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[digg=http://digg.com/movies/Cinequest_Film_Festival_Uploads_100_films_to_Jaman]California based film festival Cinequest opens its doors today in San Jose. The festival will present an impressive 250 films before its over on March 9th. Of those 250, 100 films have been chosen for online distribution through Jaman. The festival this year will be honoring the likes of Danny Glover (The Royal Tenenbaums), Bobby Moresco (Academy-Award® winning writer, Million Dollar Baby and Crash) and Michael Arndt (Academy-Award® winner Best Original Screenplay, Little Miss Sunshine). As well as showcasing those films that don’t fit the Hollywood mould.

Jaman, an online film rental site, is showcasing the trailers for 100 of the films on their website and are generously (or not so generously) giving away three films of your choice for free. While I applaud the film festival for embracing the internet as a new form of online distribution… three films… really? I can see the business model. Get film fans onto the site by offering the festival a platform etc. But three films? Come on Jaman you can do better than that! Also I wonder what percentage of the online rental price the filmmakers are getting, I suspected 0% which is an utter crime. I may be wrong and Jaman are offering the filmmakers a cut but I suspect, like so many others, Jaman are getting the full whack and the filmmaker is just grateful that his or her work is being seen… criminal. Anywho, check out the Cinequest website and Jaman’s festival selection pages for more information and to watch the trailers - there’s some gooduns!

That’s it from me,

K

[digg=http://digg.com/movies/Indiepix_Film_Festival_uses_online_distribution_and_voting]US indie film festival the Cinema Eye Honors presented by Indiepix has announced that it is to add a new audience award that will utalise both online distribution and voting process. The festival have chosen the BroadRamp platform to distribute the films and is requesting that viewers cast their vote online after watching. Indiepix are said to have chosen BroadRamp’s Content Distribution System because it does not require the user to download a third party browser plugin. However, this is a claim that confuses me slightly because taking a look at BroadRamp’s site they seem to be very much utalising flash video in their player which of course uses the “third party plugin” Shockwave. Soooo… unless I’m missing a trick and I they’ve some swanky technology they’re not showing off on their website… you still need a plugin folks.

BroadRamp seem to be best known for their work in the field of interactive e-commerce video. What’s interactive e-commerce video I hear you cry. Well, the basic concept is that you’re sitting watching a video online, or wherever, and you see a t-shirt you really like. You hover your mouse over that t-shirt and a pop-up appears giving you information, price and an option to buy the shirt. An idea then that seems to be genius and utterly horrific all at the same time.S o the cynic in me is thinking, will the content from this film festival be used as a film testbed for this evil genius video creation? Or am I turning into a internet conspiracy theorist? Either way, I am delighted to see that festivals are recognising the problems in the industry and making steps to rectify it. It does however seem bizarre to me that they would not use a more well known platform, such as blip.tv, vimeo or even the big daddy YouTube. My jaded mind is still mulling over the marketing potential of the BroadRamp system in festivals to come - you’ve been warned!

Anyway, the festival selections have been made and announced, more information can be found at the Indiepix and Cinema Eye Honors websites and voting commences on March 1st.

Right, that’s enough from me. Good night Finger Lickers, I will see you in the morning.

K

[digg=http://digg.com/movies/Be_Kind_Rewind_The_Hollywood_Indie_conflict]Evening fresh-faced finger lickers! Here’s a quick review of an indiewood flick doing the rounds for you. As I’m sure any film fan worth tuppence is aware Be Kind Rewind is the new film from Science of Sleep and Eternal Sunshine director Michel Gondry. The flick premiered at this years Sundance film festival and is being distributed by Focus Features.

Gondry’s comedy follows two slackers Jack Black and Mos Def who spend their days hanging out in the local video store in a dead-end town in New Jersey. After Black’s foolish character manages to wipe all the store’s videotapes the two are forced to recreate the Hollywood hit list using only their ingenuity and a VHS camcorder. Hilarity, as you would expect, ensues. However, evil city planning officials are moving to demolish the filmmaker’s slacker haven and build luxury apartments. In order to avoid the destruction of the video store the pair, with the help of the local community, set about making one final and totally original film to top them all.

While Be Kind Rewind entertained and made me laugh out loud on several occasions something was out of whack. Black and Def were well paired; the dialogue good; the cinematography was great and transition between the VHS-look and standard definition was well balanced. I also particularly like Gondry’s inclusion of the 2D elements in the comedy duo’s Hollywood remakes, a technique he took a good deal further in the sometimes-surreal Science of Sleep, which I loved by the way. However, I felt there was a comedy/feel-good balance problem. Rather than interspersing the comedy Gondry seems to have made a film where the laugh out loud comedy ends somewhere in the middle of the second act. He replaces the comedy with an often over pungent feel-good factor. The film turns from a slapstick fast paced comedy ride into an altogether different warm, fuzzy and dare I say it sometimes-saccharine picture. And as a result the film has somewhat lost its indie sensibility by the culmination of the third act.

Overall, this film begins with an indie feel but slowly develops a Hollywood scum on the surface. I don’t know whether this is because of the inclusion of a mainly Hollywood cast or the strange narrative shift. Either way the film leaves you with a confused taste in your mouth. While it delivers an American Independent cinema open-ended conclusion it does so while swimming in Hollywood sentiment. Perhaps that’s what Gondry was after… but I’m not sure he sold it to the audience.

K

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Hats_off_to_them_Coens]Afternoon Coen fans! I’m going to keep this brief because I’m not really in favour of the hype the Oscars gets and I don’t really want to draw any more attention to them than is really necessary. However, I felt it was of great importance to tip the metaphorical finger-lickin’ hat to the astounding Coen brothers. No Country For Old Men, my favourite film of the year to date, garnered four Oscars at last night’s ceremony and quite frankly nobody deserved it more.

The Coen brothers have been inspirational for a whole generation of filmmakers and while Fargo was also rightly recognised by the Academy, No Country for Old Men is a masterpiece and a truly brilliant return to form. So, Ethan and Joel, if you’re reading this, which you’re not, but if you are… congratulations on four every well deserved Oscars.

K

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Zombie_2_0]Afternoon finger lickin’ fans. So I mentioned a while ago that horror legend George A. Romero was at Sundance discussing the democratization of filmmaking in a spout.com interview. However, I didn’t really get into the reason why he was at the festival. His latest installment in the “Dead” saga premiered at Sundance and, as any good film director should be, he was whoring the hell outta it. The flick is basically a Blair Witch shakey handy cam take on his other apocalyptic tales. I am a big horror fan but not especially into the living dead stuff I’m more of a slasher man, however this really took my fancy.

The trailer is ridiculous and there’s obviously some jolly good hammy acting going on, but of all the horror remake dirge out there it actually caught my attention. From what I’ve read Romero has always worked in a very independent fashion and his latest film is no different, he’s using web 2.0 marketing techniques with exclusive MySpace goodies as well as tapping into the wannabe-filmmaker You Tube revolution to inspire his craft. I for one wanna give it a chance!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MdqNr0gN4Y]

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Juno_makes_indie_mainstream]It is an undeniable fact Juno has been a smash hit indie success story. Indie is the new mainstream, or so we’re told by the mainstream. Indie is cool. Juno is cool. TV and Radio presenters are cool because they talk about Juno and play the Juno soundtrack on their cool shows. Diablo Cody is cool because she wrote Juno and Ellen page is the next big thing because she is Juno. Third rate film critics are cool because they dislike the mainstream and express the incontrovertible coolness of Juno. My Mum and Dad are cool because they have “heard of” (read a drab newspaper article about) Juno.

However, it isn’t with my Mum and Dad that I take umbrage. Their foe-indie-enthusiasm is passable. It is with the third rate film critics that jump on the indie bandwagon when they discover it is cool to do so, that give me “the rage”. Now, don’t get me wrong. This is not a case of a indie film geek hating on an indie success story, far from it. I loved Juno I thought the flick was light hearted and refreshing. I was impressed with both Ellen Page and Michael Cera and I thought that stylistically the film was strong. Overall, I was most impressed by the writing and dialogue, Diablo Cody (cool name btw.) is obviously a talent. However, back to them critics.

James King is a classic example. For those of you who don’t know he’s the vacuous and generally shockingly poor BBC Radio 1 “Film Critic”. While I don’t always despise everything that comes out of the man’s mouth - he does talk about the right flicks but he goes into no real depth or detail - he’s normally shallow and generally terrible at his job 90% of the time. Again, this is not an I hate successful critics session, so please no hate mail saying I’m a frustrated film critic crying out for attention, because I’m not. I say good on the man for getting where he is with the diabolical analytical skills he possesses. However, he has, as would be expected, jumped fully and wholeheartedly on the indie cool Juno bandwagon by playing clips from the trailer and berating the mainstream films currently in the cinema. These are the guys normally plugging the latest Rocky bullshit sequel or some other shite. It genuinely makes me wanna vomit that these third rate critics get to trade off the success of a creative talent. I know it’s all good publicity for the flick but still… critics are parasites.

Juno btw, is really cool… go see it! Trends, don’t you just love ‘em!

That’s enough from me…

K

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Sundance_Distribution_Issues_George_A_Romero]With reference to my last post about the lack of distribution deals going around at Sundance, this seems to be a problem that even veteran filmmakers are noticing. George A. Romero, horror legend and creator of the infamous Dawn of the Dead (1978) is attending the festival for the first time to screen his latest film Diary of the Dead. Interviewed on video, Romero speaks to Spout.com about his work and the festival. Right at the end of his interview he touches on the issues I’ve been talking about. While greater accessibility to cheaper equipment is meaning lots more great independent films are being made, there still seems to be no solid distribution model for this type of work.

Check out their video interview at MySpace.

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Sundance_Deals_and_Distribution]Spout.com blogger, Karina Longworth, who’s currently at Sundance 2008 has written an interesting piece about the lack of deals being made so far at this year’s festival. Karina, speculates about a number of reasons for the relatively low number of distribution deals. Firstly, she references the mainstream press who are apparently suggesting that the buyers haven’t found that magic they have in previous years. Which is of course suitably vague and journalist speak for “we haven’t got a damn clue”.

Next, she discusses a comment by Sony’s Tom Bernard where he states that, we, the bloggers are to blame for taking the mystique out of the film buying and distribution process. According to Bernard the immediacy of blogging means that the press coverage of a film is happening too quickly and therefore they lose control of the media machine.

Finally, Karina suggests that possible the solution could be as simple as the fiftieth anniversary of Sundance has a pretty weak offering of dramatic feature-length flicks. Whether this is the case, is not for me to judge, I haven’t seen any of the films in question. Maybe next year, with a shiny Finger Lickin’ press pass around my neck. But, what these sluggish sales do make me wonder about is the value of a festival like Sundance to the filmmaker. Sure, it gets you some first rate press and sure it gets a very select audience into a cinema for 120minutes to watch your film. But where’s the real benefit? Where’s that golden ticket, the distribution deal that everyone is looking for? Has the time come where festivals like Sundance aren’t delivering the goods? It’s all well and good being able to put “Official Selection Sundance Film Festival” at the opening of your trailer but if only those three hundred ticket holders attending the festival get to see the film… where’s the real benefit to you, the filmmaker?

Distribution is key. The more I learn about alternative, exciting and innovative methods of getting your film seen and turning those views into earnings the more I believe that while there’s a place for the festival route, you need to think bigger.

Read Karina’s blog post here.

[digg=http://digg.com/movies/Comic_Book_Style_Guide_to_Copyright_Law_for_IndepeFilmmaking]This is a great resource for all DIY and Independant filmmakers out there. Copyright law is an absolute minefield of mind numbing dos and don’ts and you never quite know if it’s legit to use something or not. Whether it’s displaying a Coke can in the foreground of your shot or understanding music licensing this graphic novel guide to indie filmmaking and copyright law is indispensables.

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Moonshine_3]First time director Roger Ingraham’s film Moonshine debuted at Sundance 2006 and has garnered much critical acclaim. Ingraham shot his first feature-length film for under $10,000 when he was only twenty years old. Set in small-town America Moonshine is a vampire film that focuses upon a young guy, Peter, who takes a job working in a convenience store in order to care for his dying parents. As Peter works this soul-destroying job a figure of darkness waits in the shadows to take his life. Interestingly Moonshine has yet to attract a distribution deal, which is a real shock to me given the quality of what I’ve seen so far. Yet another filmmaker finding that the festival route isn’t working?

According to online murmurings, like Four Eyed Monsters, Moonshine is due to be release in its entirety on YouTube. Ingraham’s film has also been submitted to From Here To Awesome and is currently awaiting your support on their website.

Check out the trailer below and keep your eyes peeled for Ingraham in the future because he appears to be a real talent.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmYXL-2FNhg]

[digg=http://www.digg.com/movies/Say_hello_to_From_Here_To_Awesome]In recent years, independent filmmakers of all shapes and sizes have been exploiting Web 2.0 technologies to promote their individual projects. From basic trailers on a MySpace or YouTube page to the 360-degree empire that Arin Crumley and Susan Buice, of Four Eyed Monsters fame, have built for themselves; these filmmakers have harnessed the power of some extremely powerful viral technologies for their own ends.

However, online promotion and festival buzz is all well and good but what actually matters is how your turn your film, that you no doubt ploughed a good deal of hard earned or borrowed cash into, from a flick with some online buzz to a economically viable distribution deal. From Here to Awesome is a collaborative film festival founded by indie filmmaking and distribution gurus Arin Crumley, Lance Weiler and M dot Strange. The festival is designed to allow filmmakers to submit their film for free and involve the online audience, through social networking tools, enabling them to programme the festival themselves. Ultimately the project hopes to experiment with new distribution methods and ways of reading global audiences using online, cinema, on-demand and mobile technologies.

This is a really exciting development and a fantastic way for filmmakers to make a foray into alternative distribution. Hopefully in the near future Finger Lickin’ will be able to get a interview with Arin Crumley about his hopes for the project. Until then, please go and check out the site, submit your films and take advantage of this fantastic opportunity.