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Industry News
A report of news & happenings in the local industry for May 2008.
Email news to news@newenglandfilm.com.
This Month
 Cast of Amber Sharp's Don't Go. (Photo by Rebecca Sanabria.) [Click to enlarge] |
Boston’s two biggest (but until now, separate) film and video equipment dealers will be sharing a roof in the coming months. Further evidence of the marriage of formats is demonstrated in the merger between Rule Broadcast Systems and Boston Camera Rental Company, announced last month. Prior to founding Rule, John Rule was general manager of Boston Camera. He hired current manager Brian Malcolm. “I’m glad we’re working together again,” said Malcolm in a join statement.
Video Underground in Jamaica Plain is a great place to rent hard-to-find-locally-made films. After picking your favorites, every Thursday eve in May you can also sit in the VU backyard and see films that fit within “Alex’s Semi-Official Ode to David Bowie.” Members only. Sign up here.
Locals featured in the 24th Annual Boston Gay and Lesbian Film/Video Festival (at MFA, Boston May 7-18) include Peter Pizzi, BU alum Shamim Sarif, and Amber Sharp. You may recall our coverage of Sharp last year? She makes good on her promise to marry Melrose, The L Word, and 227 at this year’s fest with Don’t Go.
Haley House Bakery Café and The Color of Film Collaborative (TCOF) present Dinner & A Movie on May 9th. The Price of Sugar will be followed by a discussion with the documentary's producer and Boston filmmaker, Eric Grunebaum.
Then, on May 10th, Haven Art Lounge and TCOF presents Runt by Michael Phillip Edwards. “Runt is a strikingly passionate story of a Jamaican-American man who is forced to confront the ancestral demons of his past in order to be the man he wants to be for his son,” says the blurb. Tickets here.
A New England Emmy nomination goes to... the Rhode Island International Film Festival for its PSA campaign, No Excuses. The 31st Boston / New England Emmy Awards will take place on May 10th in Boston.
For those of you who yawn at making a film in 48 hours... head to Williamstown for Images Cinema’s 24-Hour Goosechase and Free-For-All, May 10-11. There are trophies.
Help docmakers “Connect the Docs” at a rough cut screening of Sieh "C-ya" Sameh's Sweet Salone, about the young music and entertainment scene in Sierre Leone on May 11th at the Coolidge Corner. RSVP.
The Berkshire International Film Festival runs May 15-18.
The Dhamma Brothers, a doc by MA-based filmmaker Jenny Phillips starts May 16th at the Coolidge Corner Theatre (www.coolidge.org). Constantine’s Sword starts May 30th with a pre-engagement screening on May 29th with filmmakers James Carroll, Oren Jacoby and co-producer Betsy West in attendance.
 Dhristo Bakalov, cinematographer. [Click to enlarge] |
Christo Bakalov, of New Milford, CT, will be honored with the Connecticut Film Festival Award for Excellence In Cinematography. Bakalov DP’d five of this year’s films, including Americanizing Shelly. The festival runs May 20-25 and includes other films with CT connections, such as Two Angry Moms, a documentary that investigates school lunches, by two mothers from Weston; Blind a short film by New Haven’s Stephen Dest; River Lab, a short documentary from Wilton resident Charles Clemmons; and Leave You in Me, a humorous take on a woman’s scorn, produced by Stamford resident William Doscher. Visit www.ctfilmfestival.com.
Errol Morris isn’t everywhere, though that may seem the case with the release of his latest, Standard Operating Procedure. But one can count on his presence with the film at 7 pm on May 22 at Harvard Film Archive. Homi Bhabha, director of the Humanities Center at Harvard and author of The Location of Culture joins Morris for the post-film conversation. If you miss it, take five with Rebecca Dorr and Matthew Reed Baker in this month’s Boston Magazine.
Documentaries by Alanis Obomsawin, a member of the Abenaki Nation, screen at the MFA, Boston from May 28-31. She has made more than 30 films about the rights and lives of First Nations peoples and is, perhaps, most known for 1993 film, Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance, about the Mohawk protest against the expansion of a golf course into sacred burial lands. Obomsawin will be present at each of five programs.
Filmmakers Collaborative hosts the 2008 Making Media Now conference on May 30th from 9 am to 6:30 pm at Bentley College in Waltham, MA. Themes for panels and discussion include: financing, pitching, scoring a job in the growing MA film industry, and a wide range of issues related to new media. One of our favorite people, Doc Doctor Fernanda Rossi, will be present. Bonnie Waltch reports that representatives from ITVS, POV, National Geographic, Impact Partners, Snowfall Films, and Participant Media will also be on hand. Register at www.filmmakerscollab.org.
Coming Soon
The next New Hampshire Filmmaker Roundtable, presented by the New Hampshire Film and Television Office, will take place June 11th from 12-3 pm at Red River Theatres in Concord.
The Center for Independent Documentary and the Kopkind Center are sponsoring a weeklong retreat for ten filmmakers along with mentors at Treefrog Farm in Guilford VT, from August 3-10. To apply, write a letter to Susi Walsh and John Scagliotti explaining where you are from, what media work you have done, and how you could contribute to the seminars. Also describe briefly the 20-minute visual media you would be bringing to the "film slams." Click for details. Deadline is June 15th. Price for the week is $300 and includes everything.
New England college students and recent grads, send your films to the New England Student Film Festival by June 15th.
Both New Hampshire Film Festival and SNOB (Somewhat North of Boston) Film Festival have opened their calls-for-entries. The festivals take place October and November 2008, respectively.
Held Over
According to information submitted by the company to the Maine Film Office, L.L. Bean spent $1,641,108 in Maine during 2007 photographing and producing its catalogs. Both Maine and New Hampshire count a large source of media production revenue from local companies’ ad budgets. The Maine Attraction Film Incentive Program allows certified media productions to claim rebates from the state equal to 10 percent of the money paid in wages to out-of-state workers and 12 percent of the money paid in wages to Maine residents.
Charlotte Young Bowens (Ann Arbor, MI), Maital Guttman (Greensboro, NC), and Rebecca Rideout (Easthampton, MA) are the 2008 recipients of Morrison Film Fellowships, awarded by the Maine Community Foundation. Fellowships of approximately $1,000 were given to each honoree to pursue film training. Rideout will use hers to take a course on producing and directing documentaries at the Maine Media Workshops. Applications for next year's fellowships are due January 15, 2009. Guidelines.
The Massachusetts House Ways and Means Committee's proposed spending plan would increase arts and cultural funding through the Massachusetts Cultural Council (MCC) by roughly $150,000 to just over $12.4 million for fiscal year 2009. Budget decisions for the new fiscal year (starting July 1st) will be made in early May.
Rebecca Mercer announced her departure from the MFA Film Program. Carter Long takes on her duties as the film/video operations manager as of April 30th.
Craig Goedecke of Hull, MA has been doing a lot of extra-ing. And that does not mean he’s been busking newspapers. No, soon Goedecke will join the ranks of elite background artists – he’s been on the untitled Kevin James film set and Fever Pitch. He’s blogging, too. Check out http://massextra2.wordpress.com/.
Also blogging about indie film is Jeremy Clapp; he wants traffic directed to http://realindie.wordpress.com/.
The spring edition of MovieMaker Magazine includes a special article, “Live Free and Make Movies in New Hampshire.”
Monterey Media of Thousand Oaks, CA recently acquired North American rights to Either/Or Films’ Sensation of Sight. A late summer/early fall theatrical release is planned, followed by a winter DVD release.
AmyBeth Parravano of Cranston, RI invites you to check out No Left Turn, a short about a mother and son who bond over garage rock.
NH’s Deborah Scranton (The War Tapes) has once again given soldiers a chance to report their story of the Iraq war in Bad Voodoo’s War, which can be viewed online.
Producer Tyler Heon announced that Stagewright Films, the New Hampshire based production company, is currently in production on a feature, Just Say Love. Check ‘em out at www.justsaylovemovie.com.
Filmmaker and NewEnglandFilm.com founder Michele Meek posted her short documentary Conversations with Women: Masturbation on YouTube and launched a sex survey which you can take at http://sex.littleplum.tv.
Screenings, festivals, meetings and other events at at www.NewEnglandFilm.com/events/
Erin Trahan is the editor of NewEnglandFilm.com and the managing editor of The Independent. Contact her at editor@newenglandfilm.com.
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