Diesel Civil Trust

If we did fan-finance and actually make the film, let’s say it sold: what then? There will be profits? Would people get their money back? Where would that money go? Our plan is to put anything we make into a fund that would, in turn, finance other (cost-sensible) flicks fans want to see. And from that? Build a People’s Studio. Simply have any interested/frustrated/desperate party put their script on our website, open for all to read, during a “pilot season” of sorts. Script that gets the most votes, gets the loot. That flick gets made and sold, all the loot goes back into fund for next round. If there’s enough loot from RED STATE sale to do so, idea would be to fund two low budget flicks a year. Ultimate dream: Indie Movement, v.3. Because with the shuttering and impending sale of Miramax comes the sober realization that the specialty business has just died completely. The 90’s are long over and Indie Movement v.2 has come to a sad close. Until that market is vibrant and thriving again, maybe this is a small way to keep the home-fires burning. I know we’re supposed to let all things run its course, but can’t help it: I don’t wanna see the indie film world I knew go away forever. I’m an idealist and a silly-heart, and I’ve got a dream.

Kevin Smith is a communist. (via muppetpants)

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08 February 2010,22:46 Zulu

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ataxiwardance: i12bent: Jean Seberg (Nov. 13, 1938 - 1979) was an extraordinary American actress - the star of Godard’s Breathless and three dozen other French and American films… During the later part of the 1960s, Seberg used her high-profile image to privately voice support for the NAACP and supported Native American school groups such as the Mesquaki Bucks at the Tama settlement near her home town of Marshalltown, for whom she purchased $500 worth of basketball uniforms. She also supported the Black Panther Party. Though she had done nothing illegal, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover considered her a threat to the American state. Her telephone was tapped and her private life was closely observed. She knew about it and felt chased. Things came to a head when a gossip campaign against her (FBI initiated), claiming that the child she was expecting was not fathered by her husband Romain Gary, but by a member of The Black Panther Party, drove her nearly mad. Tragically, the child died a mere two days after birth. Gary and Seberg had the corpse placed in a glass coffin so the world could see the race of the dead girl (white)… After this Seberg suffered from depressions and often attempted suicide. Her by now estranged husband Gary claimed that she did this annually on her dead daughter’s birthday. Finally in 1979 Seberg succeeded in taking her own life - Romain Gary followed suit in 1980…

ataxiwardance:

i12bent:

Jean Seberg (Nov. 13, 1938 - 1979) was an extraordinary American actress - the star of Godard’s Breathless and three dozen other French and American films…

During the later part of the 1960s, Seberg used her high-profile image to privately voice support for the NAACP and supported Native American school groups such as the Mesquaki Bucks at the Tama settlement near her home town of Marshalltown, for whom she purchased $500 worth of basketball uniforms. She also supported the Black Panther Party. Though she had done nothing illegal, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover considered her a threat to the American state. Her telephone was tapped and her private life was closely observed. She knew about it and felt chased.

Things came to a head when a gossip campaign against her (FBI initiated), claiming that the child she was expecting was not fathered by her husband Romain Gary, but by a member of The Black Panther Party, drove her nearly mad. Tragically, the child died a mere two days after birth. Gary and Seberg had the corpse placed in a glass coffin so the world could see the race of the dead girl (white)…

After this Seberg suffered from depressions and often attempted suicide. Her by now estranged husband Gary claimed that she did this annually on her dead daughter’s birthday. Finally in 1979 Seberg succeeded in taking her own life - Romain Gary followed suit in 1980…

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15 November 2009,12:38 Zulu

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soupsoup: ryanbrown: It’s now a trending topic on twitter. They’ll hit 1 million “demands” (whatever they’re calling it) easily. A reminder: they made the film for under 15k. From Wired: Eventful.com is hosting the online Paranormal Activity vote that promises to send the movie to a wider audience if said audience asks for it. It’s safe to theorize that what seems like democracy in action for horror movie fans is clever online marketing. Check out who’s behind the promotion of this little movie. It was picked up for distribution by Dreamworks and Paramount. The big studios don’t acquire movies to dump them in art houses. But they’ll certainly release a film gradually to build buzz if it lacks star power. And from Itzkoff: Over the weekend, Paramount said that “Paranormal Activity” sold out all of its midnight screenings in 33 cities, earning $535,000 in ticket sales or about $16,000 per screen. Starting Friday, the studio said, it will expand the film to 40 markets where it will be shown at all hours. Whatever the terms of their arrangement with Paramount, that’s gotta feel good. [Previously]

soupsoup:

ryanbrown:

It’s now a trending topic on twitter. They’ll hit 1 million “demands” (whatever they’re calling it) easily. A reminder: they made the film for under 15k.

From Wired:

Eventful.com is hosting the online Paranormal Activity vote that promises to send the movie to a wider audience if said audience asks for it.

It’s safe to theorize that what seems like democracy in action for horror movie fans is clever online marketing. Check out who’s behind the promotion of this little movie. It was picked up for distribution by Dreamworks and Paramount. The big studios don’t acquire movies to dump them in art houses. But they’ll certainly release a film gradually to build buzz if it lacks star power.

And from Itzkoff:

Over the weekend, Paramount said that “Paranormal Activity” sold out all of its midnight screenings in 33 cities, earning $535,000 in ticket sales or about $16,000 per screen. Starting Friday, the studio said, it will expand the film to 40 markets where it will be shown at all hours.

Whatever the terms of their arrangement with Paramount, that’s gotta feel good.

[Previously]

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06 October 2009,21:36 Zulu

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Nigerian Government Bans District 9

Charges that Neill Blomkamp’s science fiction blockbuster District 9 was racist began popping up almost immediately upon the film’s release back in August. Considering the film features an in-over-their-head South African government that allows a mega-corporation to quarantine and exploit an entire alien race, one may assume the obvious core parable for apartheid was at the heart of the racism charges, but aliens-in-a-concentration-camp was not the bullseye of most accusations. The actual problem some people had was with the portrayal of a Nigerian gang that illegally traded alien technology when not mutilating and devouring unsuspecting aliens in crude shaman-led rituals intended to imbue them with extraterrestrial powers, so to speak.

(via makingofmovies)

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21 September 2009,20:56 Zulu

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soupsoup: HBO Orders a Season’s Worth of ‘Boardwalk Empire,’ Scorsese Attached Fresh off directing Vincent Chase in “The Great Gatsby” (for a film adaptation that only existed on “Entourage”), Martin Scorsese has been tapped by HBO to do some real-life work for the cable channel. He’ll be an executive producer of its new series “Boardwalk Empire,” HBO said Tuesday in a news release, which has been ordered for a 2010 debut. Steve Buscemi stars in the series as Nucky Thompson, a man described as “equal parts politician and gangster,” who runs Atlantic City during the Prohibition era.

soupsoup:

HBO Orders a Season’s Worth of ‘Boardwalk Empire,’ Scorsese Attached

Fresh off directing Vincent Chase in “The Great Gatsby” (for a film adaptation that only existed on “Entourage”), Martin Scorsese has been tapped by HBO to do some real-life work for the cable channel. He’ll be an executive producer of its new series “Boardwalk Empire,” HBO said Tuesday in a news release, which has been ordered for a 2010 debut. Steve Buscemi stars in the series as Nucky Thompson, a man described as “equal parts politician and gangster,” who runs Atlantic City during the Prohibition era.

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01 September 2009,16:02 Zulu

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For a writer, it’s a word; for a composer or a musician, it’s a note; for an editor or a filmmaker, it’s the frames. One frame off or two frames added or two frames less is the difference between a sour note and a sweet note, is the difference between clunky, clumsy crap and orgasmic rhythm.

Quentin Tarantino, The Cutting Edge: The Magic of Movie Editing. (via stayforthecredits) (via bryanwashere)

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05 July 2009,20:55 Zulu

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Star Trek and the Jews

azspot:

About half way through, I started to get the sense that “the Vulcans” were a metaphor for the Jews. Much of the plot of the new Trek hinges around the “genocide” of “six billion” of Spock’s countrymen. Add the Vulcans themselves aren’t just smart and traditionalist; they strictly observe a hierarchal and highly ritualistic religion and code of conduct. One gets the impression that “Vulcan logic” isn’t just rational, but part of a much grander system that resembles Kabbalah in its level of complexity. And the Vulcan Ways, which are so successful in preserving tradition and religion, are certainly an affront to individualism. The half-human Spock actually leaves his home planet because of its oppressive anti-human bigotry, and after joining Starfleet, ends up dating a black girl (the perky Zoe Saldana (“Nyota Uhura”), who for most of the film seems to be wearing a galactic Bluetooth device).

Anyway, after googling a bit, I found that I definitely wasn’t the first to make the Vulcan-Jewish connection, indeed a whole book’s been written on it! And there’s a fascinating YouTube video of Leonard Nimoy discussing his invention of the famous Vulcan salute, which he borrowed from a ritual in his Orthodox Schule in which the rabbis signed with their hands the Hebrew letter “shin,” ש, the first letter of “Shaddai” (“Almighty God).

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22 May 2009,11:12 Zulu

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“THIS ain’t your daddy’s World War II movie,” Quentin Tarantino said with a grin, standing on a street corner here that had been scrubbed of 21st-century signposts to become the set of “Inglourious Basterds,” his new film about a band of Jewish-American soldiers on a scalp-hunting revenge quest against the Nazis.

“THIS ain’t your daddy’s World War II movie,” Quentin Tarantino said with a grin, standing on a street corner here that had been scrubbed of 21st-century signposts to become the set of “Inglourious Basterds,” his new film about a band of Jewish-American soldiers on a scalp-hunting revenge quest against the Nazis.

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13 May 2009,10:27 Zulu

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