http://blog.spout.com/2007/11/07/m-words/ Daily coverage of what is truly interesting in the film world Mon, 09 Nov 2009 23:15:45 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 http://blog.spout.com/2007/11/07/m-words/#comment-115164 Ballast Review (Flix99.com) Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:45:20 +0000 http://blog.spout.com/2007/11/07/m-words/#comment-115164 [...] Hammer shot Ballast on 35mm in the winter’s available light in rural Mississippi, with a cast of non-professional local actors, and discarded his script in order to flesh out the story via a two-month rehearsal process. The look, locale and subject matter couldn’t more different from Hannah Takes the Stairs, but with Ballast Hammer joins Joe Swanberg in the club of American filmmakers who are turning to stripped-down production methods and intense improvisation in search of emotional truth. The more that films like this manage to break through the wall of noise at festivals like Sundance, the better chance critics, filmmakers and audiences have of seeing each movie both on its own terms, and as part of a larger wave of back-to-basics American independent filmmaking that defies pejorative genre classifications. [...] [...] Hammer shot Ballast on 35mm in the winter’s available light in rural Mississippi, with a cast of non-professional local actors, and discarded his script in order to flesh out the story via a two-month rehearsal process. The look, locale and subject matter couldn’t more different from Hannah Takes the Stairs, but with Ballast Hammer joins Joe Swanberg in the club of American filmmakers who are turning to stripped-down production methods and intense improvisation in search of emotional truth. The more that films like this manage to break through the wall of noise at festivals like Sundance, the better chance critics, filmmakers and audiences have of seeing each movie both on its own terms, and as part of a larger wave of back-to-basics American independent filmmaking that defies pejorative genre classifications. [...]

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