It’s been quiet around here for quite some time now, but don’t worry, we’ve been quietly working on “The American Backroom” in the background and news will be coming soon. Also, we’ve been developing a couple other projects and one or two of them just gained monemtum over the last couple of months, meaning that they consumed more and more of our time.
Now, here’s one of these other projects: ASTERNAUTS. A sci-fi comedy short film in Austin, TX, by a fantastic young director: Marta Masferrer. We’ve met Marta at the Berlinale Talent Campus in February, a section of the prestigious Berlin International Film Festival, where she was a finalist of the Berlin Today Award producers pitching session with her project, meaning she pitched it to ten producers from Berlin, including us. We immediately fell in love with ASTERNAUTS, not only because it is one of the best comedy short film scripts I’ve ever read, but also because it is set in the same America that we also like to explore with “The American Backroom”. A perfect match, so wie picked it. And Marta picked us as producers.
Long story short: The film will be shot in early September in and around Austin, and we are also providing full post production in Germany at the end of the year. It’s our goal to get it finished on time for a premiere at next year’s Berlinale! But we still need a little push from you to get it made: We have just launched a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter to close our final gap in financing. Please take a look at the campaign and become part of something great! We have some fantastic rewards for your pledges, and you can also support us by sharing this campaign to your family, friends, co-workers, anyone… Please tweet us, facebook us or even google+ us We very much appreciate any contribution towards ASTERNAUTS and thank you so much for your help!
More American-Southwest-Time-Lapse-Porn, this time by Dan Eckert who created some amazing shots along Highway 395 in the California desert. And some in Arizona.
Here’s a captivating blog by Steven Hirsch: Crustypunks. Pictures of and interviews with homeless punks he met at Tompkins Square Park, East Village, New York. Snip from Wikipedia: “Crusties is a term for members of an urban subculture, with roots in punk and grebo. The term pre-dates crust punk and can be used independently. The trend was most widespread in the UK in the late 1980s and early 1990s but there are also international subsets[1]. Crusties are noted for their unkempt appearance and are associated with road protests, squatting, raves and begging.”
Flipping through the blog you’ll hear life stories like this one:
I’m a product of the American foster care system. My mom’s a Czechoslovakian whore and my dad was a sand nigger. His name was Ahmad something or other. I grew up in the foster care system till I was three. So I woke up one day and I was fucking fifteen years old, ran away from the fucking group home. Decided it was in my best interests to become a crack head on the streets. And spent the last two years losing my mind in Oklahoma City. – Ketchup
Or this one:
I’m also a vampire. I was born and raised into vampirism. I was thrown out at a early young age from my family and everything by some wicked church people, satan worshippers or something. All I remember is I’ve been into it since I was born. I speak about eleven or twelve languages when I’m drinking. Not really right now. With the cancer setting in right now because of the heat and everything, just kinda like can’t think right now. Doing my own chemo. And I got a prescription for it, somewhere here in Manhattan. I just gotta go pick it up, if I could remember where the address is. I’m thirty seven. I’m not crazy. I’m not insane. I’m not stupid. – Jeremy
For more of these exciting portraits head on over to Crustypunks…
Tom Lowe creates timelapse photography. Of rocks. Canyons. Clouds. And Light. And what he creates looks so utterly fantastic that you have to watch it with your own eyes. In his blog he writes up on the strains of shooting and all the technical challenges he has to deal with during production. And I am so not surprised that along the way Tom expresses his sincerest admiration for filmmaker Ron Fricke. I can only and truly underscore his words.
An now, let’s close our eyes for a moment and imagine shots like this on a big screen in a darkened theater. In 3D. Especially in 3D. And we will get a slight idea of the direction where THE AMERICAN BACKROOM (at least in parts) is going to take us… Mark my words
On August 28 franco-german TV network ARTE will be broadcasting two classic films shot in 3D: Alfred Hitchock’s “Dial ‘M’ For Murder” and Jack Arnold’s “The Creature From The Black Lagoon”. In order for you to watch it you only need anaglyph 3D glasses. The American Backroom and MovieBrats are giving away 10 sets of the official ARTE 3D glasses – for FREE! All you need to do is write an email to 3D@moviebrats.com, as subject line use “3D glasses” and don’t forget to insert your mail adress into the email. PLEASE NOTE: This sweepstake is only available for participants located in Germany, since we can send glasses only to mail adresses in Germany.
It’s here! The tilt shift miniature test footage we shot during our 3 month research road trip across and back the United States in the fall of 2009. Watch it now in glorious HD and full screen! This was our first try at it and it was shot mainly to explore on settings, locations and motion. Of course some shots are working great, others less great We’ve learned a lot and it helps tremendously in developing the storyboard for the actual stereoscopic 3D tilt-shift shoot of THE AMERICAN BACKROOM in 2011. BTW, We are currently in talks with tilt shift miniature-artists (some of them you might know) to get them and their talent aboard for the production.
Here’s a list of locations seen in the clip (in order of appearance):
San Francisco, CA | Louisana State Route 14S | Grand Chenier, LA | Calexico, CA | New Orleans, LA | San Francisco | Grand Canyon, AZ | Los Angeles, CA | Palm Springs, CA | Hollywood, CA | Santa Monica, CA | outside Slab City, CA | Coleman, OK | San Francisco | Camp Verde, AZ | Monterey, CA | Lavina, MT | Santa Monica again | Melrose, NM | Santa Monica | Austin, TX | outside Bakersfield, CA | Page, AZ | Austin | Santa Cruz, CA | Austin again | Hollywood | Austin again and agian | New Orleans | Austin | Page | Austin | Santa Cruz
We’ve been mentioning it before, but haven’t shown anything from our little tilt shift miniature faking video shoot we did during our research trip last fall. At least so far! Finally found the time to continue working on it and it will go online before the end of the month. That’s a promise. And here’s a little tease. Enjoy!
We very much appreciate any contribution towards ASTERNAUTS and thank you so much for your help!
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