Jesse Epstein has had a busy year on the festival circuit and receiving critical acclaim for the short film 34X25X36, which premiered at this past SXSW.  Jesse was one of five short filmmakers from Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces” to present a mobile phone generated short film for a program at this last month’s IFP. She is also the founder of a youth video program in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, and an instructor for Reel Stories: Sundance’s youth documentary lab. 

SXSW’s Lya Guerra: What’s the state of the union between you and your very successful short film 34X25X36?

Jesse Epstein: 34×25x36 is one segment of a longer project about physical perfection that I’m working on (which includes WET DREAMS AND FALSE IMAGES, and THE GUARANTEE). The project just received funds from Chicken & Egg Pictures and the Fledgling Fund – to keep going. Thanks to it’s screening at SXSW a version of the film has recently been curated by the new Youtube Screening Room and has gotten more than a million views. It can be viewed HERE.

LG: You’ve recently been named one of the 25 New Faces of 2008 in Filmmaker Magazine.
Do you think such public and sought after acknowledgments will make a difference in your future film career?

JE: This has lead to some fun projects so far – including a short film project where I had to film the whole thing on a Nokia phone. Which was pretty liberating actually. The film was about bikes and I recorded bike sounds with the phone – and my brother mixed them into music.

LG: You’ve made other films, does this latest film and recognition go towards making you feel somehow new or changed?

JE: I feel like it’s all a journey and I’m learning a lot, and continually experimenting with how to turn social issues into stories. But I realized during the interview for the article just how much I want to start making more narrative based projects too. So in this way I feel like I have a new interest in further exploring other types of filmmaking.

LG: Practical questions; How long did it take you to make “34X25X36″? And which is more taxing, the making of a short doc, or the traveling from festival to festival with it?

JE: It’s funny, the actual filming was only 2 days and the editing was fairly quick, but with limited funds, what took longer was the music and the sound mix. Going to festivals has been a great — I think it’s important to screen a film and talk directly with the audience. Q&A’s force filmmakers figure out how to explain the mission behind a film, and some of the questions people asked really helped me further articulate, even to myself, the project as a whole.

LG: Tell me a bit about your involvement in Shooting People. How has it helped with “34X25X36″?

JE: Shooting People was actually a huge part in making the film – especially because the shoot was in LA (and I live in NY). Shooting People hosted a party in San Francisco, and through Malcolm Pullenger (the SF bulletin moderator), I met the awesome DP Christian Bruno, who shot the film. Well most of it. I shot some super 8, but he did the most – and was great to work with. He has a great eye and did a lot with not too much equipment. He even did a “dolly shot” through the mannequin factory without a dolly – just hand held. Filming in the factory was a trip visually, and we were all (a crew of three) pretty amazed at what we were looking at.

LG: Your docs seem to be made with a mind to make a difference, to open eyes without bludgeoning the viewer with a message. If so, do you see your films working, making a difference?

JE: I’m interested in how media can be used as a tool for social change, and the goal is to take a social issue and turn it into a compelling story. But in this, I really aim to question and open up, and to find out why people do what they do, rather than be accusatory. In terms of an outreach plan, through New Day Films the films are being used in classrooms. And, I’ve been traveling with the films a bit – going to places like The Lower East Side Girls Club with the films and having discussions around body image and culture.
Contact info:
www.jessedocs.com or 
Jesse@Shootingpeople.org

Original post by jarod

Posted: September 29th, 2008 under Reel Talks.
Comments: none

Lance Myers is an Austin-based animator, a SXSW alum and previous juror, and a regular contributor to the DIONYSIUM series at the Alamo South Lamar (The Next Screening is TONIGHT, September 3rd). SXSW programmer Lya Guerra asks him some questions about the series, and in turn, learns about the Greeks and animation and the direction of mankind in general.

So Lance, could you give me the precise definition of “Dionysium”?
The original dionysia were political, philosophical, religious events held yearly in ancient Greece. Kind of like SXSW—they were meant to encourage creativity and rowdy drinking. Ours is held monthly because too much of a good thing can be beautiful.

Dionysium has been called evocative, fun and The Austin Chronicle proclaims it “…a night of diverse intellectual pleasures.” Are you the brains behind all this intellectual pleasure? If not, who is responsible for all this evocative diversity, etc.?
I cannot take credit for founding the Dionysium. It was created by a friend of mine from New York named L.B. Deyo. While living in New York, L.B. used to host a monthly event called the Athenaeum, which was more of a round table discussion than a theatrical presentation, like this is. So when he moved here he teamed up with an old friend, Buzz Moran, and created this.

When was the inaugural Dionysium event?
June 2, 2004. My original role at the Dionysium was to sketch while the event was happening. Those drawings are still posted in the archive section of dionysium website.

So there are lectures and music. You supply the animation and the analysis thereof. Does animation play a role in the Dionysium series as a whole?
Animation is not necessarily a pivotal part of the event. But championing the fine arts is a big part of what we’re doing here. And I just happen to be an animator who would like to see my craft taken seriously. So it’s my own personal mission, and the Dionysium is a perfect platform for carrying it out.

I don’t mean to lead the witness, but it seems the Alamo South is the perfect place for this series…Is my sweeping assumption correct?

Yes. You are correct! Tim League is obviously a big supporter of innovative theatrical events. Many thanks go to him for believing in the idea. And the Salvage Vanguard Theatre should also be commended for adopting the event as a function of their organization.

Was this event conceived and constructed to avoid an “Idiocracy” type scenario, 500 years from now, or is it simply too late?

Might be too late. I’m thinking about doing a rotoscoped version of “Ass” the movie. Or maybe “Ow, My Balls!”

Briefly, what’s on the table for the September 3rd program?
I’m not sure about the full lineup, but I can tell you about what I’ll be showing. It just so happens that my parents will be in town and attending the event and they have requested to see something created by their son. So, since I don’t have a brother, I’ll be showing episode number 6 of my web series, The Ted Zone.

Original post by jarod

Posted: September 3rd, 2008 under Reel Talks.
Comments: none

Thomas Logoreci was a writer and actor in the very well received short film A Day’s Work, at last year’s SXSW Film Festival. SXSW’s Lya Guerra catches up with him and finds out what he’s doing when he’s not winning awards or programming shorts for a festival in Albania, and makes him choose between his life’s passions.

1. What’s going on with the life of A Day’s Work? A Day’s Work has gone on to a number of other festivals. But myself and Ed were most pleased by winning the grand jury prize at the SF Shorts fest here in our hometown of San Francisco a few weekends back.

2. Okay, you write and act. You have to choose one, which would it be?
If I had to chose one, I’d probably go with writing. Though last year, after we shot ‘Day’s Work’, I went down to Albania and worked on that country’s most expensive film to date - Fatmir Koci’s Time of the Comet. I played a small role as a bandit in the film (in the photo I’m the one on the left).

3. You also program films for a film festival in Albania. What kind of festival is it and how to you find films to fit it?
The Tirana Intl. Film Fest is a mostly shorts fest that also honors several world-renowned filmmakers by showing a number of their features.
Luckily this year, owing to ‘Day’s Work’, I’ve seen a number of the best shorts from around the world. My main task now is to contact all these filmmakers and book their small masterpieces into the Tirana fest.
The Albanian capital, Tirana, has only two theaters for its population of one point two million. So people are starved for good movies. Maybe it’s a holdover from Albania’s time as socialist republic but it makes me kinda glad that the festival charges no admission.

4. Any new productions in the works?
Right now I’m wrapping up editing on a decade-long project chronicling the Olympia, Washington music scene. The feature is called Try This at Home. It’s culled from over 150 hours of tape and features talk and performances from Elliott Smith, Sleater-Kinney and Negativland among others.

Original post by jarod

Posted: August 27th, 2008 under Reel Talks.
Comments: none