mumblecore

[Joe Carney]

Makes sense. I'm always wondering why everything has to be categorized and labeled by the media and society at large--everything has to be a "movement."

I'm all for DIY picking up steam, because then someone new is bound to make a truly great film eventually, and with little resources. I see these guys making movies in their 20's and 30's with nothing...eventually if they keep at it, they're only going to get better and that's exciting.

and what's this about a gas spill? that sounds scary.

One of the subjects of the article didn't like the reductive effect of putting a label on something. (Paraphrasing). Even though I may be too old, I guess I'll have to check out a couple of them and judge for myself.

 

[krd]

Makes sense. I'm always wondering why everything has to be categorized and labeled by the media and society at large--everything has to be a "movement."

I'm all for DIY picking up steam, because then someone new is bound to make a truly great film eventually, and with little resources. I see these guys making movies in their 20's and 30's with nothing...eventually if they keep at it, they're only going to get better and that's exciting.

and what's this about a gas spill? that sounds scary.

One of the oil big companies (I think Shell?) was responsible for the leak, over a long, long time period. It's a huge underground lake -- of gas. They've been pumping it out for years, but at a criminally slow pace. There are illness clusters in some areas, and in some houses the fumes are mind-altering. Stay away, if you can!

The DIY movement in film has been going on since at least the mid 1980s ("slacker films?"), and long before that, if we count the early avant-garde era.

However admirable for the initiative, the DIY ethic in film production doesn't seem to work so well in the end. It won't be news to anyone here that dramatic illusion usually costs money, unless you shoot conversations on couches and cast your friends. Coppola offered that now famous prediction, that some fat kid in a mid western state would eventually create a masterpiece with her father's camcorder, but I think even he's given up on it.

Then again, two favorite films of the last 10 years or so were both very low budget DIY affairs (or almost), so who can say....

 

[I Bloom]

As for the DIY movement, it's been going on since at least the mid 1980s ("slacker films?"), and long before that, if we count the early avant-garde era.

People seem to keep rediscovering this same style and rebranding it, I think thats a little distasteful. I also really appreciate it when filmmakers go far from themselves and their own lives. Especially when I don't particularly relate to their lives. The underlying subtext of the filmmaker is, "I'm not trying to impress you." I want to be impressed. So go out there a f-ing start dragging that boat.

IBloom

 

[Jaime Vallés]

So go out there a f-ing start dragging that boat.

I nominate this for Quote of the Day.

BTW, I saw Fitzcarraldo at a screening in Lincoln Center a few years ago. VERY cool movie, and the boat sequence is truly impressive.