I FINALLY saw Milk... I wanted to post about it!

well, even though this was a while ago, I still thought I would blog about it. I FINALLY saw "Milk" after having wanted to see it for awhile. I found that I much preferred the Documentary over the film.

First of all, I thought Sean Penn did an incredible Job playing Harvery Milk. Wow! It was unreal listening to and watcing him. I felt like I was looking at the real Harvery Milk from what I gathered. From the way he talked all the way down to his hand movements, Penn had him matched. It was so incredibly strange and eery. He also did an excellent job at portraying Harvey's inner character. The documentary seemed to show more of Harvey as he was on the outside, in terms of his roles in the political movement and office. The film really dug into the emotional aspect of his character especially his love relationships. There was a much bigger connection with Harvey in the film than in the documentary. I felt the audience could really connect with Harvey in film in terms of his relationship, regardless of his lover's sex. His relationship were told in a heart felt and tasteful way that you could understand his love for others. This was one thing that the film excelled in whereas the documentary could not.

On a side note, I thought it was neat that some of the actual true friends of Harvey had minor cameo roles in the film. It was a nice way to incorporate both worlds.

I thought the beginning of the film was told almost exactly as in the documentary and it was interesting to see how they twisted it to work with the film. I though it was fantastic how Harvey virutally narrated the film from the recording he was making. It was a nice way to tie the events together. I noticed the only time we saw Diane Feinstein was at the beginning of the film as well, to keep her character real.

The one big problem I had with the film was that I felt more of a political movement in the documentary than in the film. It seemed to random in the film that this one guy wanted to run for office out of no where and start a movement. In my opinion I never felt the cause to why Harvey wanted to be there so badly. The documentary really showed more about who Harvey was based on the interviews of his friends. I kept thinking in the film that Harvey seemed more of a guy who wanted to be in office "just because." There was a much more gradual movement and progression from Harvey started to finished.

As for Dan White, I never felt a connection with him in the film or a reason of motive. The way they positioned his resignation did not seem effective to me. Again, it felt random. I felt I never saw his struggles to the extent as they were in the documentary, especially with Moscone. To me, he almost felt like a character just thrown in the film to act as an opposition to Harvey versus a man who virtually frustrated and exhausted with his position. It all seemed a bit fast as well. He resigned, 30 seconds later the film, he wanted the job back. There was no progression and frustrated build up that would let me to believe he wanted vengeance.

The ending to the documentary had a MUCH larger impact as well. The whole candelight march in the documentary and the testimonials about it where so compelling. I never felt that in the film. I also never felt it for Harvey. His two friends showed up at city Hall to no one and they did not seem upset at all. I remember thinking, their best friend just died and then they just walk outside a see thousands of people and the movied ends. It was not very satisfying at all.

I love how the documentary took it much further and spoke about the trial and riots afterwards. I think that said more about the movement that anything in the film. A heterosexual man killed a homosexual man and virtually got off. It sparked more of an outrage and impact. The audience of the film did not get to experience that same shock and awe as in the documentary.

Overall, I will tend to prefer to documentary over the film, despite believing it is still a great film and incredible performace. I just felt the Documentary had more substance and emotion behind it. For those that havent seen both films, I recommend it. It is quite fascinating and an interesting insight how the screenplay was written.

Okie Noodling

I really enjoyed the screening Tuesday night of Bradley Beesley's documentary Okie Noodling. Beesley's film, which came out in 2001, is about the interesting sport of noodling, or catching cat fish using nothing but your hands. The sport is only legal in four states, one of them being Oklahoma where the documentary is focused. The most interesting part of this film is most definitely the topic of noodling. At first I thought it sounded boring however I found myself completely captivated by the hunt these men were on and the freakishly huge fish they were catching - some of them literally weighing half as much as I do!

Okie Noodling was laid out in chronological order, telling the history of noodling, introducing us to some of the small town Oklahomans who still noodle, and then unfolding the story of the noodling tournament. The film had engaging characters, mainly because noodling is a family sport. There was a lot of focus on the relationships between the characters, such as the family where nearly every male noodled or the uncle and his nephew. The fact that there was more to noodling than catching fish with your bare hands (the bonding it creates between family members) made the story all the more interesting and the characters more lovable. It was very easy to like these characters because of their passion for the sport of noodling as well as the relationships they had with one another.

I did find the characters slightly stereotypical however. Everyone seemed like small town bumpkins, making it less surprising that they are the type of people to go catching fish with their hands. The film was dominated by men, showing no female noodlers and only the wives of the noodlers, portraying them as worried and concerned for their crazy husbands. The film definitely also captures what we think of when we think "small town" and "Oklahoma" in the same sentence. There are many eccentric characters which seemingly emphasize the small town feel this film gives off.

I really enjoyed this film, despite thinking the whole concept of noodling is a little weird. The weirdness is what makes this such an interesting and engaging film and the characters are what make it likable and less of a crazy concept and more of a sport. If you missed this screening definitely try to see this on your own time! This movie was great!

Bradley Beesley visits UT

The director of successful documentaries like Okie Noodling, Summercamp! and most recently Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo, Bradley Beesley, made a visit for class today and discussed his rise to prominence. Although his oration covered a variety of topics, I found two of his points most interesting. First, the sense he gave of the attachment documentary subjects feel towards the documentarian even post-porject, and secondly he discussed "making stories" for his films.
I had not considered the depth at which a documentarian relates to his subjects. Beesley described some of his noodling friends calling him multiple times a week just to talk about their shared interests. I think I gained some perspective today on what getting "into" a project really means. For his documentary on the blues, Beesley lived with a muscian for about a year in poverty-striken northern Mississippi. This type of dedication and exposure led to him being considered a real part of the family even though he began as a big outsider (white, college-educated art student vs. poor, black musician). I hadn't realized before that feature length documentaries take so much TIME. Prof. Spiro also added a great point to cap this off - doing successive documentaries is like building an ever-larger family.
The other part of Beesley's visit that struck me was his perceived breaking of the cinema-verite rule of non-interference with his subjects. He said he frequently "made" stories to film. For example, before tackling Okie Noodling, Beesley created a competition for noodling that brought together fishermen from all over the area. This provided him with lots of subjects, lots of access and lots of footage. Some people may think of this as cheating, but I'm all for taking adavantage of any situation, even ones you make yourself. I would never direct my documentary subjects to do something unnatural, but I definitely have no problem in creating a situation to get the results I want. Overall I fel Beesley's visit was very informative and fun - he's certainly a creative documentarian who is helping shape the genre.

Re..'wicka wicka'....Remix

I didn't just see a documentary this past week at SXSW, I saw a movement. RiP: A Remix Manifesto, as a movie, is about the copyright vs. cultural creativity. The film itself is a self-proclaimed biased movie. Director Brett Gaylor actually encouraged the audience to boo and cheer the movie as it went along. He told us that the movie was meant to stir up emotion and make us have a reaction. We booed the bad people when they were on screen and cheered the heros.

Brett's argument is that too much of our culture is misproperly owned by corporations who want to hault the creative pulse in this country. He says that if the rules that exist now, existed 100 or 50 years ago, we wouldn't have things like Disney or The Rolling Stones. His main focus is the industry of mash-up and remix music that is extremely popular and spreading quickly.

I enjoyed the movie and respected his well supported argument, but more importantly I was astonished at the packaging of the movie. Brett has literally started a movement to remix his own movie. He has started a website and his own company that allows internet users to have full rights to clips of his movies so audience members can go home and edit new parts in.

Brett still wants to make money of course, but he realizes that yo can't fight the creative market with lawsuits and ridiculous fines. You have to embrace the change. You have to respect the creative nature of our culture and dare to inspire it further.

Technically the film is so well edited you feel like your watching him create a mash-up song as the movie unfolds. He keeps the audiences attention by referring to relevant artists such Girl Talk or showing the importance of software such as Napster and Youtube. By creating a bias movie with a clear agenda and being open about it, he allows the audience to be inspired. He gives people a reason to continue to fight against the system and build upon the great culture of entertainment that has put this country at the top of all the industries.

This is the website where you can watch the full movie in 5 minute segments. The director intros and closes each clip with a little something to say about the clip itself. This is just a cool documentary. http://www3.nfb.ca/webextension/rip-a-remix-manifesto/

Welcome Back!

Hello Documaniacs!

SO great that so many of you got to enjoy SXSW doc premiers!

We have a special guest in RTF on Wed. at 6 p.m. in 4D: Bradley Beesley. So, if you missed his premier at SXSW, please come to this outside event and feel free to bring friends.

On another, more practical note, please get release forms signed by all your primary subjects. Underage subjects need parent or guardian signature. I do not require that you turn these in, but they are important if you want your docs to have a life outside the University.

You can print out a release and customize with your info HERE:

http://www.sawvideo.com/youth/downloads/RELEASE%20FORM.doc

See y'all on Wed.

Ellen

ok, i cant figure out how to post videos. so...nevermind. 

Intangible Asset No. 82

Apparently, I'm the only one (of the select students i asked) who saw this film.

Fine. But you're missing out.

In her debt film, singer/director Emma Franz follows famous Australian drummer Simon Barker to Korea to find the country's "Intangible Asset No. 82", a geriatric shaman who was bestowed the title by his government as a recognition of his mastery of the art of improvisation on a sort of two sided drum. Barker's search for the Asset, Kim Seok-Chul, has been seven years in the making. Not only is the great shaman intangible, he's wily too and tends to be hard to find. Barker, with Franz in tow, meets up with another Korean musician who knows how to find Seok-Chul. The film is spent chronicling the journey of Barker and the Korean to different master musicians and finally, Seok-Chul himself. 

Franz does an incredible job. Her lighting (mostly natural) is beautiful and her images are powerful. She is able to capture a singer perched on a waterfall and a private shamanic ceremony, both difficult circumstances under which to film, and disappears into both scenes easily so that the audience feels like its participating in the action. The film is very musically based so there are many shots of Barker and many others playing the drums, of singing, of chanting, etc. She puts strong emphasis on music as the universal language and lets the musicians and artist featured in her film exemplify her point. Barker's evolution as a drummer is apparent in the progression the of story and his wide-eyed appreciation of all things Korean endears the audience to him and his personal journey almost immediately. 

I felt like the editing created a nice pace throughout the film, but the whole shebang itself was a little long. But she was quite long winded on her answers during the Q&A, so lengthiness seems to be a preference for her. The story itself never loses traction because all of the characters are so charismatic and open. I found myself totally captivated by Barker's journey and Franz's strong imagery. Her debut film is very impressive, and coming out on dvd! 

here's the link to the trailer