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Exclusive: Joshua M. Harris Gives Us a Peek Behind "Oz's Curtain"

By Spyridon P. Panousopoulos on

Once upon a time there was a magical place built of motherboards and angel capital. It was a mystical kingdom where vices ran like syrup from a maple tree. It was called Silicon Alley. Of the lords of this Never-Never Land, one stood head and shoulders above the rest, like a modern day Oberon, casting spells on mortals to do his bidding. His name: Joshua M. Harris. He was a hustler surpassed by none and before the tech bubble burst, Harris held court over a group of tech-geeks, art-freaks and venture capitalists who all thought Harris’s groundbreaking tech companies, PSEUDO.com and We Live In Public, could be their E-ticket to the promised land.

This year at Sundance, filmmaker Ondi Timoner (of DiG! fame) released her documentary about Harris, We Live In Public, and it won the Grand Jury Prize for best doc. It was thus that Flavorwire coaxed Josh out of his cubby and to ask, DUDE where you been? Prepping for round two in the spotlight, as it turns out. Read more about his master plan after the jump. … Read More

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Sundance Film Festival Loses Its Head Honcho [Industry News]

By Caroline Stanley on

While we usually avoid drawing you guys into the nitty gritty of who’s going where in the film industry, today’s announcement that Sundance Film Festival director Geoff Gilmore will be heading east to join the Tribeca Film Festival team is just too interesting to skip over.

For starters, Gilmore spent 19 years at Sundance, turning it from the little indie fest that could into the crazy stars-in-Uggs extravaganza that it is today. The fact that he’ll be bringing that kind of know-how to TFF could mean that the only film festival that we always get to attend (it’s local!) could become a launching ground for a much more interesting slate of films next year. (We’d wager that programmers have already locked down the bulk of the movies for this coming April.) … Read More

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Film

Sundance Filmmaker Blog: Destin Cretton, Short Term 12

By Caroline Stanley on

On the flight home from Park City, I tried really hard to reflect on and process all that had happened over the past 10 days. I attempted to weed out the real and genuine from the “buzz” and hype. I wanted to focus on all the new faces I met, all the incredible minds I was so lucky to be around, the million perfect moments spent with such wonderful friends, old and new: hearing Mike’s pitch of his futuristic Will Ferrell movie, seeing the premiere of Mary & Max with Bekah, watching Ryan try to talk to the girl from Teeth [Editor's note: Jess Weixler who we love.], experiencing the premiere of Short Term 12 alongside Brad, Phoenix, Katelin, Michelle, Ryan, Bekah and 600 other strangers, taking a bus into the mountains with all the other Sundance directors to hear a speech from Robert Redford, trying to take a picture of Adrian with Redford behind him, videotaping our bus hit that guy’s SUV, seeing Damien Rice at night and Obama in the morning with Joy, Adam and Katie, doing the Q&A at Windrider with Michelle, hanging with Finlay and Adrian on his birthday, sitting with visual artist Maria Marshall as her beautiful images moved across the screen, hugging my sister and talking to my family after winning our award, dancing in the streets with Joseph Gordon-Levitt after the inauguration, playing Rock Band with Topanga, eating every meal in Albertson’s with Brad and Jared, crying in the premiere of Push, taking a drive with Michael up the mountain for a better perspective of Park City, reading emails from strangers who were touched by our film, trying to get through that last Q&A, getting to spend time with such talented filmmakers as: Joseph, Rashaad, Conner, Rob, Annie, Coley, Teemu, Carlo, Julius, Kai, Olivia, and so many more, getting to know the pure and dedicated team who make Sundance move (Trevor, John, Kim, Marcus, Dylan, Todd, and on and on and on). … Read More

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Film

Sundance Filmmaker Interview: Kevin Willmott on The Only Good Indian

By Caroline Stanley on

Like most of his projects, Kevin Willmott’s latest film, The Only Good Indian, reveals an eye-opening slice of America’s racial history; specifically, this revisionist western examines the life of Nachwihiata, a Native American child who is taken from his family and placed in a white boarding school to be assimilated into Christian society. It’s fiction based on upsetting fact, and the true horrors involved are part of American history typically swept under the rug.

After the jump, Flavorwire interviews Willmott about his experience at Sundance, the blaxpoitation films that inspired his career, and his rather surprising obsession with Woody Allen. … Read More

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Film

Rooftop Films @ Sundance: Old Partner Review

By Caroline Stanley on

In my last post, about The Yes Men Fix the World, I wrote about recent and more obvious manipulations in documentary filmmaking, acknowledging that every documentary contains subjective choices. Lee Chung-ryoul’s wonderful film Old Partner contains more traditional manipulations. The film observes a 79-year-old Korean farmer, his wife, and the ox they’ve had for 40 years, and from a jumbled (and essentially banal) year in their life, the director crafts a narrative with multiple levels of significance, but with the simplicity, charm and clear emotional arc of a children’s book. … Read More

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Film

Erik’s Sundance Film Festival ’09 Diary: Day 10

By Erik Davis on

Aside from stalking the halls at Flavorwire, Erik Davis contributes to Fandango.com and is also the editor-in-chief of AOL Moviefone’s Cinematical.com, one of the longest-running and most popular movie blogs online. He brought us his industry reports from Sundance throughout the festival, and can always be reached with tips or questions at erik [dot] davis [at] gmail [dot] com.

The 2009 Sundance Film Festival wrapped up last night with a fancy awards show followed by one of those hippity-hop closing night parties. Heading in to the evening, the two films most buzzed-about were Sin Nombre and Push: Based on the novel by Sapphire – and, as predicted, both took home multiple awards, with Sin Nombre taking Best Director and Best Cinematography, while Push received the coveted Grand Jury prize in U.S. Dramatic Competition, as well as the Audience Award and a special jury prize for acting for Mo’Nique. … Read More

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Film

Rooftop @ Sundance: The Yes Men Fix the World Review

By Caroline Stanley on

Much has been written (including by me, ahem) about the evolution of the documentary form, and the ways that films increasingly blur the lines between doc and fiction, “reality” and, uh, “alternate reality.” We all know that every film is subjective, that the truth is relative (relatively speaking). Tellingly, of the films mixing staged and captured footage, the ones that are getting the most attention are political exposés — films in which the artists are exposing the lies and wrong-doings of politicians and corporations, films that don’t claim to be objective, instead offering a clear opinion of what the filmmakers think is right and wrong. … Read More

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Film

Sundance Filmmaker Blog: Ry Russo-Young, You Wont Miss Me

By Caroline Stanley on

I woke up pretty exhausted this morning and grabbed a croissant and coffee with You Wont Miss Me‘s original score composer Will Bates and his lady friend Sarah Bereza. At all the Q&A’s so far people ask me about the score; I think a soundtrack is in order here! … Read More

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Film

Erik’s Sundance Film Festival ’09 Diary: Day 7

By Erik Davis on

Aside from stalking the halls at Flavorwire, Erik Davis contributes to Fandango.com and is also the editor-in-chief of AOL Moviefone’s Cinematical.com, one of the longest-running and most popular movie blogs online. He’ll be bringing us his industry reports from Sundance throughout the festival, and can be reached with tips or questions at erik [dot] davis [at] gmail [dot] com.

The beautiful weather has left Park City, as have most of the press, celebs and fest freaks — but for some odd reason I’m still here, watching movies and eating mediocre Chinese while quietly discovering some excellent new talent. Though still a relatively unknown (so much so that she signed with an agency at this year’s Sundance), watch out for the name Carey Mulligan, a delightful new actress who some folks are calling “the new Audrey”, yet I feel she’s more of a British Katie Holmes … except normal and not married to a psycho. … Read More

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Film

Exclusive: 10 Questions with Predisposed’s Philip Dorling

By Caroline Stanley on

Philip Dorling’s Sundance short Predisposed examines the unhealthy relationship between a boy and his manipulative, drug-addicted mother, focusing in on the day when he has to take her to rehab — right before an important college interview. Things become even more complicated when he discovers that she has to be intoxicated in order to be admitted. Yes, Dorling — who has been making films since he was 15 years old — manages to cram all of that action into just 15 minutes. Our brief interview with the emerging filmmaker after the jump. … Read More

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