Opera and Indie Film: More Alike Than We Think.

In the parlance of academia, my area of research is film–specifically independent film. I’ve devoted my entire working life to trying to make and distribute films for which there was no place within the major studio system. So it is as surprising to me as it is to all of you that I’ve become somewhat of an opera impresario by virtue of distributing live and recorded broadcasts of opera into movie theaters.

Opera has never been a part of my life. My exposure to it was mainly limited to the soundtracks of movies. The films of Scorsese and Coppola teem with the sounds of opera. The Marx Brothers film “A Night at the Opera” is one of my all-time favorites, and I still smile whenever I hear an aria that I first heard while Marxian mayhem was being performed on screen. In 1981, I distributed the movie “Diva,” and experienced real opera for the first time through a friendship with Wilhelmenia Fernandez, who invited me to see her perform at the New York City Opera. Continue reading “Opera and Indie Film: More Alike Than We Think.”

Podcast: My interview at the IFFS

Just got back from Vegas, one of my least favorite places in the world, where I was on a panel at the International Film Festival Summit. It’s a great event, where the folks who manage and program film festivals all over the world get together to compare notes and learn best practices.

While there, I was interviewed by Patty Fantasia for her blog, “The Filmmakers Notebook.”  Here is the podcast for your listening enjoyment. You should also check out Patty’s other podcasts from the IFFS at www.filmmakersnotebook.com.

Comments after the break… Continue reading “Podcast: My interview at the IFFS”

A very sad day…

Santo MarqueePhoto By Al Yellon

Movie Tweeviews makes its Debut

During Oscar season last year, as I was catching up on the films I had missed, I started tweeting my reactions to each of the films the moment they were over. It was fun trying to fit something meaningful into 140 characters, and with each tweet, I kept trying to top myself in terms of being clever.  Then I got hooked. I started tweeting reviews from festivals… Sundance, then Cannes, then Toronto. Finding just the right combination of words to capture my thoughts was becoming a game. It was like writing a haiku.

About a month ago, I was sitting on an airplane, when suddenly a name popped into my head. Tweeviews. How cute. No wifi was available on this particular flight, so I had to wait until I landed before I could check out whether tweeviews.com was available. Nope, gone. How about movietweeviews.com? Got it. Continue reading “Movie Tweeviews makes its Debut”

A Cubs Solution?

I had dinner tonight with Peter Gilbert, of  “Hoop Dreams” fame. We had a great time catching up on a variety of subjects, and inevitably ended up talking about the Cubs. I spouted off on one of my theories about why the Cubs are approaching their 102nd year without a championship, and Peter told me I ought to make this public, so here goes…

Baseball teams are built for their ballparks. Some ballparks are good for hitters, some for pitchers, and some for speed. Shea was a pitcher’s park, and so is Citi Field. Both the old and the new Yankees Stadiums were and are hitter’s parks. When the Astros opened what was then called Enron Field the same year that the Tigers opened Comerica Park, each of the two teams fundamentally changed from one type of ballpark to the other. I remember reading an article that suggested that Houston and Detroit should trade their entire teams with each other. Peter made the point that the Minnesota Twins have been brilliant at tailoring their team to their ballparks.

So what about the Cubs?

Wrigley Field is a very fickle ballpark. Some days, it’s a pitcher’s park and some days it’s a hitter’s park. You can tell which it is each day by looking at the flags in the outfield.

Here is my big idea…

Instead of fielding a team based on rightly-lefty percentages, the Cubs need to have two teams that they can platoon…one is the small ball team they field when the wind is blowing in, and the other is the long ball team that they field when then wind is blowing out. If they can just put together a decent lineup for both circumstances, and then adjust the lineup depending on which way the wind is blowing, I think we can finally lick this championship issue.

What do you all think?

Comments after the break… Continue reading “A Cubs Solution?”

It’s Tiempo

As many of you know, I’ve travelled to many places in Latin America over the last few years, mainly talking to Latin filmmakers about both the business and the craft of moviemaking. The most common question that comes up is why, given the size of the Latin population in the U.S., is there not a larger market for their films in our country? The answer is actually quite simple. Just as films from Colombia don’t typically travel to Mexico, and Mexican films don’t necessarily work in Argentina, we don’t have a single Latin culture in the U.S. It is a fragmented market with large, but distinct cultures. There is an available audience, but it’s not the reliable mass audience that people think it ought to be.

Not that I’m truly an expert on the subject, but last week, I was asked to be on Joe Torres’s show “Tiempo” on local WABC-TV to speak on the subject.

Updated 10/8/10: The folks at WABC, in their infinite wisdom, have removed all the streaming videos from their site prior to September. Oh, well. Their loss.

The Palm Pre: My New “Everything” Device?

UPDATED: 6/6

Warning: This post is only for complete gadget freaks, of which I am admittedly one.

Around 5 years ago, I was on a train from New York to Washington DC to attend a historic meeting. A bunch of independent filmmakers had been summoned to meet with Dan Glickman, the new head of the MPAA to discuss issues related to independent film. I was on the train with five other filmmakers, and on the entire trip we were playing with our Treo 650’s. We were trading apps (yes there were app phones before the iPhone), beaming the apps to each other via infrared port, and showing off all the tricks we had learned on the device.

In point of fact, at that moment in the not too distant past, everyone I knew in the film business had the identical phone. Why? Indie filmmakers are always on the move, and need to carry their office with them wherever they go. The 650 was a beautiful device, and with some hacks and third party software, it did pretty much everything one could ask for, and more. Continue reading “The Palm Pre: My New “Everything” Device?”

Italian Government Closes National Film School

The following is from one of my students at Columbia. This is an issue that all film lovers should be aware of. Please voice your words of protest as per the instructions below…

Dear Ira,

The Italian government of Silvio Berlusconi decided to close the Italian National Film School (Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia) with the excuse to cut expenses and save the country from a new Greece-like financial collapse.

Even if the general intent can be considered righteous, cutting one of the main institution of the italian cinema and the most important school for the future filmmakers is definitely the wrong place where to look for restoring the budget of a state, especially in a country like Italy where the cost of politics and bureaucracy is one of the highest in the world.

Now, the Italian National Film School students and faculty are protesting against this injustice. Continue reading “Italian Government Closes National Film School”

Columbia Producers on the Croisette

Some of you are already aware that I brought 12 of the Columbia University producing students with me to Cannes this year. My goal was to demystify the event, and to give them a ground level tutorial so that if they end up coming back in any capacity, they could hit the ground running. I asked them to write up some of their experiences at the festival, and I’ll share links when they are posted. In the meantime, here is a great shot of the gang at the IFP party.

Comments after the break… Continue reading “Columbia Producers on the Croisette”

Video from “The Conversation”

Scott Kirsner just informed me that videos of many of the panels at “The Conversation,” held at Columbia University back in March, are now available on line. Below is the video of my apparently controversial opening remarks, which many people interpreted as dashing the hopes and dreams of aspiring filmmmakers everywhere. But listen carefully to what I’m saying. It’s about pragmatism, not pessimism.

The rest of the videos can be found at Scott’s site

You can leave comments after the break Continue reading “Video from “The Conversation””