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

Angry Filmmaker Kelley Baker is on the road with his daughter Fiona, screening movies. Here's their latest blog entry . - Sujewa

Here's Pamela Cohn's first blog entry from the event. - Sujewa

Get the exciting news here , from Picture New York . Congrats to Picture New York, other interested people, and NYC Mayor's Office of Film on keeping New York City open for filming & photography by all (at least for now/30+ days while new rule proposals are devised & made open for public comments). This story is not over yet, but so far, very good. - Sujewa

Yes, the first decade of the 2000's - the 00's - are not over yet, we've got over 2 years to go, but so far quite a few important DIY (do-it-yourself, independent, low-budget, self-distributed to a significant degree) movies have been released (theatrically and on DVD in most cases, whatever is not out on DVD yet should be out pretty soon - w/ in the next couple of months I believe). I have written about these movies at length in the past, so I'll provide the link & a very brief intro. to each here. If you are interested, go explore. If you are into good/well made/entertaining DIY films, DIY filmmaking, & self-distro, the movies are highly likely to entertain or enlighten you and the amazing "making of" & "distribution of" stories behind them are highly likely to get you motivated towards getting your own excellent DIY movies done & out. And here are the movies: The Debut A coming of age story. Theatrically self-distributed, earning s

AJ Schnack in Silver Spring, MD, June 2007 Schnack speaking after receiving an award from the SilverDocs film festival for his film Kurt Cobain About A Son :: In June I spoke with director AJ Schnack about his wildly creative documentary Kurt Cobain About A Son ( blog , MySpace ), which is about the deceased Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain. The film uses elements of recorded conversations/Cobain speaking and visuals from three Washington state cities to reveal aspects of Cobain's life that may be unfamiliar to many audience members. See my review of the movie here . This interview happened during the 2007 SilverDocs film festival in Silver Spring, Maryland, about an hour before About A Son won the Cinematic Vision Feature Award from the fest. . Sujewa : AJ, thanks a lot for taking some time out for this interview. So, how did you get into filmmaking & why have you focused thus far on punk/indie-rock related acts? . AJ : I studied journalism in college, mostly because it seemed l

Happy August everyone! At long last DVDs of my '06 completed movie Date Number One will be available for sale by Wednesday August 15, 2007 - in a mere 14 days or less. I want to keep showing the film theatrically for months to come so initially the DVD will be available from a few places on the web & a few retail stores in the non-web world. Some people have been hearing about this movie for well over a year now, so for those people, the time to see the movie on DVD is very near. Will have details on extras, packaging, music, regions, etc. in the coming days. Cost: $12, US postage paid by yours truly/Wild Diner Films. Customers from other countries please add $2. To order the DVD: Send a check or money order for $12 (for US based customers) or $14 (for customers from other countries), made out to Sujewa Ekanayake to: Wild Diner Films 10408 Montgomery Ave. Kensington, MD 20895 If you have any questions re: a DVD order e-mail me at: wilddiner@aol.com . Or call me at 240-354-3394

Check out this most excellent Rolling Stone article about AJ Schnack's wildly creative doc Kurt Cobain About A Son. I am transcribing a long interview of Schnack that I did back in June at SilverDocs, should have it up here this week. Make sure you set aside some of your indiefilmblog reading time for that goodie, otherwise you might find youself mysteriously sad down the road, and we don't want that, do we? - Sujewa

Check out iW's Eugene's letter here , and add your thoughts and constructive ideas to the comments. Here are my comments (this is the spelling errors free version :). Ms. Cho is Julianne Cho, Associate Commissioner at NYC Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre & Broadcasting (MOFTB). :: Dear Ms. Cho, It seems that the proper intent of the new MOFTB rules would be to regulate large budget commercial filmmaking activity. However, the proposed rules, as they stand now, severely restrict ordinary citizen's free speech conducted through the mediums of film, video & photography, & thus would invite legal challenges and lawsuits. If the MOFTB is interested in refining its policies towards big budget (a budget level could be identified in the rules to clarify what big budget is - over $250,000, over a million $s, etc.) filmmaking, the rules can specifically mention that and should specifically mention that amateur & low budget/"no-budget" filmmaking, video ma

Very interesting (& of course very cool for the families of the prisoners). Reportedly the EU has been trying to get those prisoners (5 Bulgarian nurses & a Palestinian doctor) released for 8 years. Read all about it at the Washington Times . - Sujewa

By Glenn O'Brien at Times Online , check it out here . Here is a sample: "It’s hard to imagine today, but back then a Warhol film was a glimpse of a new world, a strange, weird, compelling, funny, scary world. Warhol film was for the initiated, and so it was also initiatory. When I was in college in Washington DC, we once drove miles to an obscure theatre in Maryland to see Bike Boy. After ten minutes it occurred to us that it wasn’t Bike Boy at all; it was a male porno film. Bike Boy was opening the next night. To see Warhol films you had to go out of your way. Not this summer, though, when, to mark 20 years since the artist’s death, there are ample opportunities to catch Warhol’s films in seasons around the country (see list below)." Read the whole thing here . - Sujewa

Amir Motlagh during a screening visit to MD in '05. photo copyright 2005 sujewa ekanayake Amir Motlagh is the director of the 2007 completed short film Knock.Knock and the upcoming features Whale (in post-production) and Micro (in production). To date Motlagh has completed over half a dozen short films and have screened them at festivals and other events. He is also a musician who just released a new album. In early June I spoke (via the magic of e-mail) with the filmmaker re: his current, previous & future projects, being Iranian-American and a few related matters. Sujewa: Amir, can you please 1) list all of your previously completed & released films briefly (up to My Break Ups let's say, that's what you just finished the last time I interviewed you , in 2005) and, 2 ) then take some time and introduce us to each of the current or very recently completed films (post-My Break Ups), including Knock. Knock, that you are working on; titles & descriptions, along w