Better get this out

Haven't posted much lately. Actually this is my first post of the new year. I've seen a few movies lately and worked a bit on the three docs. Mona and I are on our way to finishing our first wedding video (for a friend) and are seriously thinking about doing it for money. We think we can fill a much needed niche: hi/mid-price, high artistic quality. We'll shoot all of our stuff in HD and keep our crew small for now (just mona and I) and expand slowly. We still have to research the market more and then there's the matter of the name. We gotta come up with a good one.

Movies I've enjoyed -



Luna: Tell me do you miss me - A documentary about one of my favourite bands. Even though most of the film was shot through a dirty lens there were some great shots. We join up with them on their break-up tour through Japan, Europe and North America in 2005. This movie gave me a real sense of what they are like as people. I still think it's a crime that they didn't get bigger than they did. With me they are huge though. Their fans have a lot of insightful things to say about them. I thought Sean Eden (the guitarist) was kinda like the John C Reilly of the indie-pop world. This is the kind of film I would like to make.



When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in 4 parts.

I just have to start of with saying EVERYONE SHOULD SEE THIS. This movie by Spike Lee about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina is an amazing oral history of one of the greatest injustices in American history. I don't really into political films. This is not a political film.



All you have to think is what if this happened to people in your town and your government took their sweet time to help you. To think a city so rich in culture, one of the few good American cities, was basically left to die by the American government is just unforgivable. For Christ sakes it took them 5 days to get them food and water. What kind country would do that to their own people?

This kind of country...



Jesus Camp

Another great doc that doesn't lean on narration to give you all the info. This is about the new Christian army that's rising in the mid-west. These f--er's are scary and don't resemble the Christians I grew up with. Yes there are funny moments especially when one of the characters, a ten year old girl, is seen dancing to Christan heavy metal telling us she is dancing for god and not for "the flesh". Good thing she told us cause I was getting worried. Let's pray these Bush loving home-schooler don't screw the world up even further.

which leads me to...



Children of Men -
An important movie that stands right up there beside Bergman's Shame, Time of the Wolf and Code 46. This bugger was bleak as all hell but so well done. There were so many striking images in this film it's just hard to pick one to write about. The colour palette was all those great gritty greens and blues that I love so. In the wrong hands it would have turned out like Minority Report or the Island. Like all good dystopian movies this one captured the chaos and the mutli-facted social clusterfuck we're headed to; not just the technology. This movie also had elements of film noir with the hard drinkin' dishevled Clive Owen. He's been one of my favorite actors of late and this role further proves he is one of the best. Is he the British Robert Mitchum?

People have talked about the long takes and how well choreographed the action scenes where. Truth is you don't notice this as you are swept away by the action. After a second viewing I may notice what was going on with all that agile handheld camera but on first viewing it was all about story for me. I won't give much away but I don't think this is really a crowd pleaser and this is mostly the reason I liked it. Sorry, but the future is not friendly.

Didn't like so much

Volver: Almodavar on Auto-pilot. After 'talk to her' he has gone progressively down hill. This is an art house movie for idiots. It looks and acts like it was filmed in 1985. He has brought back his campiness and low-brow humour for this one, that's for sure. Why aren't there any transvestites? Why no dreggs of society? We really ate up that stuff. Bad Education wasn't really that great either but at least it was more earnest than this one. And what about art-direction, has he fired that department altogether. If this is him trying to do something different then don't bother.
....

Making progress on two of the three of the docs I'm working on. I have a screening coming up on the 25th of my short films at the Sylvia Hotel. Terry Miles and Ken Tsui will also be showing their films. It should be fun, although the room only holds about 40 people.