Legendary LA graffiti artist Tony “TEMPT 1″ Quan was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s Disease back in 2003. Today, the degenerative nerve disorder has left him unable to move, speak, or breathe on his own. But thanks to a pair of seriously souped-up sunglasses (and some teamwork by an international crew of artists, tech geeks, and hackers) TEMPT is still creating new art — using a gadget now known as the Eyewriter. “Our writing culture was born of making something from nothing,” he explains. “I lay in bed exploding with ideas… that’s when I knew that I wasn’t done yet.” Click through to watch the trailer for Getting Up, an inspiring new film by TEMPT’s wife, Caskey Ebeling, which documents her husband’s incredible journey and had its world premiere at Slamdance earlier this month, where it won the Audience Award for Feature Documentary.
Hey there, film lover. How’s your January? I know, I know, not much in the way of new movies worth seeing this month, what with January being the Hollywood dumping ground and all. How’s about just staying in and streaming some Netflix? What’s that? You dropped your subscription because they raised the price by five bucks? Way to take a stand! Okay, so, go hit the Redbox. Yeah, you’re right, it’s pretty cold out. No need to bundle up and head all the way over to the Walgreens, only to go find that they’re all out of Fast Five. So what now?
Well, come to find out, your old pal YouTube has a surprisingly excellent collection of feature-length flicks streaming for the bargain price of zero dollars. I know, right? And, sure, a lot of them are junk, or the same public-domain titles that have been turning up on bargain DVDs at the Dollar Tree for years now. But there are some gems in there, and (being a service-oriented organization), we’ve sifted through their offerings to find the best of the bunch. Check ‘em out after the jump.
Singer-songwriter Elliott Smith is the subject of a new documentary, Heaven Adores You — “an intimate and meditative look” at the artist’s influence since his tragic end in 2003. Nickolas Rossi directs the documentary, which promises to be different than 2009′s indie rock biopic, Searching for Elliott Smith. The project just met its funding goal on Kickstarter, where Rossi shares his personal connection to the singer’s work and a trailer for the upcoming movie. Watch it past the break, and let us know if you’ll be checking this one out when it makes the festival rounds. Click here if you want to listen to that unreleased Smith track, “Misery Let Me Down,” that recently popped up. Read More »
Welcome to “Trailer Park,” our regular Friday feature where we collect the week’s new trailers all in one place and do a little “judging a book by its cover,” ranking them from worst to best and taking our best guess at what they may be hiding. We’ve got five new trailers for your post-turkey consumption this week; check ‘em out after the jump. Read More »
Love him or hate him (and we mostly love him around here), one can’t deny the lasting influence and importance of Woody Allen — or his astonishing productivity, knocking out a film a year as writer/director (and sometimes star) for the past, oh, forty years. The sheer volume of his output makes it less than surprising that American Masters’ new profile of the venerable filmmaker, Woody Allen: A Documentary, is a bit of an epic affair: it totals three-and-a-half hours and is running in two parts on PBS. Check out the preview and some surprising clips after the jump. Read More »
As tattoo culture grows ever more widespread, we’ve seen ink devoted to all sorts of artistic subject matter, from indie comics to song lyrics. And it appears that we at Flavorpill are not the only ones who have noticed the intersection between high art and body art. In the new documentary Skin, filmmaker Ryan Hope enlists such artists as Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, and Richard Prince in what is described as a “dark, stylish examination of tattoo culture as high art.” The glacially paced trailer doesn’t give away much of what’s in store for viewers, but the visuals sure are intriguing. Watch it after the jump.
This morning, /Film clued us into an amazing-sounding new documentary about the art of the gig poster. Just Like Being There, the new title for the previously untitled, ongoing project, will explore the world of gig posters and gig poster production, documenting artists and fans of limited edition poster art within and beyond the world of concert posters. The film will focus on three artists, Kevin Tong, Daniel Danger and Jay Ryan, who are part of the core of this world, and as far as we can tell, will be filled with awesome art, music, and interviews. Click through to see two short promos about the newly-titled documentary, and head over to /Film for an exclusive interview with the director and producer.
Last year, director Kevin Macdonald and producer Ridley Scott teamed up for an ambitious, globe-spanning undertaking. They challenged people all over the world to film a video snapshot of their life on a specific day — July 24, 2010 — and submit it via YouTube for potential inclusion in what would become the feature-length Life in a Day. More than 80,000 clips were sent in for the documentary, with 1,125 chosen for inclusion in the final product.
The result is a breathtaking overview of existence on Earth in the 21st century, spanning cultures, countries, and individual outlooks. Following its Sundance premiere this January, the film is going into limited release in theaters starting July 29; but prior to that, it will receive a one-night only premiere in cinemas all over the country this Sunday, July 24. Click through to watch the trailer, learn more about the film, and find where Life in a Day is screening near you.
Let’s be honest with ourselves: We’re not going to see Stephen K. Bannon’s ridiculous-looking Sarah Palin documentary The Undefeated. (In fact, maybe no one is going to see it.) For one thing, it’s Harry Potter weekend. And for another, well, considering that the word that comes up most often in reviews of the film is “hagiographic,” we’re pretty sure it’s not going to teach us much. More entertaining, as far as we can tell, are critics’ responses. So far, one reviewer has commented on Andrew Breitbart’s seeming familiarity with male anatomy, while another suggests that the videographer should have gone to the bathroom before the shoot. The five funniest reactions we could find are after the jump.
“In the history of cinema, there are stars, there are legends — but there is only one Divine.” So begins the trailer for I Am Divine, a forthcoming documentary about John Waters’ muse and our favorite drag queen of all time. The three-minute preview includes interviews with Waters and Divine’s mom, Frances Milstead, along with tons of both rare and classic Divine footage. The in-progress film has a Facebook page, and Ricki Lake is listed as a star on IMDb. Director Jeffrey Schwartz currently has two other documentaries about LGBT icons in progress: Activist: The Times of Vito Russoand Tab Hunter Confidential. We don’t know much else about I Am Divine yet, but we sure are excited to see it when it comes out next year.
