Add to My Profile | More VideosIncidentally, I just overheard Hollywood Extra refer to the following people as “Sundance virgins:”
Bruce Willis
Sarah Jessica Parker
Matthew Broderick
Tom Hanks
Jodie Foster
Jessica Alba
Robert De Niro
Bono
Joe and Ronnie are our own Sundance virgins who felt a little defiled after falling into this “gifting” session.
We’re just one week away from the official premiere of Joe Swanberg’s web series, Butterknife, and to mark that exciting occasion, here’s the last in our series of Butterknife promos, made by members of the show’s cast. This fabulous little number is the work of Mary Bronstein, who co-stars in Butterknife as the wife of the detective played by her real-life husband Ronnie. Make sure to check out our Butterknife page, where you can get more info and sign up for updates before the premiere of the series on Monday, January 28.
In Joe and Ronnie’s latest video dispatch, Joe follows sometime collaborators Greta Gerwig and Mark Duplass around as they do press for their Sundance Spectrum entry, Baghead. Ronnie recuses himself.
Previous Sundance video coverage from Joe and Ronnie:
On Friday night, Park City endured a brief but hysteria-inducing blackout. The next morning, Joe and Ronnie assess the damage, and ask a zealous festivalgoer the question: “What is it that makes you want to hug a celebrity?”
Previous Sundance video coverage from Joe and Ronnie:
George Romeo (Night of the Living Dead) is here at Sundance with Diary of the Dead. Ronald and Joe speak filmmaker to filmmaker with him and discover an almost spiritual connection.
The second episode of Joe and Ronnie’s Sundance video coverage is live at MySpace, and embedded above for your viewing pleasure. In this clip, our intrepid twosome battle misinformation and confusion at the opening night premiere and Park City party.
Here it is, the first installment of our Sundance video coverage, produced by Butterknife’s Joe Swanberg and Ronnie Bronstien, and presented by MySpace. In this clip, Joe and Ronnie introduce themselves, and explain why we’ve dragged them and their cameras out onto this snowy mountaintop of dreams.
It’s time to present the second in our exclusive series of shorts, produced by members of the cast and crew of Joe Swanberg’s Butterknife. The short embedded above is called Best Trip Ever, and it’s the brainchild of Barlow Jacobs, the writer/star of Low and Behold. Barlow appears in the short (that’s him on the right) as his character from Butterknife. Watch, enjoy, and check back next Monday for the next short.
We’ve been teasing for months, but now we have an official release date: Butterknife, Joe Swanberg’s latest web series, starring Ronnie and Mary Bronstein, will premiere on Spout on Monday, January 28. That’s four weeks from today, and on each Monday between then and now, we’ll have a new, special, Butterknife-related video here on SpoutBlog. Since it’s New Years Eve and you’re probably already halfway in the bottle, we’ll start the party with a re-run of Michael Tully’s contribution to the Butterknife promo canon, which originally premiered here. Check it out above, and check back next week for a new short directed by and starring Butterknife collaborator and Low and Behold writer/star Barlow Jacobs.
indieWIRE has released the results of their annual critic’s poll for the best undistributed films of 2007, and Ronnie Bronstein’s Frownland has made the top ten. The Gotham award winner received seven votes, the same number as Abel Ferrara’s Go Go Tales, which is interesting for a number of reasons. For one thing, Ferrara and Bronstein were two of just three American directors to make the Top Ten. For another, in the case of both films, whether or not they’re actually undistributed is basically a question of semantics.
I first heard that IFC had acquired Go Go Tales back at the New York Film Festival in September, and have heard a number of confirmations of that rumor since. Anthony Kaufmann even references those whispers in his indieWIRE write-up of the poll, noting that “for now, [Go Go Tales is] still technically available.” It basically gets to keep its place on the list because IFC hasn’t yet issued a press release.
Meanwhile, Silent Light earned 20 votes in the poll, which would have been good enough to tie for second place…had the film not been disqualified because Tartan quietly acquired U.S. distribution rights last month. I certainly didn’t get a press release about that––I’ve got to be one of the film’s most vocal supporters, and I didn’t find out about the deal until a month after the fact. Frownland, meanwhile, has distribution in France, and due to the number of North American film festivals where it’s played, it’s probably been seen by more non-critics on this continent than the film ranked right below it on the list, Nick Broomfield’s Battle for Haditha.
This is not about me fronting like Silent Light deserves recognition and Go Go Tales (whichI’m on the record as having loved) does not, nor am I trying to argue with the rules of this particular poll. But it does seem like proof positive that not only is the line between “distributed” and “undistributed” getting a lot murkier, but the idea of distribution-as-victory is maybe not all it’s cracked up to be.
Another Friday, another link in our Butterknife email chain. This week, Butterknife star Ronnie Bronstein interviews Mary Bronstein, his Butterknife co-star and real-life wife. In addition to appearing in Butterknife and Ronnie’s award-winning feature Frownland, Mary is currently working on her directorial debut, and word on the street is that she’s also putting together a small little something involving puppets.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be bringing you interviews with the cast and crew of Butterknife every Friday. Next week, Mary interviews Butterknife cinematographer Sean Price Williams. As always, check out the Butterknife page on Spout for further updates.
RONNIE: Hey baby! Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. First off is a hold-over from Joe’s interview with me. He wants to know why I get so stressed out sometimes. Yeesh. While we’re married and best friends and I’m supposed to ostensibly know everything you think about me, I’m pretty curious to hear your take on this. ‘Cause it’s not the kind of thing I’d normally ask you around the house.
I’m so happy to introduce one of the coolest elements of our Butterknife promotional blitz: over the next couple of weeks, we’re going to be introducing a series of short videos made by Butterknife cast members–who are all, of course, talented filmmakers in their own right–that are inspired by/formulated to spread the word about the web series. Our first video comes from Mr. Michael Tully, director of Cocaine Angeland Silver Jew. It’s embedded above.
We’ll be posting all Butterknife stuff here at SpoutBlog, but you can also subscribe to our YouTube channel, if subscribing to YouTube channels is a thing that you’re into. Oh, and on oft chance these video inspire you to make your own Butterknife-themed clip, upload it to YouTube and leave a link in the comments to this post.
indieWIRE has released the results of their annual critic’s poll for 
