It is Not the Same Thing – A Film by Kathy Choi

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

The Echo Park Film Center in Los Angeles is posting films made in its youth film class structured around the concept of work. The students made films about how they view jobs and work. It’s a great idea for a film class and throws the students into a very mature thought process. I really like this very fine film by Kathy Choi, Ce N’est Pas La Meme Chose (It Is Not The Same Thing).  She lets a woman from France compare the working life there to the life in America.  There are fascinating and sharp observations made about how the French worker simply wants to be efficient and get the job done within the regular day contrasted with how the American worker is expected to show a willingness to stay longer and ‘look’ more busy or dedicated.

Having closely observed American corporate office life I can attest to the phenomenon that is the actual ruling principal behind the entire American economy: at all costs one must always look busy.

The sad fact of our current jobless recovery is that an enormous percentage – probably in the 50% range – of all corporate American jobs are totally and completely unnecessary and should not exist.  In other words, those jobs should not come back because they are fake.  They are occupied by people spending the vast majority of their time looking busy, talking busy, pretending, and doing next to nothing.

The French view which holds a job to be something limited and something to do efficiently and well, while not allowing it to overwhelm one’s life strikes me as a very mature and reasonable view.

This little film is exceedingly good and reminds me of Godard.

10-Minute Film School with El Mariachi Director Robert Rodriguez

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

Director Robert Rodriquez shows how he put several sequences together for his low-budget first feature, El Mariachi. His solutions for working with a single camera and extremely limited resources are ingenious. His consistent recommendation to young low-budget filmmakers is to simply refuse to spend any money on anything. After watching this film it becomes very apparent that the only thing really preventing people from making films is a simple lack of ability.

For further study, Mubi.com has nice in-depth article called 30 Minute Film School that covers all the shot types and lighting setups one needs in order to make a narrative film.

Here’s a fascinating continuation of the 10-minute film school in which Rodriguez shows how he filmed a complex shootout for Desperado with Antonio Banderas by using a video camera to pre-plan the entire sequence.

Egypt Celebrates First Victory in Revolution

by Cimaxion

Egypt has begun to put out its garbage. It’s an amazing achievement for Egyptians that I have witnessed via the news video and photos coming from Cairo’s Tahrir Square. Congratulations to all the Egyptians who wanted to be free. They forced a raping, murdering, totalitarian criminal to resign his dictatorial position. The dictator Mubarak was and is an ongoing embarrassment and deep shame to the entire Middle East and to the United States that insisted on giving him respect and credibility even while he committed murder and oppressed a great civilization. Egyptians have made an incredible start to ridding themselves of the human garbage that was and is Mubarak. It remains to be seen if Egypt can become truly free and wrest control of the nation from its military.

Hopefully, the revolution in Egypt will spread to topple the rest of the governments in the Middle East which are nearly unanimous in their willingness to allow brutal thugs and criminal royal families to rule in bitter oppression. These savage despots straight out of the Dark Ages are specialists in murder, rape and complete suppression of all ideas and expression. They also have the absolute respect and support of governments like those in the U.S.

Beyond the Middle East and its ‘royal families,’ it would be astonishing and constructive to see the people of China put their own garbage out by removing their totalitarian government. Revolution is in the twenty-first century air. No one is immune.

Digital Underground in the People’s Republic of China

by Cimaxion | 2 Comments

Rachel Tejada shot and edited this film about independent and underground film in China. It was produced by dGenerate Films.  It’s in six short parts and covers the basics of independent film festivals and efforts to make films that will somehow survive the oversight of the repressive government.  I post this out of a measured interest, but I cannot overlook the depressingly passive sadness of everyone who so much as glances into the camera.  They consistently refer to themselves as independent filmmakers or underground filmmakers.  Underground they may be out of necessity, but they are most certainly not independent.  They are comfortably passive and have an absolute zero level of confrontation or rebellion in them.

I cannot muster significant respect for billions of people who want to express themselves and flourish but do not ever make the decision to pick up their totalitarian government leaders and drown them in the sea.  You can talk to me until you are blue in the face about your independent cinema, but until your cameras shoot something I’m not listening.

Parts 2 – 6 after the jump

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Rising to High Places – 1963 Documentary On Office Buildings

by Cimaxion

A great example of mid-twentieth century English pride in… office buildings! This is a 1963 production of the Rank Organization. My depressing view on modern city skylines, regardless of how beautiful they may be at night, is that all those magnificent towers are simple stacks of flimsy cubicles and low ceilings with ugly lighting. Modern cities are nothing more than support structures for desks.

The Secret Identity of Author B. Traven

by Cimaxion

B. Traven was the mysterious best-selling author of the novel, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, which was made into a classic film by director John Huston in the 1940s. But who was B. Traven? The mystery surrounding his identity remains fascinating to this day. There have been many theories about who he was, whether he was several people, whether he was an expatriate German or perhaps even the President of Mexico. People in the film world apparently thought they would have meetings with him, but were then informed that a representative would show up. But was the representative actually B. Traven?

When an artist hides his or her identity many theories develop. Modern figures who have cribbed from Traven’s playbook are the novelist Thomas Pynchon and the painter Banksy who really have no reasons for remaining anonymous beyond the artistic jolt that a secret identity personally gives them. It’s not the crooks that interest Batman after all – it’s the secret identity. A secret identity makes you better in every way because it turns you immediately into a work of art. All artists should be mysteries. At the very least, they should tell lots of lies.

I present this post and its excellent documentary as part of my preparations for an upcoming film. Getting the right mood.

Part 2

Parts 3 – 6 after the jump.

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Robert Mapplethorpe’s Life Work Given to Los Angeles Museums

by Cimaxion

As I was driving yesterday, I was thinking about my latest film work and muddling through half-formed thoughts about how, whether anyone likes it or not, Los Angeles is the center of art in the United States.  New York has become too much associated with the 20th century’s industrial approach to art.  Los Angeles, it seemed to me inside my comfortable car, is where it’s at.

Today it was announced that the work of American photographer Robert Mapplethorpe has been given in joint trust to the J. Paul Getty Trust and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Well, there you have it.

Enjoy the gift, Los Angeles, because you’ve earned it.

If you want to learn a lot more about Mapplethorpe and an incredible drive for artistic expression, read the National Book Award winning memoir by Patti Smith, Just Kids.

Tokyo Night Trip – A Film by Luciana Botelho

by Cimaxion

Luciana Botelho turns cab rides in Tokyo into a gorgeous abstraction that maintains its romantic atmosphere flawlessly.  What I like about these films is how the filmmaker seems able to surrender herself to a particular time and place over the extended period of time necessary for making the film.  Not an easy thing to do.  I’ve posted about this filmmaker’s work before.