ARTHOUSE FILM NEWS - Cosmic Disco Detective Rene at Facets, Chicago 11/29/23

DATE NUMBER ONE http://www.wilddiner.com/ a comedy about several first dates a movie by sujewa ekanayake "The film is about as charming as they come...presents a world in which cultures don't clash, they mesh. It's refreshing to see characters who all appear to have a natural optimism, as opposed to the typical indie-film predilection for bitterness and cruelty. " - Michael Tully, Rotterdam & SXSW film festivals selected filmmaker http://blogs.indiewire.com/tully/archives/010529.html "I found the characters and the premise sexy, sexy, sexy ." Jerry Brewington, Hollywood Is Talking blog, on Story 2 of Date Number One http://hollywoodistalking.com/Blog/508/ Thursday July 13, 8:30 PM, $5 SANGHA 7014 Westmoreland Ave Takoma Park, MD 20912 301.891.3214 website: http://www.sangha.ws/ directions: http://www.sangha.ws/VisitingSangha.html Director & some of the stars will attend the screening. "FIVE really entertaining, fully realized romantic interlu

And by wild I mean lots of driving & doing the show/making some new fans & lots more driving back to a hotel room in the early, early AM. Chris came down from Virginia Beach to Kensington, MD to show his excellent movie The Proper Care & Feeding of an American Messiah on Thu 7/6. He wrote about the experience at his blog, check it out here. Thanks a lot for coming down to K-town Chris! That was some fine Summer '06 DIY film distro/screening action. Very cool.

This week filmmaker Cyrus Kar sued Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld & others over a two month long imprisonment in Iraq. Here are some details from the AOL article (man, AOL's got quite a few interesting articles today): " Kar was taken into custody in May 2005 after he visited Iraq to make a documentary film about Cyrus the Great, the Persian king who wrote the world's first human rights charter. Potential bomb parts were found in a taxi in which Kar was riding. He was released July 10 after his family sued, accusing the federal government of violating his civil rights and holding him after the FBI cleared him of suspicion. He is a former U.S. Navy SEAL, according to news reports. " Read the entire article here . - Sujewa

From an AOL article about an Indian royal family disowning a prince for being gay: " Homosexuality is banned in India and punishable by up to 10 years in jail, but gay activists are trying to lift the veil of secrecy over the community in a country where public hugging or kissing even among heterosexuals invites angry stares, lewd comments and even beatings." Read the whole article here . Probably a rich cinematic vein waiting to be created there: movies (they would have to be indie movies more or less I think) about being gay in India. Time to export the idea of a Queer Cinema movement to India. Time to discover the Indian versions of Greg Araki , Todd Haynes , Christine Vachon , Todd Verow & the like. Also a Public Display of Affection film movement could be useful there too. - Sujewa

Chris Hansen came all the way down from Texas (by way of Virginia Beach) for a quick visit & screening in Kensington last night. His movie The Proper Care & Feeding of an American Messiah played well to Kensingtonians, Chris had a good time, made some money (enough at least to get his car some gas to get back on the road to his next destination), perhaps he will blog about his screening experience at some point soon. I gave Chris a copy of Date Number One, so perhaps there will be a Chris Hansen review of Date Number One this month. Date Number One screeners were mailed out to David "GreenCine Daily" Hudson & Amir "Still Lover/Whale" Motlagh this week. So more reviews soon I think. Screening #9 of Date Number One will be happening next Thu, 7/13, at Sangha in Takoma Park. Will have all the details on that screening later today. Larry Clark 's Wassup Rockers opens today in DC (yup, at a Landmark theater, oh well. now that Caveh's Sex Addict is do

Jim Jarmusch's movies are unlike any other American movies around. Characters spend a lot of time without doing much or saying much. It would be very strange for a screenwriter other than Jarmusch to write a script that could work as a Jarmusch movie because financiers & producers will probably be very hesitant to support such an unorthodox script. Yet the weirdest of all possible film lawsuits are happening, GreenCine Daily points to this story about a screenwriter accusing Jarmusch of stealing the script to Broken Flowers. Perhaps the legal system will produce the truth. It would suck if it turns out that Jarmusch did steal the Broken Flowers script. But I guess if that happens I can still be a huge fan of Stranger Than Paradise, Down By Law, Mystery Train & Night On Earth, since their originality is uncontested. Until proven otherwise, I am going to assume that Broken Flowers is a Jarmusch original. It certainly bears a lot of Jarmusch signs: quirky characters, dry hu

Saw "Syriana" (well made, sad) last night but even that was not enough to keep me from getting enthusiastic about independence day. Happy 4th of July everyone, have a lot of (mostly safe) fun! Enjoy the holiday today, we'll get back to making ourselves & the world better tomorrow. - Sujewa

From The Beach Reporter 's coverage of Lance Weiler's new feature Head Trauma & its appearance at the LAFF: " A true independent film, “Head Trauma” is written, directed and produced by Weiler. He is even handling his own press. But this is nothing new for Weiler who also wrote and directed the digital feature “The Last Broadcast,” which just finished a run on HBO and can be seen on IFC. He was also in “development hell” with a pilot that tested well but never got picked up, an inspiration for “Head Trauma.” “I think in some ways it's very rewarding and there's that creative control,” said Weiler of independent filmmaking. “It's a case of the grass is always greener. You want more resources but you hear when people are working on studio films what they're looking for is more creative freedom. They're looking for the ability to own the negative, own their work. So I think it's always a Catch-22. It's very hard when you have to do all this stu

Texas based indie film director & screenwriting professor Chris Hansen and his funny & excellent movie The Proper Care & Feeding of an American Messiah are coming to the DC area on Thu July 6. The film is about a man who believes that he is a regional Messiah, & his quest to find a special mission from God. Messiah will play at Kensington, MD's Kensington Row Bookshop as a part of the Capital City Microcinema screening series. Read all the life-changing information below: The Proper Care & Feeding of An American Messiah A film by Chris Hansen Best Feature FILM EXPO TEXAS 2006, Official Selection STIFF Seattle's True Independent Film Festival 2006, Official Selection South Regional INDIE GATHERING Film Festival 2006, Finalist PEC Independent Film Championship 2006, Official Selection MYRTLE BEACH International Film Festival 2006, Official Selection COSMOS International Film & Video Game Festival 2006 " Many of the sequences fire on all cylinde

Even though we in DC may not have as many cool things happening here as our epic - only 4+ hours away - neighbor NYC, we do have the free concerts at Fort Reno every Summer. I attended several of these Fort Reno shows last Summer, dug them a lot. Local indie bands (including some w/ large followings, such as Metropolitan & The Evens) give free performances at a park (near a former Civil War era? fort, remains of a fort?) every Thursday night, all Summer long. Here's the schedule for this Summer's concerts at Fort Reno. See ya at a show. Bring an umbrella. - Sujewa

Not sure why IMDB does not have the cast, crew & director info. up on its Date Number One page, but I have re-submitted that info. so perhaps soon we will see that info. up on IMDB. In the meantime, here is the IMDB page for Date Number One . If you are one of the 200 or so people who've seen the movie so far, you may want to partake in the many interactive features IMDB offers: ratings, reviews, message board, etc. There will be a 1 week long run of the film coming up most likely in September in DC. Will have more info. on that late next week. Speaking of incomplete tasks, I am off to finish up the promo e-mails for Chris Hansen's The Proper Care & Feeding of an American Messiah screening on 7/6 in Kensington. More on that very soon. - Sujewa

Tonight I was at the Four Eyed Monsters screening in DC & the projector kept breaking down. Well, it wasn't really the projector but the computer that was feeding the film/the file to the projector. The first time the film stopped (lost image, audio could still be heard) it came back on a couple of minutes later. The second time we waited for about 5 mins & nothing happened. So I went to the projection booth to see what was going on. The projectionist & a young theater employee were dealing w/ an unfamiliar projection system (the flick was being played back from a hard drive) & they had no idea how exactly to fix it. I got on the keyboard after the computer was shut down & restarted, then once the project was loaded back up I figured out how to get the flick back up to the point where we lost the image & all was good. The Avalon hooked me up w/ some popcorn for my services :) Then like 20 mins later, right after we learnd that Susan's character was acce

Not much time to write about this since I've got to get to the Avalon in like 30 mins, but here's the link. - Sujewa