Interview with Lev Manovich (excerpt) (2006, 8.8 MB, 4:23 min.)
Lev Manovich is a Professor in Visual Arts Department, University
of California -San Diego and the author of The Language of New Media
which is hailed as
Category Archives: cinema
Boxers
Shotgun Stories
Jeff Nichols – Shotgun Stories (2008, 10.3MB, 1:50)
Shotgun Stories tells the tale of two families with the
same father. One, in which the children are named
Kid, Boy, and Son, came before dad sobered up and
found Jesus. The second, his marriage to a beautiful
woman who had four more boys, was his do-over.
After his death, an explosive feud breaks out between
the grown half-siblings.
It opened to rave reviews, and from the chilling
trailer alone, I can see why.
Jillian Mcdonald – Me and Billy Bob
Me and Billy Bob (2004, 22.7MB, 7:04 min.)
Jillian inserted herself into existing film clips as the recurring
object of actor Billy Bob Thornton
Standard Operating Procedure
Errol Morris – Standard Operating Procedure (2008, 11.2MB, 2:00)
We don’t hide our love for Errol Morris – see here
and here – but there’s no need for us to apologize.
The man is a genius. His latest feature, Standard
Operating Procedure, interviews Abu Ghraib prison
guards and tells the story behind the now-infamous
photographs of abuse from the prison, uncovered in
2003. Dubbed a “nonfiction horror film” by Morris,
this investigative film, much like A Thin Blue Line,
helped Morris once again dig deeper into a crime
file, this one just more contemporary.
When you see a picture, you don’t see outside the frame.
With the frightening pictures as a jumping off point,
Morris interviews those involved with the scandal to
get the whole story.
Can’t wait to see this one.
LOOK
Trailer for LOOK, the movie, which is composed
entirely of surveillance camera footage.
LOOK asks (and attempts to answer) questions about
security versus privacy, highly relevant in modern,
legitimately paranoid times.
Are you always alone when you think you are?
No Country For Old Men
No Country For Old Men (trailer) (2007, 15 MB, 2:30 min.)
“Based on the acclaimed novel by Pulitzer Prize winner Cormac McCarthy.
The film simultaneously strips down the American crime drama and broadens
its concerns to encompass themes as ancient as the Bible and as bloodily
contemporary as this morning�s headlines.”
From – Miramax Films. directed by the Coen Brothers.
Tinjail
Still Project 07 (2007, 5.7MB, 1:29 min)
Half of the splendid & indispensable MTAA, whose work we feature here
whenever possible – conceptualist pranksters with a rare (for the territory)
& self deprecating human warmth – Mark River makes interesting video stuff
(amongst other things) on his Tinjail site.
A lot of them are kind of multi-channel (go look) & don’t fit the dvblog format.
This one does & is excellent too..
Here’s his preamble to it:
‘The wild blue yonder, the decent, la jetee, fearless, street fight,
loud QUIET loud, a sound of thunder, enemy at the gate, so wrong they
Quiet City
Quiet City (2007, 11.2MB, 1:52)
Stunning, reflective trailer for Quiet City,
a movie by Aaron Katz, available from Benten Films.
These are my favorite kinds of films.
I love living in – being in – cities, but I prefer them
when they are their most silent and empty.
Text loosely taken from the Apple trailer site, edited by me:
Together, Samantha and Charlie, two somewhat aimless youths,
share twenty-four hours drifting from late night diners, to city parks,
to abandoned apartments, to a party and art gallery deep in the heart
of industrial Brooklyn. Delicately realized with generous humanity,
Quiet City offers hope for intimate connection in a world that grows
larger by the day.
Almodovar – Volver trailer
Volver trailer (2006, 30 MB, 1:38 min)
A long time ago I sat stony faced and unmoved through the much lauded
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown & concluded,
quite wrongly, that Almodovar was not for me.
In 2006 about him by Bob Light in the UK Socialist Worker
prompted me to go & see his latest movie, Volver,
& I’m so glad I did – it’s simply magnificent.
Since then I’ve done a bit of catching up.