YES

"Energy is more important than perfection. Perfection is boring. What’s exciting is something that is alive and things that are alive have flaws." -  Steven Soderbergh

FIRST LOVE

My photography / man crush on Joel Sternfeld deepens with the release of his new book First Pictures.

Dragonslayer

Scratch this off my 'to-do' list from below... Watched a screener of Dragonslayer the other night. A vérité documentary about 'free spirited' skateboarder Josh 'Screech' Sandoval. The film creates a cinematic portrait so rough and ready, yet so pure and intimate. To be honest, it's the sort of film that makes me want to give up film making altogether because it's the kind I have always wanted to make, and here it is, made. Well not quite... but it's a film that both inspires me and frustrates me in the best possible ways.

The other thing that Dragonslayer does well is give you incredible access into a very 'specific world'. I've seen many 'skate films' and films with skateboarders as characters, but none have given this kind of access into the lifestyles of this subcultures most hard-core players.

It's such a beautifully poetic and fucked up punk of a film.

These kids are more than alright...

...they're amazing!

Via Nick Turpin via The Guardian.

YOUTHVILLE

I saw this a week or so ago and it's really stayed with me.  The film feels like you have tapped into someones 'memories' or you have tapped into the way we remember memories. It's not a collection of momentous, epic events, but rather a sequence of regular moments that when cut together create a real sense of the time these kids spent together, just hanging out, 'spanning time' (insert link to Photo Booth Scene from Buffalo 66, which sadly doesn't seem to be on the YouTubes). Sure these kids are good looking hipsters and there are skateboards, but I'm sure if any kid with a bunch of friends shot and cut enough footage and synched a moving track underneath you could get something similar. I guess thats whats cool about the film, it's not what they are doing, it's the fact someone did it! Very cool.

If I find out that this is actually 'branded content' for a Nokia camera phone, Sony HD thingy or a pair of shoes, I'll be super disappointed!

THE QUEEN OF COOL

I think I have contributed to a hundred or so hits to the you tube clip below over the past few days. It's one of the coolest live performance clips I've seen. I saw Blondie last week on tour with the Pretenders and my friend Adalita supporting (who by the way is releasing her debut solo album early next year and it's amazing! More on that later though...)

Blondie may look a little different these days, but man she is still the Queen of Cool!

I want this song in Cherry Bomb!

I can not see this soon enough!

Through a strange sequence of events I was able to see some of the 'uncut' rushes from the actual 'heavy metal picnic'. I can't wait to see the final film!

Young and full of the devil 2

I think it's a Wim Wenders book of photographs called Pictures From The Surface Of The Earth where in his introduction he asks the reader to view each photograph as the opening frame of a movie. Not a still image from a film, but the opening frame from the opening scene of a film. It's a really interesting exercise to get you thinking about 'stories', about the things that may happen after a particular image. Or, as in the photos below, what may have happened before...

Photos by John Luke Smalley

Writing...

Working out what it can be. Rather than what it is...

YOUNG AND FULL OF THE DEVIL

Words from a wise guy

if it doesn't come bursting out of youin spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.

unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

by Charles Bukowski

via Ted Hope via Poets.org

Wow

Sometimes you see an image that makes you stop and stare... for hours...

Via photograpaher Jennilee Marigomen

Heavy Metal Parking Lot (films that changed my life pt 1)

Last week I did guest lecture at the Victorian College of the Arts School of Film and Television. One of the things I had wanted to do for a while was just show a bunch of short films that have really effected me over the years. I think I took in about 20 -30 shorts, but I only had time to played around five, once we chatted about each of them. I wanted the students to think about why it is they want to make movies. If it's "to tell a story" or "to create worlds and characters" why not consider writing a short story or a novel? Is your 'film idea' a better idea for a painting? A song? A photograph? A stand-up routine? A newspaper article? What makes a film want and need to be a film and how do you best use the elements of cinema for your 'film idea' so it can only be a film, and nothing else, because all those other options will perhaps be easier for you and definitely less expensive and require way less people to make it happen.

One film idea I'm sure glad isn't any other art form is Heavy Metal Parking Lot. I showed this as an example of how films don't need to be huge in scale, overly planned and /or require the hearts and minds of a mulitple cast and crew. Sometimes all you need is to be at the right place at the right time and with the right attitude.

Heavy Metal Parking Lot is more than just a cultural time capsule, it's a couple of filmmakers doing what all great documentary filmmakers do. They are simply holding a mirror up and reflecting who 'we' are, in the most raw and pure of ways.

There is a great interview with Jeff Krulick who made Heavy Metal Parking Lot here, and another here with guest Dave Grohl. And also check out this excellent site Triple Canopy that not only has a pretty cool interface but also features alot of Jeffs other work, including Harry Potter Parking Lot!

True Love and Chaos pt2

I stare at this photo everyday...

(I don't know who it's by, or where it's from...?)

True Love and Chaos pt1

Lately, I have been drawn to images and films and that explore or portray ideas of 'chaos', as broad as this sounds it fits very specifically into the development of a few film projects and in particular Cherry Bomb.

Earlier today I saw this amazing short film over at Boing Boing. I wouldn't usually be drawn to this overly technical style of filmmaking, however, Nuit Blanche wears it's bells and whistles proudly on it's sleeve, yes it's FX we have all seen before, but here the visual audacity doesn't take away from the simplicity of the idea and more importantly the emotional connection between the man and woman.

What I really like about this film are the two characters who are totally engulfed by chaos, literally, smashing glass and crashing cars, and yet they remain totally at ease and focussed, almost hypnotised by one another.

Please click out and watch the clips in the largest way you can!

Also check out the equally impressive 'Making Of'. I think seeing the process behind making Nuit Blanche made me appreciate the film even more. Even though most of it's trickery is revealed, there is surprisingly more comping and FX work going on that I first thought. Making the narrative and the romantic spell of which the couple are under (of which no computer effect could enhance) even more impressive.

I dont know... maybe I'm just a hopeless romantic!