Second skin doco about virtual worlds

Second Skin, is a documentary about virtual worlds (WoW, Second Life, Everquest 2) and the lives they enhance and destroy.

Second Skin takes an intimate look at three sets of computer gamers whose lives have been transformed by online virtual worlds. An emerging genre of computer software called Massively Multiplayer Online games, or MMOs, allows millions of users to interact simultaneously in virtual spaces. Of the 50 million players worldwide, 50 percent consider themselves addicted. From individuals struggling with addiction to couples who have fallen in love without meeting; from disabled players whose lives have been given new purpose to gold farmers, entrepreneurs and widows, Second Skin opens viewers’ eyes to a phenomenon that may permanently change the way human beings interact.

Second Skin, opens in the US this August.

Info at: http://www.secondskinfilm.com

This August, Second Skin will become the first widely released movie about virtual worlds- a movie for the 50 million gamers who spend most of their time in virtual worlds, and all those curious to understand this phenomenon.

Protest slaughter of dolphins in Japan

Just saw a very compelling documentary about dolphin slaughter at the Melbourne International Film Festival. The movie called The Cove is utterly disturbing and you may well want to grimace, turn away or just shut your eyes while the footage of horrific scenes take place. But for how much longer can we turn away from the crimes we perpetuate against animals!?

Thank goodness people care and it’s kudos to the film makers who risked their lives to capture this untold story of how the tiny coastal village of Taiji, Japan is at the epicenter of this dreadful crime.

The website won’t give the plot away and it’s something that the director wants you all to take your friends to see! Who knew! But sometimes it’s not such a bad thing to make money to further influence a cause and get the word out.  I’ve personally learnt that you don’t have enough time to be complacent about the things you believe in, and I am trying to have some conviction and stop in my own complicity of killing animals.

See what you can do to help the campaign to raise awareness of The Oceanic Protection society and help spread the word.

http://thecovemovie.com/

Win tickets to Food Inc.

Did you know that the average American supermarket now stocks 47,000 products that are no longer seasonally dependent and miraculously stay fresh? Food, Inc. is a documentary that dishes up surprising and shocking truths about what we eat, how it’s produced and where we’re going from here.

For your chance to win a double pass to take part in the MIFF (24 July – 9 August) be the first to email competitions@foodfest.com.au between 4 – 5pm today (Tuesday 21st July) with your name and contact details.

Food Inc. (USA):  Showing Sat 1 Aug, 2.30pm at GU Cinemas and Thurs 6 Aug, 4.45pm at ACMI
(Part of the Melbourne International Film Festival)

Beijing pressures Melbourne International Film Festival to dump documentary

Excerpt: THE Chinese Government has demanded that the Melbourne International Film Festival dump a documentary about an exiled minority leader whom they label a terrorist and blame for instigating this month’s ethnic riots in Xinjiang, which left more than 180 people dead.

The Australian film about millionaire Uighur businesswoman and grandmother Rebiya Kadeer, who was once feted by the Chinese Government as an example of ethnic harmony in China, is scheduled to premiere on August 8.

Festival director Richard Moore said the Chinese consulate in Melbourne phoned him late on Friday after the festival’s full program was published in The Age, insisting that the documentary, The 10 Conditions of Love, be withdrawn.

The consular official, Ms Chen, who is believed to be the new Melbourne cultural attache, demanded that Mr Moore justify his decision to include the film. She also castigated him for allowing Ms Kadeer to be a guest of the festival. Ms Kadeer is due in Melbourne next month to speak at the premiere.

More from The Age

Covering the Mirrors, roadside memorials project

Covering the Mirrors documents a resistance, a reversal; where each ‘roadside memorial’ undermines the (non-) nature of the motorway space.

The proliferation of non-space seems perversely natural; airports, freeways, shopping centres, stations and hubs appear at each turn and beyond every turn off. These vast areas designed for functionality, supposed progress, in fact programmatically efface ‘the local’ with its community interests and historical presence; this leaves empty meaningless space in abundance.

Contrary to intent the ‘universal network’ actually isolates the individual by atomizing the community. It does this through an expanding ‘grid’ of interstitial non-spaces that affects all aspects of daily life – from our environment through to our emotions. No longer are these in-between zones mere links; they are fast-forming generic centres, places in and of themselves – that control and re-order the social experience.

Yet the presence of roadside memorials somehow resists this deterritorialization. As the visual markers carry with them a sacred significance and a small piece of history, which once situated in monotonous space they activate a subversion of the spatial homogenization. Suddenly these non-spaces are filled with meaning. These shrines with their folk rituals and cult following hint at a growing social dissent – as an emergent material culture they tap into an underlying collective impulse to reclaim lost space.

Taking the roadside memorial as his starting point, Neuman uses a variety of lens-based media, and techniques that span from appropriation to documentary to the staged, to critically respond to physical and cultural changes in the Australian landscape.

Host:
Don’t Look Experimental New Media Gallery
From – Wednesday, July 15, 2009 at 6:00pm til  Saturday, July 25, 2009
Location:  Don’t Look Experimental New Media Gallery
Street:  419 New Canterbury Rd, Dulwich Hill, Sydney, NSW (426/428/445 bus)
Phone:  0401152434
Web: http://www.myspace.com/dontlookgallery
Email:  dontlookgallery@gmail.com

Beautiful Losers – Film

Directed by Aaron Rose, Beautiful Losers tells the story of his semi-legendary Alleged Gallery in downtown ’90s NYC. Alleged provided an incubator for a group of taggers, skateboarders and other criminally disposed minds AKA young artists (such as Harmony Korine, Mike Mills, Ed Templeton, Barry McGee etc) who hung/worked and 20 years later became famous and successful beyond your wildest dreams. Tough life huh?

The film covers off their progression from DIY street art twenty-somethings to mainstream success in advertising, film, and graphic design. Even though it somewhat glosses over trickier subject matter about what happens to punk ideals when they meet big bucks – the film does provide nice insights into some of the greater artistic minds of our time. Plus their can-do-art attitude is pretty inspiring.

Where:
ACMI Cinemas, Fed Square, Melbourne
When:
Premiere Thurs July 2, 7pm. Then Fri July 3, 7pm; Sat July 4, 7pm; Sun July 5, 5.30pm.

Website: Beautiful Losers
Source: 3thousand

Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival

The Margaret Mead Film & Video Festival is the longest running documentary film festival in the US. The Festival takes place each November at the American Museum of Natural History. The Mead showcases far-reaching international documentaries and a range of non-narrative films and videos. The Festival seeks works that showcase the diversity of non-fiction storytelling including: animation, indigenous media, experimental and essay films, as well as hybrid works. The Festival seeks works made within the last 3 years and that is of any length.

Send in your submissions http://www.amnh.org/programs/mead/submit/

Deadline has been extended til June 26th, 2009 so hurry!

More information on Margaret Mead from Wikipedia

One minute challenge for filmmakers

The competition is for filmmakers to produce an original and imaginative film that works within the confines of sixty seconds. The categories for submitting your film are Film, Animation, Mobile File, Documentary, Machinima, Experimental, Title Sequence, Film Trailer, Ident, Advert. Each month we will show the films sent to us which are open for a public vote to decide which film wins each month and goes into the grand final of the twelve best films of the year. At the end of the year the best 12 selected films will be judged by the public to decide which film is the Winner of the prestigious Renderyard 1 Minute Challenge award. You can submit as many films as you like. Your film must be no longer than 1 minute in length.

To submit a film please click the link.

Iron Maiden – Flight 666

You may have missed this limited cinema release: but really you should track this one down via DVD or web, cos it’s definitely worth it! Flight 666 – Somewhere Back in Time World Tour.

You don’t have to be a head banger, wear pentagrams or cuss Jesus. This is a phenomenal film about a phenomenal band – loud, gregarious and bloody brilliant -  just like the members of Iron Maiden and their manager Rod Smallwood.

It’s another fabulous documentary from Film Maker, Anthropologist and Heavy Metal Evangelist – Sam Dunn. Sam  is a Canadian film director and personality most notable for his documentaries, Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey and Global Metal.

And what Global Metal missed (in some respects) in terms of hearing enough music, Flight 666 definitely makes up for it and more! More crazy fans, crazy countries, crazy tour schedules and more Eddie.

Here are some links: and buckle up, not because it’s bumpy; but just very fast, oh and did I say LOUD!

YouTube
Sam Duun’s Facebook page

Indonesian films at EngageMedia

Screening a collection of Indonesian documentaries, as uploaded to the EngageMedia.org website.

Thursday, 14 May 2009, 8pm start
Serial Space, 33 Wellingston St, Chippendale, Sydney, Australia

Bilal : This experimental film tries to question what the meaning is of being both a punk and a Muslim. Bagasworo is a punk who sing Adzan (the song Muslim people sing each time they pray five times a day). This film was shown in the Rotterdam film festival in 2008 and at “Jakarta 32 degress” held by Ruangrupa, Jakarta, 2006. [ 3 minutes 50 seconds ]

Taring Babi: Welcome to Taring Babi, an activist collective in Jakarta, Indonesia. Taring Babi is an independent community, also known as Marjinal, AFRA (Anti Fasis, Anti Rasis), and Tempe Quality. As a community, they are committed to fighting for equality and justice and often joins forces with local bands, media collectives, and workers’ organisations to build events and campaigns that are inclusive and creative. Their home base also serves as a distro where they sell tshirts, badges, pins, and albums they have made, as well as a printing studio. [ 36 minutes ]

Andang And Sarjo: This film documented Andang’s experience when he cut his long hair. He met Sarjo who has long story with his job as hair dresser/cutter. Sarjo told Andang about living in Jakarta and his roots. [ 8 minutes ]

Jogja Berhati Mural: An overview of what had been dropping on and off the walls of Yogyakarta, Indonesia. They call it mural, can also be said as paintings done on vertical walls and can sometimes extend to other forms of expression such as graffiti. The painting doesn’t stand for itself and making murals in Yogyakarta are renowned for its procession to observe and negotiate on practical needs of the locals a.k.a. owners of the walls. [ 23 mins ]