Film festival buzz is always a tricky thing to wrap one’s head around. Almost without fail, a solid percentage of the movies that everyone seems to be breathlessly hyping the day before a Festival have vanished from the conversation by the time the Jury has issued their verdict. And, if you’ve read any of the passel of Tribeca preview stories to hit the web over the past week, you know that this is a Festival with its own unique issues concerning hype vs. delivery. So with the first big weekend of Bobby DeNiro’s sixth annual legacy-cementer about to begin, here’s an extremely scientific assesment of the films that have attracted the most early Fest buzz. We’ll revisit this list at the end of the Fest, after the awards are announced on May 3.

Earth-Shattering Buzz

Taxi to the Dark Side
World Documentary Competition
This look at the evolution of the United States’ stance on torture has an advantage of buzz-by-association: its director, Alex Gibney, established himself as a documentary brand name first with Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, and then as exec producer of the recent Sundance hit, No End in Sight. The film itself is coming off a successful college tour, which resulted in quite a bit of blog buzz. Gibney and exec producer Sidney Blumenthal have pumped the film on The Huffington Post and Salon, respectively, and YouTube clips are starting to spread throughout the political blogosphere.
Notable Pullquotes: “Quickly progresses from chilling to alarming to utterly terrifying!” - Village Voice; “Meticulous!” (meant in the most positive sense of the word) - New York Times
Outlets offering an official endorsement: L Magazine, Premiere, Wall Street Journal
Odds of living up to the buzz: 10 to 1

Gardener of Eden
World Narrative Feature Competition
Variety gave Entourage star Kevin Connolly’s directorial feature debut a shot of cred when it placed the drama on its list of films that distributors are most eager to see. The fawning interviews with Connolly and star Lucas Haas are to be expected, but Tribeca is notorous for offering a home to god-awful celebrity vanity projects that vanish after their star-studded afterparties. Could this one possibly find life beyond the red carpet?
Notable pullquotes:“Whip-smart!” - New York Magazine; “Embodies the spirit of Tribeca!” (again, I think this is meant as a compliment) - E! Online
Outlets offering an offical endorsement: NY Daily News, VH1
Odds of living up to the buzz: 20 to 1

Still Life
World Narrative Feature Competition
The winner of the Golden Lion at last year’s Venice Film Festival finally makes it to the States–without a distributor. Jia Zhangke’s follow-up to The World has already been marked with the scarlet “M” (for “masterpiece”) by indieWIRE and The Reeler; though blog anticipation is thus far fairly minimal, although at least one Tribeca detractor names the film as possibly the only reason not to skip the procedings altogether.
Outlets offering an official endorsement: L Magazine, Premiere, TimeOut NY.
Odds of living up to the buzz: 2 to 1

This is England
Spotlight Section
Shane Meadows’ Thatcher-era, coming-of-age/skinhead-becoming flick unexpectedly beat awards season attention hog The Queen at the British Independent Film Awards last fall. Blog buzz is high, but the film’s struggle to secure an audience-friendly rating in its home country has sparked more chatter than the Tribeca premiere. Word on the street is universally positive, but England lost some urgency as a Tribeca must-see when IFC and Netflix announced plans to day-and-date release it in the States this summer.
Notable pullquotes: “Must-see!” - Premiere; “Feels more authentic than many documentaries!” - NY Times
Outlets offering an official endorsement: Village Voice, L Magazine, TimeOut NY
Odds of living up to the buzz: 3 to 1, but it’s going to be hard to quantify: as England’s not competing for Jury prizes and already has distribution here and abroad, its Tribeca run is basically just an early commercial for the July release.

A Walk Into the Sea
World Documentary Competition
Esther Robinson’s first film is a portrait of her uncle, Danny Williams, a sometime Factory fixture and Warhol boyfriend who mysteriously disappeared at the age of 27. The doc popped out of the pack of recent Warhol flicks when it won the Teddy for Best Documentary two months ago at Berlinale. Blog buzz is sizable, although a Technorati search produces many results related to the death of editor Jim Lyon earlier this month. Executive producer/noted doc blogger Doug Block is doing his part to spread the word.
Notable pullquotes: “Fascinating stuff!” - New York Magazine, “An emotionally complex portrait of the Factory moment!” - Village Voice
Outlets offering an official endorsement: L Magazine, Premiere,
Odds of living up to the buzz: 5 to 1

Mid-level Buzz

The Air I Breathe: According to New York Magazine, this Forrest Whittaker-starrer was the most talked-about flick at the Fest’s opening night party–but the crowd that fills the average Tribeca party doesn’t always reflect the crowd in line for morning screenings.

Times and Winds: This Turkish coming-of-age tale will be “the great discovery of the festival,” predicts indieWIRE.

Passio: This silent-film/live performance event is, according to the Village Voice, a “sublime, once-in-a-lifetime experience.”

Honorable Buzz Mentions - films with one rapturous pullquote

Avida: “Wonderfully anarchic!” — indieWIRE
The Killing of John Lennon: “Haunting, intensely impressionistic!” - Village Voice
Hellfighters: “Absorbing and insightful!” - New York Magazine
The Hammer: “Pure comic gold!” - Village Voice

Adaptations: Hot Fuzz, the next film in a trend of respectful spoofs playing with genre cliche.

I like the films coming from Swanberg, Duplass, Bujalski, et al mentioned in Kristin’s Mumblecore post. Kevin and I watched Joe Swanberg’s new film, Hannah Takes the Stairs at SXSW and I had the same response to it I’ve had to his other films (LOL, Kissing on the Mouth). I didn’t leave the theater riding on one emotion. I left talking about all the brilliant little gems, the pieces that are more relevant in his films than the whole. As Kristin put it, the films are a series moments so acutely portraying people trying to communicate.

As far as labeling this family of film–and the friendships growing between the filmmakers–as a “movement.” Well, I bristle at the idea. What is it about coining a movement that (in this case before these filmmakers even reach the age of thirty) we find comforting? Does it somehow validate watching films which individually may confuse us? Now that they’re grouped together, like the French New Wave, are we now able to analyze them? Where as before, we just had to watch them like we would any other movie.

If a group of like minded people gather together, it’s normal. But if those like minded people gather together and make something interesting, like European painters exiled to New York after World War II, they’re labeled a movement. Their work is not close and intimate, it’s recognized by themes and concepts demarcating that movement. In short, trying to stamp “mumblecore” on the work of a filmmaker like Joe Swanberg I think defeats what his films try to achieve: A moment of real intimacy and connection with the audience. The moment when a 25 year old girl sits in a theater wading through the film and suddenly says to herself, “Whoa! This is me! My boring little life is on a big screen and now, suddenly, it’s interesting!”

Maybe now instead of having that moment, that 25 year old girl will say, “Hmm. This is Mumblecore.”

When is it time to demarcate a filmmaking “movement”? What if the filmmakers in this movement don’t want to be grouped into any kind of movement at all? And what if the films in this movement revolve around the crisis of self-definition? Could it get any worse for one of its members than to have to talk about feeling self-conscious about being in a movement?

An article in the Spring 2007 issue of Filmmaker Magazine begins by asking these very smart questions, which immediately intrigued me. The article, “What I Meant to Say,” looks quite thoroughly at the independent film movement known by many as “mumblecore.” There are several posts waiting to emerge from this article, so I hope Paul and some of the other guys will share their thoughts in the coming days. For now, just check out the article and take note of the collaboration aspect of this movement.

The article generalizes these mumblecore films as “severely naturalistic portraits of the life and loves of artistic twentysomethings.” Names like Joe Swanberg (LOL), Mark Duplass (The Puffy Chair) and Andrew Bujalski (Funny Ha Ha) are all names that bubble to the top of this “scene,” if you can call it that. (I’ll never forget stumbling across Funny Ha Ha with some friends. It was definitely unlike anything we had ever seen.) Here’s another description from the article:

The first aesthetic indicators–and, it must be stressed, not all friends of mumblecore make films like this–are improvised dialogue and naturalistic performances, often by non-actors. The films employ handheld, verite-style digital camerawork and long takes. Budgets are tiny. The plots hinge on everyday events. The stories are often obvious reflections of the filmmakers’ lives. Most characters are white and educated and pursue creative endeavors when not pursuing one another. They are sensitive. They are sincere.

So that’s mumblecore, and it’s been slowly emerging for a while now. But apparently something interesting started taking shape this year at SXSW, causing people to sit up and pay attention. The festival’s promotional shorts were co-created by eight so-called mumblecore filmmakers, most of whom also had feature-length films at the festival (most of which were made with, written with, or acted by some of the other filmmakers).

It may be hard to follow all that, but you get the idea–this is a tight group. Read the article and you’ll see all the names and how they’re intertwined. It’s quite remarkable. And it made me think that something exciting is happening, whether or not I love this style of film (and I’m not convinced, yet, that I do–I’ll get back to you after I see more). The exciting thing that’s happening, from my perspective, revolves around a shared filmmaking experience that organically draws in ideas and talents from anyone who has some to offer. It’s not about competition–rushing to finish your film first, get it to festivals, attract the most attention. It’s about the love of making movies like this, of finding a format for expression that works, and sharing with others through that format.

In the end, these films, as the Filmmaker articles says, are ultimately about “trying to communicate.” While all films are trying to communicate something, it’s often something that’s inside one person (the writer or director). What’s interesting (and rather poetic) about mumblecore, is that people are interacting and trying to communicate on the screen as well as through the creation process. That seems to be filmmaking collaboration at its best.

We talk with film blogger Karina Longworth of Vidiocy.com about how blogging is changing the film industry. And we caught up with director Gregg Araki, who ponders what feminist film critics will think of his new stoner flick, Smiley Face.

Download FilmCouch #16 or subscribe in the iTunes store (search for “filmcouch” or click here to launch iTunes) and a new free episode will download every Friday.

So have you read the recent LA Times article about films budgets? ($78 million of red ink?) You may have at least heard about it, because this article has been linked to lots of snarky commentary on the outrageous amount spent on dying Matthew McConaughey’s hair. And I will admit, that’s pretty funny.

Getting past that, though, this article is really a rare peak into the world of gigantic budget Hollywood productions that are “developed” from existing “properties” (in the case of Sahara, a series of books). Some pretty amazing accounting gymnastics take place along the way. Here are a couple of sections from the article to give you an idea of what I’m talking about:

- Sahara, an action-adventure based on the bestselling novel by Clive Cussler, has lost about $105 million to date, according to a finance executive assigned to the movie. But records show the film losing $78.3 million based on Hollywood accounting methods that count projected revenue ($202.9 million in this case) over a 10-year period.

- “Courtesy payments,” “gratuities” and “local bribes” totaling $237,386 were passed out on locations in Morocco to expedite filming. A $40,688 payment to stop a river improvement project and $23,250 for “Political/Mayoral support” may have run afoul of U.S. law, experts say.

- Unlike most financial failures, “Sahara” performed reasonably well, ranking No. 1 after its opening weekend and generating $122 million in gross box-office sales. But the movie was saddled with exorbitant costs, including a $160-million production and $81.1 million in distribution expenses.

It makes me wonder, yet again, if one day people will realize how many more individual movies could be made for much smaller budgets, each with an opportunity to make a return on its modest investment through artful storytelling, filmmaking, and connection to a passionate audience.

Have you ever sat in a theater laughing at a movie until your insides hurt, and then realized you’re the only person laughing? Or have you ever had a friend carry on about some YouTube video you HAVE to see because it’s so funny you’ll pee your pants…and when you see it, you’re mildly amused, at most?

Humor is one of those things. It’s highly personal, right up there next to how you like your ham sandwiches made and how you like your underwear to fit. With that being the case, I’m wondering if it’s possible to pull off an all-funny-videos site. Isn’t that putting all your eggs in one basket? Promising too much?

“Will Ferrell” could very well be the answer to any and all “Is it possible?” questions. He’s also the one who’s been busy making such a site happen. Yesterday it was announced that Ferrell, along with his business partner Adam McKay, has launched a new comedy video site, FunnyorDie.com. Sure, the name alone represents a big promise, but so far the site is either keeping that promise or it’s riding the power-of-positive-thinking wave–yesterday the video Ferrell and McKay made had already attracted 1.5 million page views. So many people are hitting the site that today it had a “Too many people are blowing off work to download our videos” message on the homepage.

Kicking this site off right on the heels of Blades of Glory, when our laugh lines from Talladega Nights are also still fresh, was smart for sure. With two movies in a row like that, Ferrell starts to feel like a magic drug–”magic” because everything he touches gets your laugh going, and “drug” because the more you get, the more you want. (At least if that’s your kind of humor, which it either is or isn’t.)

It will be interesting to see how much Ferrell shapes and controls the flavor of the site and if he can sustain its original brand. Will it become synonymous with a certain Ferrell-style of humor, or will it quickly morph into just another video site where finding a real laugh is like winning a big prize?

Apparently there’s a “huge trend” in outdoor movie viewing equipment, while some of us are still trying to catch up (ie: save up) for a proper indoor setup.

The appeal of watching movies outdoors is kind of odd, when you think about it–the great outdoors really doesn’t provide the ideal movie-watching conditions. But the appeal is also very real. A big part of the appeal is driven by nostalgia, especially if you grew up in the 70s going to drive-in movie theaters with your parents, who didn’t have the money to hire a sitter. My brother and I would wear our pajamas, eat some home-popped popcorn out of a paper grocery sack, then fall asleep in the back of the station wagon while our parents had their “date.” I still love that image in my head of all those cars lined up in a field, facing a huge screen.

There’s also something novel about watching movies outdoors, especially now, when drive-in theaters are few and far between. Watching a movie outside with a bunch of people is somehow a very festive, community-building experience. I remember watching Pittsburgh on one of those cool inflatable screens with a huge crowd on the opening night of the 2006 Waterfront Film Festival. I also think fondly of the night I sat on a friend’s front porch watching a horror film projected on a sheet one Halloween night. Both nights I remember being chilly and slightly uncomfortable. I remember the screen quality, and/or the sound quality, being less than stellar. But I remember feeling extremely content.

There’s something “for-the-masses” about outdoor entertainment. Anyone passing by can participate, on some level. You don’t have to be invited in, you don’t have to pay for the right to watch and listen for a while. It’s like theater or music performed on the street or in the town square. I imagine it’s what many are drawn to when they organize film series in parks (which are also growing in popularity).

But this “huge trend” that I read about last week in a New York Times article (“The Drive-in Without the Drive”), seems like something quite different. Imagine a 65-inch screen TV permanently installed by the side of an 80-foot pool. Think systems that, with sound and everything else involved, can run from the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars. This paragraph from the NYT article will give you a taste of what we’re talking about:

Speak to the integrators and you see a backyard future in which one might never be forced to sit in a tiresome garden and sniff a rose again: Drop-down motorized screens hidden under the eaves; lots of little speakers all over the property (because multiple speakers on low volume create less spillover noise than two big speakers on loud); tiny speakers that look like lights in the trees; speakers in the pool, so that you need not miss Barry Bonds breaking the home run record when your head dips into the water.

Well, that’s novel for sure. But nostalgic? For the masses? Community-building? Yes, I’m old-fashioned. And it sounds pretty sad to me. When you have this whole setup permanently in your yard (or should I say “on your grounds?”) can you really ever just go outside to enjoy being outside? To maybe grown some vegetables in your garden? To play with your kids or your dog? To sit in the shade and read a good book? The ironic thing is that after spending so much money to transform our outdoor spaces into indoor spaces, will people start to complain about the “outdoors” being outdoors? The mosquitoes, the heat and humidity the unexpected storm and bird poo on the screen might very well end up driving people back inside. (And if I was their neighbor, I’d probably be glad.)

Even if my budget didn’t dictate my choice, I think I’d take the borrowed projector and the sheet set up, providing a novel, nostalgic night or two of fun a year.

Do we judge action movies with a double standard? Is there a right and a wrong way to make “exploitation cinema?” Kevin brings in pulp cinema expert Adam Forrest to ponder these questions. They take a close look at Grindhouse, 300, and more.

Download FilmCouch #15 or subscribe in the iTunes store (search for “filmcouch” or click here to launch iTunes) and a new free episode will download every Friday.