Today’s video is perhaps a little, erm, sensual for Youtube’s censorship policies, so we’re uploading it here… Check out below the Unkle video for ‘Follow Me Down’, directed by Warren Du Preez and Nick Thornton Jones, a featuring a performance by the model, Liberty Ross…

Also, an Arcade Fire/Terry Gilliam bonus (we’re not obsessed) – a little animation created as a trailer for the show…

Is it a commercial? Well, yes, for Levis. Made using 2,770 frames, a team of 5 people travelled across the US in a campervan stopping periodically to take photos. The entire shoot took 14 days. How tired they must have been (a lot less tired than if they’d have actually walked it, I suppose). We think it’s cool, and the Edward Sharpe soundtrack definitely helps…

Went to a screening at 10pm, which included the brilliant Golden Bear at Berlin winner, Incident By A Bank, a single shot reconstruction of a failed bank robbery in 2006.

Some serious video library action took place on Friday. I became pale due to lack of sunlight. Saw some great stuff though, such as a Finnish student animation, called Benigni, about a lonely musician befriending a tumour that grows on his arm. Strange, but very engrossing.

Another of note was a British short by a young filmmaker, Alex Barrett. His ‘Paintbrush: The Epitaph’ was a comic, and moving tale of Facebook existence.

After a bit more 35ml Club action (and experiencing drinking a shot of Russian vodka out of a bottle the shape and size of a shotgun), it was time for a very interesting Thai shorts screening, in an amazing little cinema called B-Movie.

Four Boys, White Whiskey and Grilled Mouse was here again, but was followed by a very interesting and original short set inside a chat room, Bangkok Tanks.

More, more, more video library action on Saturday, so many films, so little time… A great film called Rita, about a blind girl in Sicily, briefly experiencing freedom was a stand-out choice.

Later a screening in the main cinema, Zeise 1, included a film of Sol Bondy, the producer of a Future Shorts favourite, The Girl With The Yellow Stockings. His new film, Sparrows, aside from looking extremely difficult to make, was a very clever, one-shot story of a man and woman meeting in a bar and spending the night together.

After a night spent in the festival club (but no fish market at 6am – apparently essential if you visit Hamburg), Sunday was leaving day. Awards (announced when I was at the airport), went to the Korean ‘A Perm’, and the Estonian ‘Angry Man’, both very worthy winners…

So after getting up at an easyjet hour I have now arrived in Krakow! Went to get my accreditation pack, and found this cute bottle of champagne (don’t worry, it’s not actually the size of the building behind, it’s just perspective…).

After settling in, I checked out the a screening from the Polish national competition, which featured a quite leftfield animation about a town full of people with no heads, called Danny Boy.

Then, after an early dinner at a little salad bar called Chimera (has to be my food find of the month!), it was time to check out the first of the student programmes at the festival. The screening was taking place inside this gorgeous retro cinema on the main square (I’ll post some pictures tomorrow), and was going well until half way through the second film, an funny short about a man with Tourette’s (Bad Lyrics), there was a techical programme and the English subtitles disappeared. Time to head home and brush up on my Polish…anyone have any phrases for me to use?

Tuesday:

Next up – Hamburg…

]]> http://futureshortsblog.wordpress.com/2010/06/07/krakow/feed/ 0 futureshortstom bottle%202 danny boy prayers for peace four boys http://futureshortsblog.wordpress.com/2010/02/17/paradise-circus/ http://futureshortsblog.wordpress.com/2010/02/17/paradise-circus/#comments Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:39:29 +0000 futurehamish http://futureshortsblog.wordpress.com/?p=326 ]]>

Future Shorts have teamed up with Massive Attack to release the videos for their new album, Heligoland. Most of these will be shown on the Future Shorts YouTube channel except for this one as it’s too racy…

‘Paradise Circus’
Directed by Toby Dye

A frail little old lady looks straight down the lens of the camera as she describes the fuck of her life from nearly forty years ago. Intercut with her frank confession is actual footage of the intimate moments she describes; for this senior citizen is none other than the star of one of the most infamous pornographic films ever made, 1973’s ‘The Devil In Miss Jones’.

Austin, Texas

Friday
The first thing that hits you here is the inescapable presence of technology and constant flurry of twittering – the convention centre is littered with people on laptops – blogging, reporting, seeding… and on the receiving end, we’re getting twitters every second – this is serious information overload. It is fascinating to see how twitter has become such a key tool in arranging your time at the festival – setting up meetings, connecting with other people and planning your schedule.

I Love You, Man premiere

We attended the first couple of introductory panels and caught the opening film, the witty and sharp American comedy I Love you, Man by John Hamburg (writer of Zoolander, Meet the Parents) which went down a real treat to a rapturous audience. The film screened in the exquisitely beautiful Paramount Cinema and was probably the first time Ive ever been ordered to “Turn your f**king cellphone off or you’ll be out on your ass”. Then on to a series of festival opening parties, the key one being in the Buffalo Billiards, which is about as American as you can get.

The Paramount Cinema

Saturday
Saw a couple of the shorts programmes – one of which featured a documentary from our catalogue ‘Peter and Ben‘ by Pinny Grylls which had a great response. After spending time in the Film and Interactive Trade Show – a space for companies to exhibit their latest products and services, we headed over to the Alamo Theatre. This is undoubtedly one of the best cinemas in the US – the owner being a lively character who likes to give his audiences a real experience. Not only can you order food and drinks from the comfort of your cinema seat, if you have a ‘noisy neighbor’ can simply “raise a flag” on your table to have them removed! We were there to watch All Tomorrow’s Parties – a collaborative documentary about the super-cool UK music festival held in Butlin’s resorts. Featuring brilliant footage from the likes of Iggy Pop, Beth Ditto, Nick Cave and Sonic Youth, this very well realised film really captures the essence of the festival – would highly recommend checking out both the film and the festival. The film is produced by Luke Morris, whose shorts you may have seen at one of our events over the past few years – “Heavy Metal Drummer” and “Je T’aime John Wayne“. After the film we caught a live VJ set by UK duo The Eclectic Method before partying on down at 6th Street.

6th Street

Sunday
The morning brought more shorts programmes and a great selection of animation. Fabien attended a panel on the future of branded content and how artists and companies are working together to bring messages to the world (Watch it here) Panellists included representatives from Youtube, Britdoc and the Independent Film Channel.

sxsw panels

The afternoon we partook in the Shooting People pop quiz and a game of egg throwing before watching Jamie Johnson’s “Sounds Like Teen Spirit” which follows three teen/pre-teen singers and one band from across Europe as they compete in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest. We were absolutely blown away by the film and would really highly recommend going to see this – it engages brilliantly with the kids and is thoroughly entertaining. Leaving the screening hungry, we went to a party hosted by Film Florida and ate some free fried fish meanwhile Fabien headed out to catch an exclusive 22 minute preview of Sacha Baron Cohen’s new “Bruno” material. After which we headed over to the Winnebago Man premiere party. Although we haven’t had chance to catch the film yet, there has been a lot of buzz around it at the festival – the feature film originates from an infamous youtube clip of a foul-mouthed, frustrated Winnebago salesman. Watch it here

Austin building

Monday
This was the day when the weather literally did a u-turn and went from wet and cold drizzle to glorious sunshine and the city of Austin really cam into its own. Spent the morning at the last day of the trade show followed by a really interesting panel on The Future of DVD and Digital Distribution. Many comments about the inevitable demise of hard goods and how this will affect our sense of ownership and how we will handle media. Headed down to the Filmmaker BBQ run by the Director’s Guild of America to meet directors with films in the festival. Then on to play Rock Band (badly) at a Marketing Mixer on the 17th Floor of the very Metropolis-esque Frost Bank Tower with stunning views across the city. Then on to a British party, followed by a trip South to the San Jose Motel, a gig at the infamous Emo’s, then on to an open air party hosted by US free publication / online magazine – The Onion. Phew

Tuesday
After catching up with some work at the convention center, saw two more programmes of short films – was particularly impressed by these programmes – Reel Shorts 3 with some entertaining US comedies and Global Shorts with some brilliant documentaries. These included some Three Minute Wonders – one by James Lees whose film The Apology Line we represent who had created a brilliantly colourful short about the contents of people’s pockets on the streets of London – James has an incredible ability to divulge some of the most personal stories from complete and utter strangers! Then headed over to Emo’s for the ATP film party featuring live music from The Drones followed by the Film and interactive closing party on the rooftop at Maggie Mae’s.

Austin Sunset

Wednesday
Took a much needed day off to cope with the barrage of information and lack of sleep and decided to indulge in some Texan tradition… we hired a car and drove out to the Austin lakes where we stumbled across a beautiful enclave called The Hippy Hollow. After some swimming and lazing about, we hired a speedboat and jet ski from the eerily abandoned Volente beach and had an hour of high speed adrenaline kicks.

Road trippin

Austin Lakes

Speed boating

What better to do next than to head to a traditional Texan Rodeo… and we were not disappointed! In a stadium full of cowboys and cowgirls, the event began with bucking horses, followed by some lassoing calf action, obstacle races and finally after a laser-show to rival the Superbowl they brought out the bulls – highly entertaining stuff. The event finished with a performance by country and western legend Clay Walker.

Rodeo Austin

To finish the night off, we snuck through the back gate and caught Echo and the Bunnymen at Emo’s who despite sounding a little rough round the edges, proved they still have it.

Thursday
Fabien saw Joe Swanberg‘s latest indie feature “Alexander the Last” and I watched experimental shorts, one stand-out film being the brilliant “Cattle Call” by Matthew Rankin and Mark Maryniuk (was that influenced last night’s rodeo by any chance…). Followed by screening ‘Rip: A Remix Manifesto‘ by Brett Gaylor which raised some really current and valid questions about the state of copyright in music and rights ownership. The film’s main protagonist is ‘Girl Talk‘ a mash-up artist creating tracks from samples of existing recordings and Gaylor highlights the flaws in rights control through Girl Talk’s experiences. What really gets to Gaylor, though, is that much of today’s music is derived from previous releases. The Rolling Stones have perhaps inadvertently borrowed riffs from old blues legends and have evaded the long arm of the law. Plus, the Stones have been able to sell these tunes to, say, Nike for commercials use and prosper even more. So the line between inspiration and infringement is often blurred. The film is a real edgy and fascinating glimpse into one of the more pressing issues of our Internet Age.

The evening was spent firing around venues to catch as many bands as possible, these included Akron/Family, Bang Bang Eche, Efterklang and Passion Pit.

Queue for Emo's

Friday
Began the day with a tour around the infamous Flatstock exhibition and had to seriously restrain myself from buying something from every stall, the quality of the designs were so insanely high. Fabien attended a panel called “Brands, Bands and Fans” on how consumer brands around the world use music as an effective platform for delivering a brand experience. Featured speakers from Xbox and Coca-Cola. After a few final meetings we headed over to the Cedar Courtyard to catch Razorlight performing their new-ish material followed by a blinding set by post punk rockers White Lies.

Cedar Courtyard

White Lies @ Cedar Courtyard

Grizzly Bear at Cedar Courtyard

Final dinner at Moonshine we checked out a few more bands including Grizzly Bear and Au Revoir Simone. Highlight of the evening was the set by Gallows, Frank Carter leaping around the venue like a crazed monkey leaving smashed lights and broken bones in his trail. We finished the night off at the Red Bull Party which was somewhat lacking in atmosphere and taking branding perhaps a little too far by insisting on an entry pass in the form of a fake tattoo…

Red Bull tattoo

Gallows

Stimulating, inspiring and exhausting, roll on sxsw 2010 – we are ready for you!

There is a real buzz to this screening, the audience are mostly massive ‘Lil’ Wayne fans who are dressed in hip hop attire. In the cinema, there are shouts and chants of lyrics and whoops! This was by far the most ‘event’ like mood of any screening.

The film was pretty compelling, following Lilwayne on tour in Europe, recording and writing from the back of his tour bus and endless references to his strange addiction to cough syrup.

The next day I wake at 8am, two cups of weak american coffee I head to the festival to see buzz doc titles ‘Afghan Star‘ by British filmmaker Havana Marking about a generation of young Afghans trying to break into democracy through Afghanistan’s own version of “American Idol“.

Afghan Star

The film follows three different families of the contestants battling out for the big prize. A really touching and moving film, a Q&A followed the
film with representatives from ‘Afghan Star‘. Would love to screen the film in the UK. I catch up with Jess Search from Shooting People who pins an ‘I love Kabul’ badge to my jacket. I wear it with pride!

I head to the Racquet theatre to see Lee Daniels ‘Push‘, a really harrowing and brilliant film based on the book by New York writer Sapphire. The films has Maria Carey in a supporting role as a social worker who was surprisingly convincing as well as Lenny Cravitz playing a nurse! The film is tough to watch dealing with abuse and inceste and child pregnancy but strangely the story is uplifting. There is a real honesty to the script and there is an amazing performance from unknown actress Gabourey Sidibe playing the main character Saphire.

I head to see the Shorts 3 programme, highlights are Swedish Director Patrick Eklund’s ‘Instead of Abracadabra‘ and Icelandic ‘Two Birds‘ from Runar Runarsson. ‘Two Birds a hard hitting film of teenage love and excess, Instead of Abracadabra a funny and honest look at a magicians ‘craft’.

Instead of Abracadabra

I head down to the Canadian party on Main Street where I meet old friend Thesy, an actress based in LA and we meander through the bustle. Rita who works for New films international grabs me as she has just met ex-Hole and Smashing Pumpkins bass player Melissa Auf der Maur who is in town with her short film ‘Out of her minds’. We have an excited conversation about film and live music and bringing her to the UK for do a Future Shorts Live event!

The next morning, I sleepily head to the Eccles theatre for a screening of the most anticipated film of the festival ‘I Love You Phillip Morris‘ starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor. The film is a funny, sometimes explicit love story based on the true-life tale of a onetime married police officer turned gay Texan conman, Steven Russell. Overall a pretty good film.

I Love You Philip Morris

I get on the theatre loop bus (these buses are the only way of getting around Sundance as the cinemas are all over the town) and head
to see music video director Mark Webb‘s ‘500 Days of Summer‘. A very funny and innovative take at at the Boy Meet Gal, Gal leaves boy, Boy breaks down pic. Really entertaining and Zoe Dechanel shines as Summer.

500 Days of Summer

Amreeka

I head to see a film everyone is talking about ‘Amreeka‘. The film is Director Cherien Dabis debut about Muna Farah and her son who escapes from the hellish West Bank to the what seems an even more hellish small town in Illinois. This is a witty, honest and very moving film about immigration in the US.

Report back soon!

I headed for Main Street and the famous Egyptian theatre where I ran into the man responsible for it all, Robert Redford in a rather dashing black beret, I joined his entourage and ended up in the New Frontiers, a space dedicated to installations and video art. He walked around the space greeting filmmakers for about 15 minutes and headed out.

The legendary Egyptian Theatre

The opening press conference at the Egyptian theatre had Robert Redford in an optimistic mood “This could be a very inspiring time for artists,” he told the crowd. He talked about the first 25 years talking about how the first few years he had to stand outside the screenings hustling people to come in like the guys outside a strip joint.

Robert Redford speaking at New Frontiers

Met this Canadian filmmaker walking down main street who confided that Def Jam /Island records were having a party and their new signing ‘Razorlight‘ was playing! So after persuading the door I was big british music critic, I watched Johnny Borrell and his drummer play to only 100 sundance snow booted hipsters.

The following morning I headed to the Racquet Cinema to see ‘Shorts 2′ programme. Standouts included Vice Founder Gavin McInnes starring ‘Arsehole‘ and a two strong Australian films Miracle Fish and Jerrycan. The latter being executively produced by Nash Edgerton, the fantastic director of Spider and Lucky.

Heading now to see midnight screening ‘The Carter‘ the doc about syrup addicted massive rapper ‘Lil Wayne‘ will report back soon…

See for yourself: www.respublica.ru/top10