When the trailer for David Lynch’s new web series Interview Project premiered in early May, I was so skeptical that I mocked the repetitive banality of Lynch’s “drinking game-inspiring intro.” I’ve since had a chance to see five episodes of the series — which premieres publicly on June 1 and through which Lynch and Co. will unveil one short video each day for the rest of the year — and now I think I’ve found the method motivating the mundanity.
We’re to take that introduction as its producer’s statement of its thesis, but it also reveals something about its form. Addressing the camera in his rumpled shirt and jacket, firing off a deliberately prosaic monologue in sing-song, with the words “people”, “interview” and “different” pushed so many times as to completely lose meaning, Lynch appears to be using that banality as a smokescreen. And why not? This is, essentially, what he’s done for most of his working life.
“There is, of course, cause for concern, and even alarm.”
These were some of the first words out of moderator Annette Insdorf’s mouth, at the start of a panel called Snip Snip: Are Cutbacks in Film Distribution and Criticism Affecting Quality Filmmaking? in Telluride on Sunday. She ticked off all the alarming factors––studio-funded arthouse distributors like Paramount Vantage and Picturehouse are shutting down; marketing costs for the average film have risen to the $20 million range, which means that true indie distributors can’t compete; there’s a glut of films in both festivals and in theaters; print outlets dedicated to film have all but disappeared, and general interest publications have come to see critics as a luxury. She closed this listlessness-inducing laundry list with the question, “Will we simply have to read blogs to be informed about non-Hollywood cinema?” The distributors and journalists on the panel (including Michael Barker of Sony Pictures Classics, Anne Thompson of Variety and Scott Foundas of Village Voice Media) ended up taking this querie and running it into a lively, contentious debate. But first, Paul Schrader declared that he’s already heard the death rattle of cinema as we know it.
Introducing a screening at the Starz! Green Room yesterday of a segment from In Their Boots, a new web-to-PBS series from Brave New Foundation, Jim Miller disclaimed that there were no ideological intentions fueling this new work from the production company that brought you Iraq For Sale and Fox News Porn. Though Miller, Robert Greenwald and their Brave New compatriots are very much in the business of attempting to bring down the modern conservative movement, Miller maintains that this series is “Totally non-partisan…we’re not taking a stance on the war, good or bad or anything.”
On a long enough timeline, this will probably turn out to be an indefensible statement, but as far as the quarter of an hour of reality TV-style footage shown here on Monday, it’s reasonably sound. …Read more
The Webby Award nominations are out, and several Spout favorites have gotten the nod across the various Online Film & Video categories. David Wain’s Wainy Dayswas nominated for Best Comedy Series. VBS.TV, VICE Magazine’s video portal and the original home of a serialized version of Heavy Metal in Baghdad, is a finalist in the Travel video category (and wouldn’t it be fun to see the NY Times‘ service journalism trounced by Garbage Island, above). Finally, The West Side, the deconstructed Western web series which I wrote about in November, was nominated as Best Drama Series. Congrats to all, and don’t forget to cast your vote at the Webby Awards homepage.
After the jump, you’ll find the final episode of Joe Swanberg’s webseries Butterknife, starring Mary Bronstein, Ronnie Bronstein and Craig Zobel (Great World of Sound). Above, you’ll find the penultimate episode, which premiered on butterknife.spout.com last week, but in the haze of SXSW, failed to make it to the blog. Also after the jump, you’ll find a full episode guide, with a bit of where-are-they-now info on Butterknife’s illustrious stars and guest stars. To comment on the episodes, check out the Butterknife discussion page at Spout.com.
This episode of Butterknife co-stars Barlow Jacobs, co-writer and star of one of my favorite festival films of 2007, Low and Behold. Barlow also appears in New Orleans Mon Amour, one of the films I’m most looking forward to at SXSW. You can go to Spout.com’s Butterknife page for more info on the series, to watch future episodes, to talk about the show, and to sign up for email updates.
This episode of Butterknife co-stars Sean Prince Williams (again), the cinematographer of Frownland. You can go to Spout.com’s Butterknife page for more info on the series, to watch future episodes, to talk about the show, and to sign up for email updates.
This episode of Butterknife co-stars Sean Prince Williams, the cinematographer of Frownland. You can go to Spout.com’s Butterknife page for more info on the series, to watch future episodes, to talk about the show, and to sign up for email updates.
This episode of Butterknife co-stars Michael Tully, director ofSilver Jew and Cocaine Angel, and Sean Prince Williams, the cinematographer of Frownland. You can go to Spout.com’s Butterknife page for more info on the series, to watch future episodes, to talk about the show, and to sign up for email updates.
Add to My Profile | More VideosWith the 2008 Sundance Film Festival now but a memory, Joe and Ronnie return to the site of their first video dispatch and sum up their week in Park City. This is the last of their Sundance video dispatches, but if you’re worried about going through Joe and Ronnie withdrawl, don’t be: Butterknife premieres here on Spout tomorrow. Visit the Butterknife page, mark your calendars, tell your friends, etc etc.
Previous Sundance video coverage from Joe and Ronnie:
Time for another link in our Butterknife email chain. This week, Butterknife creator Joe Swanberg interviews Ronnie Bronstein. In addition to starring in Butterknife, Ronnie is the writer/director of Frownland, for which he’s up for an Independent Spirit Award.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be bringing you interviews with the cast and crew of Butterknife every Friday. Next week, Ronnie interviews Mary Bronstein, co-star of Butterknife and Frownland (and Ronnie’s wife). And do check out the Butterknife page on Spout for further updates.
JOE SWANBERG: Do you feel manipulated by me when you are working on Butterknife? Am I exploiting you and Mary for my own artistic and personal benefit?
RONNIE BRONSTEIN: Haha. Sure I feel manipulated by you, but only in the most benign sense of the word. I mean, by agreeing to be in the project, right, I’m essentially agreeing to let you ‘handle’ and ‘manage’ me and my time, which to be honest, is sort of unnerving.
But then again, we both know that we’d never ever shoot a single frame of the show if it was left up to me. I’m always groping to find some kind of petty weasel-ey excuse to put it off. Seriously, if I found out that a relative of mine died or something on a week we were supposed to shoot, deep down, amidst the grief, some part of me would actually be happy cause it would mean I wouldn’t have to shoot Butterknife that day. So yeah, you are kind of manipulating me…but more in the way a parent is forced to ‘manipulate’ their kid onto the school-bus or something.
And now, for your weekly Butterknife update. Joe Swanberg and friends are off shooting new episodes this week, but Joe sent along some stills to tide us over. Above, you’ll surely recognize the one and only Ronnie Bronstein; after the jump, you’ll find stills featuring guest stars Barlow Jacobs (writer/star of what was probably my favorite film at Sundance 2007, Low and Behold), and Michael Tully (director of Cocaine Angel and Silver Jew). Tomorrow, we’ll continue our interview series with a conversation between Joe and Ronnie. And as always, you can and should check out the Butterknife page on Spout.
The show is a kind of comedy of manners, tracking Bronstein’s private investigator from professional foibles and communication breakdowns on the streets of Brooklyn, to the blissful home life he shares with his adorable wife (played by Ronnie’s real-life wife Mary, who co-starred in Frownland). It’s sort of like Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Early Years, except Larry’s a detective, and Cheryl can actually stand to be around him.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be bringing you interviews with the cast and crew of Butterknife every Friday. We’re doing this as an email chain: I sent Joe some questions, he sent Ronnie some questions, Ronnie sent Mary some questions, and so on. Below the jump, you’ll find my interview with Joe. Check out the Butterknife page on Spout, and check back here next week for some Joe-on-Ronnie action. But not in, like, a dirty way. You know what I mean.
The West Side, a web series by Ryan Bilsborrow-Koo and Zachary Lieberman, defies online video stereotypes in virtually every meaningful way. It’s not a quick-and-shoddy, webcam-in-a-dorm-room production; there are real scripts, costumes, score and locations. It’s presented in wide screen, in crisp, meticulously lit and After Effected black-and-white. Plus, it’s a Western, a period piece, and a gangster fantasy. But it’s also a truly independent production, produced with more ingenuity than cash, taking inspiration from existing genres but twisting them to fit its own unique iconography and mythology.
This is likely one of the reasons for the four month gap between the debut of the first episode (which I wrote about here) and the posting, this week, of the second. In the interim, the filmmakers’ blog has become an essential read, not just for details on their tech struggles and triumphs, but as a source for tips and tricks for DIY filmmakers making work specifically for the web.
This is truly a serialized work, so if you haven’t seen Episode One, watch it here before moving on to Episode 2. They’re not embeddable, but that’s okay, because they look really pretty on the plain white page.
Full disclosure: Ryan and I both used to work for this company, but we’ve never met.
Add to My Profile | More VideosLance Weiler of Head Trauma fame has launched a new web series on MySpace called Hope is Missing. Loosely intended as a companion to Head Trauma, which is being released on VOD on October 23, the series is a true cross-platform event unfolding over MySpace, Twitter, and even real life. Two episodes are live so far; I’ve been having fun sorting through the comments, watching the users go from taking it at face value that these are “real” clips about a real missing girl, to questioning that assumption, to making the connection to Head Trauma. The first episode is above, and the whole series can be found here.
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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