Hey folks, this fish yanking long haired hippie is daring to pull a dag danged miracle on these folks lives. Harry here, and Massawyrm is at it again with another look at the Indies that made the grade in the great AICN Indie Search... A never ending quest to find the movies that you and I have never heard of. And get them heard of. Without further ado, here we go....
Hola all. Everyone's favorite cigarette chomping, Dr. Pepper swilling, Indie schilling Jesus impersonator here with my weekly installment of Indie Indie goodness. That's right, bring me your neglected, your underappreciated, your unseen masterpieces and I will watch them. That's what I do.
So lets talk Indie, shall we?
Feature Presentation -- KILLING CINDERELLA
Romantic comedies. There's something to be said about romantic comedies. Mostly that they're redundant, predictable, cliched, predictable, unimaginative, predictable and just so damned predictable. They center around the time honored formula of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back. Every time. And Indie comedies are no doubt the worst offenders in this category, as they become an even more formulaic sub-genre all to themselves in which a group of girls and/or guys, all of a specific cultural or geographical background and of similar ethnicity, strike out to find love and discover just what it really is to experience love in modern times (that's pretty much the blurb on the back of the coverbox for every Indie romantic comedy of the last five years).
Of course there have been a few breakaways that have really stepped outside the box (Swingers in which boy loses girl and then finds another girl, Chasing Amy in which Boy meets lesbian, boy converts lesbian, boy blows the whole deal and loses lesbian, and Jeffrey where boy meets boy, song and dances ensues, boy loses boy, boy gets boy back). But for the most part, romantic comedies give us almost exactly what we expect of them. Formula.
And that's why many of us, myself included, just love them so damned much. Me, I get absolutely retarded for a good romantic comedy. I don't care how many times I see Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan hook up. I'd pay to watch them do it again. I just love a good romantic comedy.
And that's why I just fell in love with this weeks feature pick, "Killing Cinderella". It's your typical sugary love tale of a woman looking for love in all the wrong places, only this woman is slightly delusional and has a hallucinatory imaginary friend, Cinderella. The cultural group for this little Indie venture: Jersey girls. The twist: attacking the myth of prince charming and the ideal that a woman's ultimate goal is to nab her prince charming over all else. The end result: cute, adorable, lovable magic. It's just so damned sweet, you can't help but love it.
Now, the key to a good romantic comedy lies in one important factor. It's not the cleverness of the writing, nor the originality of the premise or even the production values of lavish backgrounds. It's chemistry pure and simple. Forget about acting in it's theatrical sense, forget about whether the names are big enough to draw in crowds, forget about Oscars. It's all about that spark, that indescribable attraction that bleeds out of the screen, envelopes you and sucks you in to root for that inevitable, totally obvious ending. Bogart and Bergman. Peppard and Hepburn. Hanks and Ryan. They all had that certain something, that no matter what the circumstance, you couldn't help but need these two to be together for your life to be complete. The leads of "Killing Cinderella", Marin Hinkle (Karen) and Anthony Clark (Brad), have that spark. And that spark drew me right in.
I admit it, I'm a softie, but I just got absolutely retarded for this cast. Everyone of them turns in a dead on realistic portrayal of someone I've known in my life romantically. From the guy watching the game in the bar over his girlfriends head while she has the ever important what's wrong with us talk (me), to the girl debating phone in hand to call or not to call (me) to the guy totally in love with his best friend but too afraid to say a damned word about it (coughcoughnotmecoughcough). It's all spot on, and its all funny.
Everything works in this movie, from the aforementioned cast, to the pacing to the often clever true to life dialog. It delivers everything a romantic comedy should. You laugh, you smile, you cuddle up to your significant other and remember just why you are together (in my case Lucky Pierre, who I met while in that French prison with Mouth). Then you tell them you love them. This movie reminds you why.
I must mention that one performance really stood out, Jessica Capshaw (yes, as in the daughter of that Capshaw) who plays the comically depressed best friend going through self-help books like El Cosmico does his stash. She honestly delivers the bulk of the solid comedy in this film, milking every joke for its worth yet maintaining an endearing quality that you can't help but adore. And she's just so damned cute in that lovable, little sister sorta way. She was just splendid.
One of the great things about this film is that its a first feature for writer/director Lisa Abbatiello, who put this piece together nicely. I'm always impressed by first time directors that nail down their first feature so well. If romantic comedies are going to be her mainstay, then I know we'll hear from her soon enough again. She's shown her talent at this in all the right places. Just give her some names and she'll be filling the cineplexes. But for now, she's made an Indie comedy that hit the spot.
You can find out more KillingCinderella.Com
Glass Slipper Productions
805 Washington Street #7
Hoboken, NJ 07030
(201) 653-1668
Festival Pick - SOFT FOR DIGGING
Now, lets shed the cuddle talk for a moment so I can discuss this weeks festival pick, "Soft for Digging". This film is about as far from endearing and cute as you can get without actually being a member of the Manson family. Its a dark, brooding experimental film covered in the grit and grime of slow, monotonous reality. This is one of those pictures you will have to see at a festival, because I can't foresee a studio having the Huevos to pick this up for distribution.
Why, you ask. Because this film contains only 3 spoken parts in it's entire 74 minutes of film. And two of those are only one word a piece. "Soft for Digging" is a very visual picture that focuses around the life of a lonely old man, living in rustic rural America, who believes he has witnessed the murder of a little girl. However, when no body turns up and no one comes forward looking for their lost child, the man begins to question his own sanity as his obsession for solving this murder begins to mount. Beginning very slowly, this film simmers its way to a frothing boil of a climax that finishes off with a jaw dropping conclusion.
With a strong visual style and a knack for telling a story without the need for words, director JT Petty weaves an intricate tale and maintains strong mood shifts that carry the viewer through this man's daily routine and the disruption that plagues him. And with only the soundtrack to carry it audibly, simple things, like the protagonists pet cat, become characters all to themselves, taking on their own personalities and affecting the story in their own subtle ways. This is that rare experimental film that doesn't come across the least bit pretentious. Petty explains the story, using familiar situations that we've seen so often that we don't need to hear their dialog, we know it by heart, and then he smacks us out of left field with concepts we would never expect from this kind of film.
"Soft for Digging" is playing this week at the Nantucket Film Festival. It Premiers June 21st. If you're anywhere nearby, I highly recommend taking in this disturbingly quiet picture. This film isn't for everybody, as the lack of dialog might bother or bore those not willing to take the risk on an experimental piece. But if you are willing to risk it, it's well worth your time, if for anything, the discussion you'll have with someone after it.
JT Petty
(514) 815-9891
For more info SoftForDigging.Com
Attention Directors (and wannabes)
Massawyrm isn't the only one who wants to see those films of yours. It turns out someone upstairs in the executive boardrooms is looking out for you too. The top brass at Fox Searchlight have launched a new program called Fox Searchlabs, a program aimed at helping to nurture young talent and aid you on your way to becoming the director of the future.
What is Fox Searchlabs and why is Massawyrm of all people talking about it? Well, it's "a mentoring program for aspiring directors, that may have made an Indie film, or a short, or have done some sort of creative work." What they do is take 40 applicants a year, hold private, intimate lectures with accomplished directors (thus far the likes of Billy Bob Thornton, Baz Luhrmann, Bryan Singer as well as many others have come to speak) and then they supply you with all the equipment you'll need to shoot a short film on DV as well as a modest budget for those items not included that you deem necessary.
Then, once you have your equipment, you shoot a short film that will have exposure on Fox's new website devoted to this venture (not yet up and running as far as I've been told) and possible exposure on the Fox Movie Channel. This short film then becomes your calling card with which Searchlabs helps you to acquire an agent and find you a place, if not in the Fox family of studios, then somewhere else where you can direct your masterpieces. They'd like you to sign a first look deal with them, but as far as I have been told, this is NOT mandatory. Just a little something they'd like.
Searchlabs is still in such an age of infancy that not quite all the details on how everything works has been hammered out yet, but it is up and running.
I have to applaud the top brass for this one. Apparently Peter Rice (President of Fox Searchlight) and Miles Ketley (Searchlight Senior Council) deserve the pat on the back for greenlighting this project. Here are two guys who are definitely not on my Soulless corporate execs list. Searchlabs is a PURE LOSS PROJECT. Plain and simple. It will not generate revenue. It will not pass go and collect $200. It is merely an investment for the future, rooted in the hopes that somewhere out there is the next generation of filmmakers that will hopefully (in their eyes) find a home with the Fox family. This is the same kind of brass cojones that put money behind guys like Rodriguez, Tarantino and Anderson. It's ballsy and I like it.
And here's the ultimate kicker. They're not looking for you to submit a professionally made film. No siree. They're looking for anything and everything that shows the underlying genius in you. Sure it could be a budgeted Indie film. But it could also be no budget DV film or even a script. Something that demonstrates your creativity. They're not looking for you to be an accomplished director. They're looking for someone with vision that could use some help getting to the next level. And yes, that's you.
So send your tapes or scripts to:
Fox SearchLAB
10201 West Pico Blvd.
Building 667, Suite 5
Los Angeles, CA 90035
or for more info CLICK HERE
Well fellow Indie lovers, that's it for your chain-smoking friend this week. I'll be back next Monday with a brand new pack of films and a brand new pack of Camel Filters. Until then, keep those tapes coming.
Massawyrm
3408 Red River
Austin, TX 78705
