Andrew Berends and his Nigerian interpreter Samuel George are still in custody, according to the blog keeping track of the situation. There is an email from Andy here, where he says he enjoyed a brief respite from the interrogation over the weekend, but it has been confirmed that he and George are back in custody as of Monday afternoon. There is information on the blog on how to call or email Senators Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton (Andrew's home state senators) and ask them to pressure the US State Department to pressure Nigeria into releasing Andrew and Samuel. I did. It only takes a minute!

» Continue reading "Doc Linkage | Berends Still In Custody; Finneran Leaving AFI; Prolific TIFF Doc Blog"


Doc Linkage | TIFF Doc Picks, Where Is AJ?, "I.O.U.S.A." Makes Waves

[Mark Rabinowitz] A look at some of today's doc news on the Internets, including "I.O.U.S.A." making waves and some doc tastemakers choose some films to catch in Toronto.

TIFF Doc Pics: What Should You See?
Over at the Toronto International Film Festival's Doc blog (required reading for you doc heads out there) TIFF doc programmer Thom Powers is ramping up the posts on the way to the festival, which kicks off on September 4th and he's asking some notable folks in the film world (still waiting for your call, Thom!) for their top doc picks from the upcoming fest. He kicked off the series on August 19th with Tom Hall, the director of programming at the most excellent Sarasota Film Festival and blogger at the Back Row Manifesto. \Other folks surveyed include doc it out's Agnes Varnum, filmmaker and D-Word founder Doug Block, American Museum of the Moving Image chief curator David Schwartz and a pair of Chicago scribes, Ray Pride and Jonathan Rosenbaum. Most often mentioned film? Agnès Varda's "Les Plages des Angnès".

» Continue reading "Doc Linkage | TIFF Doc Picks, Where Is AJ?, "I.O.U.S.A." Makes Waves"


DNC Day 1: Film Festivals Kick Off

Today the film-related functions at the DNC start in earnest, with the kickoff of the Impact Film Festival, Sea Change Communications and Cinemocracy screenings and panels, not to mention the ramp up of the Cinemocracy Late Night Lounge. The LNL opened on Saturday night and as a result, tequila and I are going to have to spend some time apart. Morgan Spurlock rolled into town last night and this afternoon he'll be doing a Q&A following a screening of his latest film, "Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden?" Other films screening this week include Mary Lambert's "14 Women," a look at 14 female US senators, "I.O.U.S.A.," a look at the rising debt crisis in America (getting lots of press, this one is!) and the recently-opened "Trouble The Water," from Carl Deal and Tia Lessin.

NOTE: Lawrence Cann's "Kicking It" was inadvertently left off my list of docs screening at the Impact Film Festival! My apologies!

The pre-convention activities kicked off on Saturday night with the media party at Elitch Gardens Amusement park. All rides, games, food and drink was free, so of course I had to ride the roller coaster, win a duck and spill wine on myself. Well, I gotta be me!


It's good to be the king!
;-)
JennynMesmall.jpg

Photo ©Christopher Dyer



Cinemocracy Credits

[Mark Rabinowitz] In my post of yesterday, I neglected to mention that Cinemocracy is brought to you by The Denver Film Society (the folks that put on the most excellent Denver Film Festival), the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs and the 2008 Denver Convention Host Committee.



Docs At The DNC: Gettin' Political, Y'all!

n1012918954_30105694_9787.jpg [Mark Rabinowitz] The Democratic National Convention approaches and yours truly will be attending his 3rd convention since 1988. I am a film and political junkie and as luck would have it, there are a load of political films and political panels (and parties) in Denver over the next week or so. I can't wait. There are two main film-related mini-fests going on at the DNC, Cinemocracy and the Impact Film Festival as well as copious book signings (Heather Thomas, no shit!) panels and events.

Cinemocracy, an open call for entry film festival made up of 5-minute films that invoke the spirit of democracy. Get it? So they announced their ten finalists today, all to be screened at Cinemocracy Rocks at Red Rocks on August 25th and at the DNC. They are (in no particular order):

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NYFF-Whither The Docs?

[Mark Rabinowitz] So the New York Film Festival announced the full lineup for their 46th annual event and yeah, there's a lot of stuff I am excited about. I won't be in Venice, so it'll be nice to see Darren Aronofsky's "The Wrestler," the Clint Eastwood film "Changeling," Laurent Cantet's "The Class" ("Time Out" was genius) and of course one of my all time favorite films, Nagisa Oshima's 1983 masterpiece "Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence." Indeed, I do love this festival. The press and industry screenings have a sort of pomp and circumstance all of their own and most other fests don't do full on press conferences after the press screenings. But.....

Aside from Ari Folman's "Waltz with Bashir" and Alexander Olch's "The Windmill Movie," nary a doc is to be found unless you count Jia Zhangke's "24 City" ("Er shi si cheng ji"), described as "straddling the border between fiction and documentary." I haven't seen it, so I can't say where I think it ends up in its straddle but 2 (maybe 3) docs out of almost 30 films?

I know there are plenty of docs screening in Venice and Toronto and it's not like the Film Society hasn't programmed films from those two festivals before. I do understand that it's a programming committee and maybe they just didn't like Ross McElwee's "In Paraguay," Agnès Varda's "Les Plages des Agnès," Chai Vasarhelyi's "Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love" Or Paul Cronin's NY-set "A Time to Stir." Hell, maybe they all suck (doubtful) or maybe they did like them and the filmmakers didn't want to play the NYFF. Maybe.

What do you all think? Am I being too doc-centric (the name of the blog notwithstanding)? Too harsh on the selection committee?



Heads Up: The TIFF Doc Blog Returns!

[Mark Rabinowitz] While we link to it on our sidebar, I haven't yet really mentioned the excellent doc blog being run by Toronto International Film Festival doc programmer Thom Powers with posts by Powers and many other fine writers. Some of the most recent posts include Dan Stone writing about his TIFF '08 doc "At the End of the World" about eco-warrior Paul Watson and Jeffrey Levy-Hinte writing about his doc "Soul Power," about the 3-day concert "Zaire '74" held alongside the Muhammad Ali-George Foreman fight in uh, Zaire...in erm.. 1974.

Knowing Thom and his passion for documentaries, there's a lot more to come, I am sure!



Doc Linkage: Stealing America The Beautiful, BritDoc Pix And "Looooouuuuuu!"

[Mark Rabinowitz] A roundup of some of the doc news and features currently floating around as ones and zeros.

Louuuuuuuuuu
Following up on something I wrote about last week, indieWIRE reports on Lou Reed's Q&A following Monday night's screening of Julian Schnabel's "Lou Reed's Berlin." I'm not sure "a horrifically lyrical rendition of children's screams for several minutes," "a seminal bummer depicting the tortured lives of two drug addicts" and "...joy in performing even the most agonizing of songs" are really the best advertisements for the film, but Schnabel is a fine director and DP Ellen Kuras ("4 Little Girls," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind") ain't no slouch, either so if you're a Reed fan, it might be worth a trip.

America The...Hackneyed?
While over at ReverseShot's ReverseBlog, Michael Koresky takes aim ("hackneyed and juvenile") at Darryl Roberts' "America the Beautiful," which opens tomorrow, August 1st. Ouch.

» Continue reading "Doc Linkage: Stealing America The Beautiful, BritDoc Pix And "Looooouuuuuu!""


Doc-Linkage: HBO Doc Series Continues; BritDoc Wraps; New NZ Doc Society

[Mark Rabinowitz] One of our periodic selections of doc-related stories from around the globe. And I do mean GLOBAL, today.

The Recruiter Airs Tonight
Tonight marks the 8th (out of 12) screening in the HBO Documentary Film Series with Edet Belzberg's "The Recruiter." In a nice change of pace, the film focuses on an aspect of the War in Iraq that takes place here at home. The Washington Post has a nice write up here. Upcoming films in the series include: Ivan O'Mahoney and Laura Winter's excellent "Baghdad High," Paul Taylor's "We Are Together: The Children of Agape Choir," Rory Kennedy's "Thank You, Mr. President: Helen Thomas at the White House" and "The Black List, Vol. 1" by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders and Elvis Mitchell. Of the five remaining, I've only seen "Baghdad High" (hence my one word of praise) but look forward to seeing the others. Maybe I can get screeners from HBO so I can praise them in advance....*cough...hint....cough*

2008 BritDoc Festival Wraps
Over at indieWIRE, Cinetic Rights Management head of programming and marketing Matt Dentler wraps up this year's edition of BritDoc Festival, including a look into how this year's themes of comedy and music played out at the fest. Well, at least the comedy part. There wasn't a whole lot about the music side. I am damn sorry I missed it, but next year...oh YES, next year! Look Out Oxford, the Rabbi's a-comin' to getcha!

Hoops, There It Is!
The Documentary New Zealand Trust are starting a bi-monthly doc film society and kicking off the series with Steve James' acclaimed "Hoop Dreams." Called DOCNZ Focus, the series tips off on Tuesday, July 29th with a screening and an appearance by the NZ Breakers, a team in Australia's National Basketball League. Other films scheduled in the series are Joshua Tickell's "Fields of Fuel" as well as Costa Botes and Peter Jackson's mocumentary "Forgotten Silver," The latter programmed, apparently, to provoke "the question ‘should we believe everything that documentaries show us?’" The final three films yet to be announced. Each screening will be followed by a discussion.



IDA DocuWeek Comes To NYC, AJ Schnack Weighs In On Early Reviews

[Mark Rabinowitz] Over at All These Wonderful Things, AJ Schnack has been busy, despite attending BritDoc and, I would wager, enduring a substantial hangover today. He's got two interesting posts, one of which (I'll get to the other in another post) outlines the lineup for the first IDA DocuWeek NYC, set to play at the Village East Cinemas and IFC Center. Schnack notes that the screenings will likely get this films a review in the New York Times, potentially costing them a review if and when the films receive a proper theatrical roll out later in the year. AJ laid out the potential scenarios in a post back in April and if indeed the DocuWeek screenings are reviewed by the Times, this could seriously alter the documentary distribution landscape.

As for the films, I hope to see them all, although it'll take a lot to get me to see Glass. Nothing against the film or the filmmaker, of course. Philip Glass' music just makes my teeth hurt, is all.

At a time when the documentary distribution landscape is already being rearranged almost daily, how concerned should we be about early NY Times reviews? Let me know your thoughts, people!



CINELAN Announces New Distribution Partnership; Films To Screen At BritDoc

[Mark Rabinowitz] So, over at my other job I am in acquisitions for CINELAN, a motion picture publishing and syndication company focused on professionally created, three-minute non-fiction films. Turns out we have something pretty cool to announce and since it's doc related, I guess I should mention it. That said, it's legitimate news and I am not just pimping out one of my gigs in another, I promise. It's been written up in indieWIRE (oh, right. No relation there!) and Screen Daily (subscription only) and will, I am sure, appear in other places in the coming days.

At any rate, CINELAN has announced a new UK-based distribution partnership with telegraph.co.uk, the online arm of the Telegraph Media Group and I, for one, am very excited about this. It's the launch of CINELAN's contextual delivery system, whereby films will be embedded next to relevant text content. It's pretty cool, actually. This should kick off within the next ten days and new films will be added over the next three months. CINELAN is also in talks with with UK broadcaster Channel 4 involving their 3 Minute Wonder series and films will soon be distributed through CINELAN theatrical partner Picturehouse Cinemas.

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