» Posts Tagged ‘directing’
Stop Talking About Your Film & Make It: How Daniel Patrick Carbone Went for Broke & Wound Up 'Smiling'
No budget, no experience, and no Ryan Gosling — I’m not as cynical as Strong Bad, but this recipe rarely bakes into an “indie film” hit. And yet, Daniel Patrick Carbone’s first feature Hide Your Smiling Faces did just that, becoming the underdog knockout of the Tribeca Film Festival and being cited as one of the best films of 2013 so far! Daniel was kind enough to sit down with NFS for a video interview from his Brooklyn apartment about anything from working with kid actors, to color grading the New Jersey outdoors, to how 2001: A Space Odyssey pairs with Jeremy Piven in PCU. More »
I’m sure that when we all decided we wanted to become film directors it was a very serious and impassioned decision. We watched films made by the best directors in the industry, read the books that documented their entire life’s work, and waited for the day when we could pull off screaming into a bullhorn while wearing safari jackets and jodhpurs. However — it is the weekend, so why don’t we take a little break from the weightiness of our dreams and take a lighthearted look at what Vimeo’s Video School says about what it takes to be a good director. More »
There are varying moral compasses around the world aimed at a myriad of different coordinates, but the tenet that seems to point due north is the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” This applies even to filmmaking, which tends to create pressure cookers of human interaction where emotions run high and pleasantries reduce to barked orders. At times, filmmakers may feel a bit lost, whether it’s with having to deal with a room full of egos or finding your own “esque.” Director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire, 28 Days Later, Trainspotting) offers great perspective with his “golden rules of moviemaking,” which could put even the most lost filmmaker back on course. More »
Trinity Anderson is barely 12 years old and she makes me feel like I’m slacking: she knows how to operate a steadicam, has been animating for years, and just finished a successful kickstarter for her short called Me and Ewe. Seriously? I’m pretty sure at 12 years old all I did was play tetherball and draw really awful stick figure cartoons. (Come to think of it, not much has changed.) Trinity was ever-so-kind enough to sit down for a video interview with NFS to talk about anything from her Dragonframe stop-motion software, to her thoughts on gender equality in the movie biz. More »
Director Haifaa Al-Mansour On Making the First Film Shot Entirely in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia is experiencing many firsts in terms of filmmaking, specifically with the film Wadjda, which follows an 11-year-old Saudi girl on her pursuit to obtain a bicycle. The movie is the first by director Haifaa al-Mansour, the first to ever be shot entirely in the country, and the first to ever be shot be shot entirely in the country by a woman. Her film premiered with standing ovations and rave reviews at the 2012 Venice Film Festival, and since then, al-Mansour has gone on record about what it’s like to be a filmmaker in a kingdom without cinemas. More »
Filmmaking has gone through many great evolutionary events in its over 130 years of existence. It has seen technological advances: from Edison’s Kinetograph, (arguably) the first motion picture camera to the Blackmagic Cinema Camera, from exhibiting films on a Kinetoscope, to exhibiting them on smartphones. However, one change that has yet to really be made in the film world is its presence of female directors. Fandor released an infographic that breaks down the distribution of women in both independent cinema and Hollywood, and the figures may surprise you. More »
Ridley Scott Reflects on Beginnings, Breaking Into the Industry, and Using Too Much Smoke
We are fortunate enough to live in a day and age in which the words of prolific and eclectic filmmaking talents come readily and often. We’ve already heard from working cinematographers such as Roger Deakins and Blue Valentine DP Andrij Parekh, as well as friends of nofilmschool Ryan E. Walters and Timur Civan. We’ve also heard from directors such as Steven Soderberg and Ridley Scott – and all of this is just to name a few. Now, we have a few more valuable words from Sir Ridley — this time discussing everything from his breakthrough into the industry, his experience in learning how to work with actors, and honing a highly sensitive visual eye. Click through to hear these words and more from “the director who uses too much smoke!” More »
This is a guest post by filmmaker Jeremy Engle.
Many filmmakers are weary of casting real teenagers, particularly non-professional ones, in their movies. And for good reason: You can’t shoot long hours, if you film during the school year, you need to get them tutors, and there’s tons of extra paperwork. And I haven’t even mentioned the parents. For many, teenage actors just add up to too many headaches. More »
Rambling On With Directors, an Insightful Round Table With Today's Prominent Independents
There seems to be an influx of great candid discussions with some of the most interesting working filmmakers today — one of the awesome benefits of having more people with cameras out in the wild. Produced by Shoebox Pictures and Filmmaker Magazine, moderator Russell Costanzo sits down with Craig Zobel, Alex Karpovsky, Ry Russo-Young and Antonio Campos to discuss some of the important questions that directors face, starting with the big one: “Why do you direct?” Watch the full piece after the jump: More »
Writer/Director Harmony Korine started out his filmmaking journey as a teenager, penning the screenplay for the 1995 breakout film Kids when he was just 19 years old. With his most recent release Spring Breakers, Korine continues to destroy expectations and come into his own as an innovative and radical filmmaker. In this short clip from Tumblr’s new editorial feature project Storyboard, Korine talks about his process and what it means for him to be a self-described ‘solider of cinema.’ Check it out after the jump. More »
A new web series called Hollywood Trenches from CineFix has been talking with director Joe Carnahan, and while we’ve already shared 2 videos from the conversation, the 7-part series has finally come to a close. In the refreshingly candid and honest interview, which features fellow director Jack Perez asking the questions, Carnahan talks about everything from creative control, to movie financing, and finally to his experience working on, and finally quitting, Mission Impossible III. Check out the videos embedded below. More »
Edward Burns, director of Nice Guy Johnny, Newlyweds, and most recently The Fitzgerald Family Christmas, is utilizing social media not only to get in touch with his fan base about all sorts of topics related to filmmaking, but also get his films out to his audience without spending money on advertisement. He’s even trying to get input from his Twitter followers on his upcoming film project. Recently he sat down with Sheri Candler to talk about making and distributing films for little money outside of the studio system, and we’ve got the second part of that interview below: More »
While Hollywood is attempting to dive back into a franchise whose best movies were arguably over 30 years ago, the approach taken by The Empire Strikes Back director Irvin Kershner can apply not just to future Star Wars films, but to anyone making anything that requires a suspension of disbelief. A French journalist named Michael Parbot had virtually limitless access to the production, and it’s only now that we have a more complete version of the documentary he produced in 1980. There are some fantastic and candid moments from some of the cast as well as the crew, and even if you are not a Star Wars fan, there are plenty of tidbits about storytelling and filmmaking that apply just as equally today. More »
Edward Burns, director of Nice Guy Johnny and Newlyweds (his newest is The Fitzgerald Family Christmas), has been around independent filmmaking for nearly 20 years, and he always seems to find new ways of reinventing himself and figuring out different ways to tell stories that matter to him. The great thing about the DSLR revolution is that it has put professional-looking images within reach of almost anyone. You can now spend a few hundred dollars on a camera and it will get you quite a bit of the way there, and let you focus on everything else to make the best movie possible. In an interview with Sheri Candler, and in the online Q&A session below, Edward Burns talks about his career, low-budget filmmaking, screenwriting, and how it’s possible to make movies cheaply. More »
Directing is not easy work, especially if you’ve never done it before. It’s easy to say “action” and “cut,” but everything that happens after a take can be just as important as what happens during a take. So what should you be doing once a take is finished? Director Patrick Tucker, who has been at the helm for more than 400 broadcast TV episodes, recently gave some advice about what a director should do after saying “cut.” More »
You can always expect Joe Carnahan (Narc, The Grey) to tell it like it is, and he’s always very forthcoming about his life and his career. We’ve been lucky enough to see a sizzle reel for his Daredevil project that never got off the ground, as well as another for a film called Gemini Man. Carnahan sat down with Cinefix and Director Jack Perez (Some Guy Who Kills People, The Big Empty) to talk candidly about the role a director plays and some of his personal experiences in a new web series called “Hollywood Trenches.” Check out the first two episodes below. More »
Steven Soderbergh has been getting a fair amount of attention lately as PR winds down on what could be his last theatrical feature film, Side Effects (he technically has one more movie left, a Liberace biopic starring Matt Damon which is heading to HBO). In a recent New York Magazine feature from Mary Kaye Schilling, which is now online at Vulture, the DIY-minded director talked about his career, what he plans to do next, whether he’s really retiring from directing, and what he’s been watching on TV lately, which happens to include Lena Dunham’s Girls (though he doesn’t actually say he loves the show as the title of the article would suggest). Click through to read all about it. More »
You’ve probably seen at least one of them if you’ve ever been to a film festival. Some of them are long, some are boring, some are downright brilliant, but one thing the biggest ones have in common is that they can launch an indie career. Suzanne Ballantyne, the Head of Programming over at the Raindance Film Festival, has put together some tips for budding amateurs from her experience watching over 500 potential festival feature films per year — and hopefully by the end you’ll have the knowledge to fake being an “Indie Auteur.” More »
Independent film would probably not have become what it is today without people like Kevin Smith. Whether they actually made things worse for the rest of us because of their success is up for debate, but there is no doubt Smith is one of those few filmmakers in Hollywood who makes exactly the kinds of movies he wants to make (not too dissimilar from Andrei Tarkovsky). In this interview below from Gavin Michael Booth’s How Many Days Project, Kevin Smith talks about what it takes to be a filmmaker, the current state of distribution, and what brought him to make Clerks. More »
If you’re not familiar with his name, there is a good chance that he’s influenced some of your favorite directors currently working today. Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky (Stalker, The Mirror, Solaris), who made most of his films during the Cold War era in the Soviet Union, has contributed quite a bit on the practical and theoretical aspects of cinema. In this clip below from Voyage in Time, Tarkovsky gives some advice to up-and-coming filmmakers, specifically about sacrificing yourself for cinema and being morally responsible about what you’re making. We’ve also got two of his earliest films below, which he made during his time at film school. More »
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