Gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello have drawn an increasingly large following as the decade as worn on, but this year their cinematic profile has raised dramatically. In Berlin this year Madonna unveiled her Filth and Wisdom, staring frontman Eugene Hutz, and now comes a full blown tour documentary filmmaker Margarita Jimeno, Gogol Bordello Non-Stop. The film made its North American bow at AFI over the weekend and screens again this Wednesday at the Arclight. The Bogota, Columbia born, Williamsburg based Jimeno, who has made shorts and worked in the art and editorial departments of NYC indies for a decade, caught up with us to discuss her fascination with There Will Be Blood, her desire to adapt Que Viva La Musica! and where to catch Sid Vicious on You Tube. …Read more

Flame & Citron, directed by former Dogme 95 auteur Ole Christian Madsen, walks a thin line between ass-kicking assassin movie and dense WWII period drama. The film recounts the true story of Bent and Jørgen, code names Flame and Citron, as they cruise around occupied Copenhagen offing Danish Nazis and German officers. In addition to action flick and period drama, the film also features a healthy dose of noir. The spare lighting and superb camera work showcase solid performances.

The film opens with several scenes of Bent and Jørgen carrying out their grim duty, knocking on doors, killing their mark, moving on, all overlaid with voice-over by Bent, which is both informative and moving. The plot steadily thickens, scene by scene, as more characters, each with their own motivations, begin to play a role. The ballooning cast of players is too much to keep track of in a first viewing, but this may well be the point. As the sabotage and double-crossing mounts, we’re forced to trust that Bent and Jørgen are doing the right thing, even if it’s confusing and ugly.

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Where has Harmony Korine been in the eight years between his 1999 Dogme 95 effort Julien Donkey-Boy, and his IFC-acquired, Cannes/Toronto entry Mister Lonely? It has something to do with a fire, a screenplay about pigs, and a cult of Amazonian fishermen called The Malingerers. He talks all about all of that, and also why he’ll never make “genre films”, in this video interview (which doesn’t seem to be embeddable, but if you can figure it out, let me know). Is it truth, or some kind of Herzogian fantasy? You decide.

[Via Movie City Indie]

Over at the Filmmaker Magazine blog, Scott Macaulay has posted an excerpt from the Lumiere Manifesto, a project inviting video bloggers and web filmmakers to create one-minute works inspired by early-film pioneers the Lumiere Brothers. The Manifesto is quite Dogme 95-esque in its call for aesthetic and technical restraint. There are six basic rules: no audio, no editing, no effects, no zooms, all cameras must be fixed and all Lumiere films must be 60 seconds or shorter. Calling these guidelines “arguably the natural limits of the original Lumieres,” Manifesto authors Andreas Haugstrup Pedersen & Brittany Shoot elaborate:

Online video has now for years allowed the advancement of personal narratives and showcased the world through the eyes of other video producers. At best, we display an edited view of our worlds. At worst, we destroy important viewpoints through unnecessary editing. [...] We believe it is imperative that the filmmaker meets the world at eye-level and not from above. That is to say, life should be filmed as it happens on its own premise without any additional intervention. Only by opening the self to our surroundings can we be at the right place at the right time.

The quest for filmed truth is a noble goal, perhaps, but the manifesto itself is just so stiff and humorless. And is it even necessary? More thoughts after the jump.

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