Ba HumBug!
With the Holiday season in full swing, I thought I’d share some of cynicism with you all. Although there are definitely a million things I can come up with I’ll just settle for the top four things I despise about the “movie industry.”
4 Things I Hate about movies
Numero Uno: Movies that are “Co-Directed”….C’mon Son…da fuck outta here with that shit son! Although I love the Coens Brothers film, I truly wish that someone would just take the back seat and give the director credit to its proper person. I despise it because although these guys are brothers or anyone else who “co-directs” there is no way that they think, act, and feel the same way about every single aspect of each film. It’s seems like total chaos! Plus film is a director’s medium. In a sense…”co-directing” is gay. And not homosexual “gay” just wack and corny “gay.”
Numero Dos: The definition of an “Independent Film”
How in the hell is a film that has an A list/B List star considered Independent?! For example, Pulp Fiction starring John motherfucking Travolta, Harvey Kietel, Samuel L. Jackson, Uma Thurman, Eric Stolz and Ving Rhames (Still mad about that rape scene) be considered an “Independent film” ?? I mean it’s not like it didn’t have distribution before it was made. It was produced by Danny Devito and Harvey Weinstein who had produced an Oscar-nominated film prior to this movie’s release.
Numero Tres: All these new 3-D movies
Why must every movie with some CGI or dynamic special effects HAVE TO BE released in 3D?? Why?! I mean 3D has been around for a while now, more than twenty years if I’m not mistaken. Haven’t films like Star Wars, Back To The Future, Indiana Jones and Lord of The Rings done fine without 3D releases? I understand that Avatar was a successful 3D release but c’mon Hollywood, this has been your problem since day one because you’ve always been behind the wheel on what people want.
Numero Cuatro: Film “Purists” who are anti-digital filmmaking
These people whoever and wherever they are disgust me. It’s nothing wrong with traditional filmmaking via 35mm BUT now that the digital technology has caught up visually and made it more cost effective my question “why would you?” I mean its like telling someone to use a rotary telephone when calling someone instead of a Blackberry or I-phone or mailing information via the post office when a simple e-mail is better just because “its the way it’s suppose to be done” You know what i say “fuck outta here!” They way its supposed to be done is the best way you know how.
If I’ve ruined your christmas spirit in some way….DA WELL!
Feliz Navidad!
Risky Business
Recently I was involved in a group discussion with some fairly intelligent people (depending on who you ask) and we began deliberating about life and the job market. There were a couple of filmmakers, myself and someone else and a few geeks. One of the geeks began to berate or better yet speak condescendingly towards the other filmmaker asking ” why would you throw away your law degree and become a filmmaker, especially since its such a risky business. ” He went on and on while the young filmmaker handled the questions as nobly as she could. I desperately wanted a piece of the action but I sealed my lips shut. Not due to the fact I was afraid (perish the thought) I just know thyself and I tend to speak very passionately at times and didn’t want to test my patience. So I decided to vent here. So for that obnoxious geek who ruined an intelligent group conversation, here goes.
To be completely sure I looked up the definition of Risk.
Risk – The quantifiable likelihood of loss or less than expected returns.
Hmm. Really…so with that said i thought about life in today’s economy. With unemployment soaring at a steady pace of over 10% across the nation, Social Security on its way to obscurity and the real estate market as flat lined as ever…whose the one really at risk here: The Entrepreneur or the Employee? Easy answer if we look at the numbers. Furthermore, I thought about all the people in this country who celebrate Fridays and complain about Mondays. They’re pathetic! Don’t get it twisted, I see nothing wrong with wanting to do a job or career that you are absolutely passionate about and love doing. If that’s your goal in life then consider yourself successful. However, that isn’t the case with most people in America. If the last few years has proven anything it’s the fact that no one’s job is safe. In fact I personally feel that working a 9 to 5 and depending on a pension plan and a paycheck is a far greater risk without an equal reward.
Although I do agree that there is a high degree of risk in the entertainment industry and/or Entrepreneurship as well, the reward is far greater. So for the obnoxious guy whose pontification ruined a splendid conversation, in another year or so I’ll be looking for a few good dedicated soldiers to help build my empire, send me your resume.
Martin Scorsese = Michael Jordan
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Rarely does anyone transcend a sport the way Michael Jordan transcended the sport of basketball. I can remember the sleepless nights after MJ would torch the Knicks like a ruthless killer with no remorse. A few games come to mind: the 55 point game entitled by Spike Lee as the “double-nickel” game at the Garden on just his 5th game out of his 1st retirement. Then there’s the “Flu Game” of the 1997 NBA Finals in Utah as he scored 35 points while being dragged off the court by Scottie Pippen. The third time being the as i like to call it the “Memorial Day Massacre” of 1992 as poured in 52 points on my beloved Knicks yet again. The last one is the one notoriously known as “The Shot.” I remember recording the game that day on June 14, 1998. MJ stripped Karl Malone and dribbled up the floor as I said to myself “fuck! He’s gonna do it again. I can feel it!” and that he did as he crossed over a stumbling (pushed) Byron Russell, stepped back and drilled the jumper.
That feeling of euphoria I got from witnessing Michael Jordan is the same elation that comes from viewing a Martin Scorsese movie or picture as he calls them. I can remember the first time I ever saw GOODFELLAS. I was about fifteen years old and I was mesmerized by things in that film that I had never seen before: Characters breaking the fourth wall and speaking directly into the camera, jump-cuts, the infamous continuous “shot” where Henry and Karyn enter the club through the back door. I viewed that film and judged it the way Larry Bird and Bill Walton judged a young Michael Jordan’s 49 point game against them in the playoffs in 1986 “He’ll never do that again.”
So with my curiosity at an all time high I delved deeper to discover if this Marty Scorsese guy was legit, and the next film I came across was TAXI DRIVER. This film was released 1976 B.S.W. – Before Star Wars and again I was blown away by his cinematic style and flair for storytelling. Similarly as Bird and Walton were in their very next game against MJ in which he torched them for a Boston Garden playoff record 63 points. Nevertheless, I discovered that Martin Scorsese was and is a cinematic force to be reckon with just as the entire NBA discovered about Michael Jordan for two decades.
However, with all praises well deserved for Mr. Scorsese, I’ve dishearteningly began to view the latter part of his career in conjunction with Jordan’s. Towards MJ’s latter years in Chicago he lost some of his flair and pizazz and began to play it safe on the court. Instead of a double clutch two handed jam on a fast break, he’d simply thrown it down gently with one hand or instead of blowing by a defender for a vicious high-flying, tongue wagging dunk over a seven footer, he’d settle for a step back Jumper or a baseline fade away. So for me it seems as if Mr. Scorsese is following the same path on the cinematic court. Instead of a jaw dropping jump-cut or a character breaking fourth wall with some slick dialogue, it seems as if he’s tightened up his belt a bit for much safer and greener pastures with films like AVIATOR, THE DEPARTED and SHUTTER ISLAND, all which are still very good films but…it seems as if the flair and pizazz has faded a bit.
Of course, I wouldn’t dare ask the question “has Scorsese lost a step?” I certainly hope not. In fact, he may even resurrect himself with the new Frank Sinatra picture he’s working on. Although, for fans sake let’s hope its closer to MJ’s first resurrection with Chicago Bulls and not his latter one with the Washington Wizards.
Did ya miss me?!
As my main man Varnell Hill would say…. Well….I’m back. Hopefully….deep breath ( only because I think women are only allowed to write “sigh.” Weird–I know.) I’ve been really negligent towards this blog lately but…I have an excuse…a great excuse. I’ve working on my second feature film LOVE DON’T LOVE NOBODY throughout the entire summer and I’m finally DONE (knock on wood). It was a quick shoot but at the same time a long shoot. I initially scheduled it to be a 2 week shoot…and it was a 2 week shoot– just spread out over 3 months. I certainly didn’t intend from it to happen that way but casting issues and budget constraints as well as Murphy’s Law took place.
My first major issue was the casting situation. I held my first and only casting call on April 25th 2010 and with my lead actor already in the bag (more on him later) I was able to cast two female lead roles out of the four that were available. First, was the role of Constance which went to Darlenis Duran who I felt read well for both roles. The second was for the role of Chastity which went to Candice Goodluck. However, the roles of TYRE and NICHOLAS were still up for grabs. In fact, I went into production with only 3 roles cast. Several weeks into production the role of TYRE would go to a diamond in the rough and up coming comedic standout Larry D. Stewart. Lastly, the pivotal role of NICHOLAS played by James Godley, wasn’t cast until the last few days of production.
My second major issue was straight out of a movie (how ironic). The lead actor Sterling J. Williams in the role SOLOMON GATES held my entire production hostage…TWICE! First he fractures his ankle while playing football with his sneakers loosely tied. He was out of commission for two weeks! Although he was able to trek to Brooklyn from Queens in a soft cast to do some voice overs for the periodically. His second hostage takeover was the best of them all. A day before we were ready to begin shooting again he sends me a photo of his arm attached to an I.V. in the emergency of on a hospital bed. Smh…unbelievable. This dude was suffering with appendicitis and ready for surgery. Kudos to him for holding it off for a day or two (high off painkillers) to film some scenes. We shot for one day with him in this condition until I decided that he’d be better off getting the surgery and returning in another week or so ready to go. Sterling…a trooper for real. A crazy one…but nonetheless a trooper.
So we wrap the film and I begin the editing process and I realized the story needed some additional scenes. So I rounded up the troops and we shot six additional pages in just a couple of hours. I was blessed with a really smart and dedicated cast. We got it done and now WE ARE DONE. Again…knock on wood.
So there you have it the three major reasons why I’ve been completely M.I.A. on this blog and without further ado….
Don’t Believe The Hype ?
Just a few months ago I watched Lebron James single handedly dismantle the Chicago Bulls (Which always give me great pleasure because I’m a bitter New York Knicks fan) and I had come to the conclusion that he was the basketball player on the planet (at least until this past Thursday when he rescinded this notion by joining the Miami Heat with all stars CHRIS BOSH and DWYANE WADE.) Although I still believe he is the closet thing to a perfect basketball player in the NBA.
However, as we all know Kobe Bryant just won his fifth ring (excuse me while I vomit) and I began to wonder is the “The King” a choke artist…or (gasp) overrated?!?! I mean how could a guy blessed with Michael Jordan’s athleticism, Karl Malone’s strength, Magic Johnson’s court vision and Isiah Thomas’ speed go out in the playoffs the way he did….two years in a row ( although Lebron was phenomenal in this series averaging damn near a triple double while scoring over 30 ppg ) ?!??
So i began to ponder…”is there a professional filmmaker out there in Hollywood who hasn’t lived up to the hype or has not done enough to appease peoples expectations of him…?…Or her (for all you feminists out there. Yes, I know women make movies too.)
After careful evaluation a few directors came to mind:
DAVID GORDON GREEN catapulted his way into the film industry with low budget coming of age story “George Washington.” Garnering him numerous awards and accolades all over the world. Following his glorious debut with a few solid films such as “All The Real Girls”, ” Undertow “, “Snow Angels” and the box office comedy smash “Pineapple Express”. However, to me it just seems like he hasn’t quite lived up to the hype as of yet. Granted, he’s a talented filmmaker but has not come close to rendering anything as beautiful and poetic as the aforementioned ” George Washington.” It is still too early to tell but time is ticking. 
The second name that came to mind was the Brooklyn native Darren Aronofsky who burst onto the Independent film scene with his aesthetically cerebal feature debut ” Pi ” which won an Independent Spirit award for Best First Screenplay. In addition to awards and rave reviews at the Sundance Film Festival in 1998. Since then he has went on to direct “Requiem for a Dream” , “The Fountain” and the critically acclaimed “Wrestler.”
The jury hasn’t decided on these guys as of yet but if I were a cynic ( some believe so) then I would say that with of these guys at least four films deep into the game as compared to Mr. Martin Scorsese whose fourth film was the “Taxi Driver.” Or the Spike Lee whose third film was “Do The Right Thing” both being highly touted young filmmakers who lived up to the hype they received early on. Aronofsky seems to be headed in the right direction and Green…I’m feeling like he might of sold out with Pineapple Express, a film that didn’t come close to what he is capable of. As for “King James”…well, Michael Jordan won his first NBA Championship in the seventh season of his career and Mr. James’ seventh season just passed. Maybe “eight” is his lucky number.
A Foreign State of Mind
On my occasional quests for a euphoric cinematic high I tend to roam through the aisles of Best Buy, Target or “Tar-jay” for you bourgeois folks, as well as the mom & pops like Kim’s video store craving for something fresh and original. However, sadly enough I walk right past the American film section towards the foreign films for which I’ve seem to have developed a strong passion for; particularly with films from the French New Wave era. Films such as Francois’ Truffuat’s “400 Blows”, “Jules & Jim” as well as Jean Luc-Godard‘s many classics “Breathless”, “Pierrot Le Fou” and “Band of Outsiders.” After viewing each of them, what really struck me was the fact that they were made over forty years ago and still remain fresh and innovative even in comparison to the modern films of today.
This has only fueled the flame on my ambivalence towards American cinema over the last twenty years. It made me wonder “why don’t we make films like this in america?!” “Has cinema stop evolving?” ” Why are there so many rules?” “This is art isn’t it?” A very young art form at that, barely a hundred years old! To me the French New Wave Era’s cinematic breakthroughs were on par with Hip-Hop’s breakthrough into the mainstream during the 80′s with artists like RUN DMC, PUBLIC ENEMY and KRS-ONE among many others. New Wave Directors took risks and their rebellious nature has influenced the way movies are made even today, with jump cuts and shooting on real locations as opposed to studio sound stages back in Hollywood at that time.
I’ve begun to distance myself from the way films are made in America and even more so at film schools across the country. Not to say that I’m totally against film schools, I’m just against them destroying true creativity because It seems pretty obvious to me that everyone at NYU makes the same kind of self-conscious, boring, preachy stuff. Over at USC everyone is taught how to dumb down films for the broadest audience and both methods must be outlawed. In fact the only thing film schools should do is roll out the cameras to the students, show great films and get the fuck out of the way! I myself even have a film degree from St. John’s University but as John Singleton once said “everything they teach you in film school is right and everything they teach you is wrong.”
I’m sorry but (No I’m not) American films have lost their edge. We frown upon nudity (I’m still not mad at you Janet Jackson) but glorify violence and we shun away fresh ideas for old ones. I compare it all to Rocky IV. America has become the Apollo Creed of cinema: cocky, arrogant, naive, past its prime and unwilling to grow. While Foreign cinema aka Ivan Drago continues to remain humble, train hard, innovate and inspire and we all know what happened to Apollo Creed….
Is it just me? What do you all think?
Jarmusch or Spielberg??
I recently listened to an interview with one of my favorite directors of all-time Francis Ford Coppola. While discussing his new film at the time “Tetro“, he was asked the inevitable question that all great directors are asked ” So what kind of advice would you give to someone who wants to be a filmmaker?” Coppola replied “well…that depends on what type of director you wanna be…do you want to be Jarmusch or do you wanna be like Spielberg?”
I immediately paused the interview and thought to my self “hmm…what an intriguing question?!” My mind began to wonder about the pros and cons of being the Idiosyncratic, rebelliously enigmatic risk taker that is Jim Jarmusch versus the immensely wealthy, alien loving, box office breaking, global iconic director that is Steven Spielberg…tough choice. So I decided to really dig deep inside myself and be honest. I love movies, I love filmmaking and every aspect of it (except for the bullshit politics sometimes) and several of my favorite films as a kid coming up were films directed and/or produced by Spielberg, i.e; “Jaws“, “Close Encounters of the Third Kind“, “E.T.“., the Indiana Jones trilogy (I purposely left out that despicable fourth installment) and Jurassic Park. Now each and every one of the aforementioned films are films we’ve all heard of and have made tremendous amounts of cash and any filmmaker in his right mind would Michael Vick his dog to claim that body of work.
However, apart of me just would not feel…artistically satisfied (although with a net worth of over a billion dollars I’d get over it…quickly!) so I began to conjure up the films of Jarmusch whom I feel is one of the very few truly Independent filmmakers working within the Hollywood studio system. He owns all the negative prints of his work and almost always gets funding outside of the studio system. He took his scholarship tuition money for his thesis film and made a feature film “Permanent Vacation” for a measly $12,000 and then followed that up with his second film “ Stranger Than Paradise ” for $125,000, which brought him critical acclaim and worldwide notoriety. His other works include “ Coffee and Cigarettes “, “ Down By Law “, “ Ghost Dog “, “Broken Flowers” and the most recent ” The Limits of Control.” Neither of any being box-office smashes but somehow when I view them or read about them I can sense that Jarmusch is secure with himself and his work. I admire Jarmusch for not compromising his vision for capital gain and truly being independent in thought. But…I thought about Spielberg again and some of his other popular yet more mature films such as “Schindler’s List“, “Amistad“, ” Saving Private Ryan” and “Munich.” And in the midst of my decision those two little characters popped up on my shoulders and the one of my left would say “filmmaking is an art form and should not be compromised for commercial gain!” and the one on my right would say ” no my friend…filmmaking is a business and if you want to continue to make films, they’d better make money” and suddenly they vanished! Then I was all alone and I thought well I’m definitely not in this game to be a broke ass artist but on the other hand I’m not trying to be a sell-out.
So my final conclusion was this…and its a rap quote from one of my biggest inspirations and in my opinion the greatest rapper EVER, the jigga man himself.
Jay-Z – “And I can’t help the poor if I’m one of them/So i got rich and gave back/ so for me thats the win-win.
Hollywood…Step…Ya…Game…Up!!
Let’s face it most movies nowadays are not that good. I don’t know if its a trickle down effect of too many people at the studios trying to tell filmmakers how to tell their stories or could it be that the filmmakers are just that bad?! I believe the truth lies somewhere in the middle. So with that said who’s fault is it?…OURS! It is OUR fault. We the people must stop supporting these boring, weak plot driven, romance/comedy/action bullshit and hold “HOLLYWOOD” accountable for the garbage they force feed us every Friday.
Example…for the the past few months of this year, the studios have fed us: DEAR JOHN, LEGION, COP OUT, FROM PARIS WITH LOVE, YOUTH IN REVOLT, SHE’S OUT OF MY LEAGUE and the list of Razzie nominees goes on and on and on….In fact within the past three years majority of the films that I’ve grown to love have been independent films, and by Independent I am not referring to those Independent studios divisions of Hollywood either. I’m talking real motherfuckers sacrificing their lively hoods, credit scores, child support payments, student loans or anything else just to bring a vision to life.
We should not have to wait until the end of August for great films out of the studio systems. I don’t know about the rest of the world but I am sick and tired of being able to predict every little nuance of a story in these flat drawn out movies. Now I know some of you may feel that the word “Independent film” means quirky, plot-less, character driven stories and I’m here to tell you in some cases…yes, you’re right but there are a few good films out there (clearing my throat–”This Can’t Be Life”) that deserve to be seen and heard and talked about in abundance.
Here are just a few of the truly independent produced film over the past few years that I’ve grown to love:
- In Search Of A Midnight Kiss – Written & Directed by Alex Holdridge
- Chop Shop – Written & Directed by Ramin Bahrani
- A Good Day To Be Black & Sexy – Written & Directed by Dennis Dortch
- Something Is Killing Tate – Written & Directed by Leon Lozano
- Medicine For Melancholy – Written & Directed by Barry Jenkins
- Ballast – Written & Directed by Lance Hammer
Whenever the opportunity presents itself I advise you all to seek and hunt the aforementioned films, among several others, down and enjoy them.
“Wall Streets got interested in film and communications, and these are the people who brought you the Big Mac. In the past twelve years, I can’t think of one classic they’ve made.” – Francis Ford Coppola
ATTENTION HOLLYWOOD–I am sick and tired of your star driven, over priced and predictable way of filmmaking! I miss the old you…the one that cared about telling a good story with good characters and great writing. It is time to STEP…YA…GAME…UP!!
If you feel like I feel let it be known and if not…let that be known as well.