No. It isn’t too soon to figure out the hits of the summer.  The shoes of the summer, the songs of the summer, the meals of the summer and the drinks of the summer.  It is already the end of July and the biggest movie of all time opened this past weekend and I think it is high time we picked the summer hits before summer ends, as it always will.

As in past years we will go with a They Say/I Say approach

SONG OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: Katy Perry’s danceable and absolutely adorable “I Kissed A Girl”

I SAY: The much better/more interesting “The World Should Revolve Around Me” by Little Jackie.  Unlike Perry, I LIttle Jackie is here to stay and her song is just as catchy, has better lyrics and is infinitely more fun to blast.  Way more fun video, too.

SHOE OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: The gladiator sandal.  Because nothing says flattering like bands of leather showing exactly how field hockey ready your calves are.

I SAY: The humble Haviana is what I live in but I just found the Converse take on the wedge espadrille and I declare them the shoes of the summer — cute, practical, and saucy.

SHOW OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: 90210, starring the amazing Shenae Grimes from Degrassi.

I SAY: GENERATION KILL, starring nobody you know, and moving as slowly as a war should move, and keeping you laughing and cringeing.  The best part is that every single trope of when the shit hits the fan (dudes are happy, dudes are doing something nice) is ignored in favor of a bigger problem — modern warfare in a foreign land without enough supplies.  Plus the J.Lo is dead thing was hysterically funny in a sick way.

MOVIE OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS

I SAY: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS.  Seriously.

TREAT OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: Donuts are the new cupcake!

I SAY: Little tarts with different crusts and different fillings are the new cupcake.  While donut shops can only get names like “Hole in One” a tart shop has a myriad of saucy and interesting names at its disposal.  Whole wheat graham cracker crusts with keylime pie filling in a two bite version.  Nothing will be the same.  This may take a year to come true, but I promise, The Tart Has It will be huge.  Or maybe Tarts and Vicars.  I’m working on names.

RIDICULOUS FAMOUS PERSON TREND OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: Pregnancy. Spears, Simpson, Angelina, Jennifer Garner, Minnie Driver…

I SAY: Using Youtube to reclaim your cultural relevance.  Even worse, using Twitter.

RIDICULOUS NON-FAMOUS PERSON TREND OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: Staycations

I SAY: Using Facebook as a way to communicate with friends and brag about conquests real and imagined.  Also using Facebook updates as a form of haiku writing.  Which is both ridiculous and awesome.

ON-LINE ADDICTION OF THE SUMMER

THEY WILL SAY: Photos and videos of things in nature that look pornographic.

I SAY: Mobwars on Facebook.

From 2007:

Is it just me?

Or has Molly Ringwald’s dress in Pretty In Pink started growing on you?

It only took 21 years. But I kind of like it now.

I think someone (Z.) told me I was crazy. Which I am. But look at this:

From LAT

PRETTY IN PINK, 1986 I was so not responsible for that prom dress. There were a lot of clothes that I liked a lot in that movie. I still have that corduroy Chinese jacket that I wore and the outfit from the scene in the music store. But the prom dress was an idea that the costume designer came up with. I couldn’t stand it. When we went back to reshoot the end, I tried to get them to use a different dress but they would have had to reshoot a few scenes. I always thought that my character Andie was a good designer. But the dress is so iconic. I am sure that a designer is going to come up with a collection based on it.

I acted out all the parts, including the Steve Perry dance.  And I think that is the same random hall where the RDJ wanted to have his club in Less Than Zero.  But this is it.  I remembered almost everything including Renn Fest teen girl swinging her legs to the music.

And I thought she should know.

She will appreciate this:

http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/dal/705407729.html

Hi, Krasssssssssssssss!

Because the future of independent film is about distribution.  Because finding the right home for smaller movies guarantees a future voice for independent filmmakers who should not and can not survive in the world Mark Gill calls independent film (specialty films that crossover are simply too rare and not financially or artistically realistic.)  Because there is a way to make the internet a place where people watch arthouse movies.  Because VOD and DVD aren’t bad words:

Dentler and C.R.M. recognize that the tipping point for online film consumption hasn’t been reached yet, though they anticipate rapid growth soon. (In this, they’re not alone. The Web video site Jaman boldly, if somewhat self-servingly, predicts that the online video distribution business worldwide will grow to $12 billion a year by 2012 from the current $2 billion.)

Read more here!

(thanks Dad!)

I know I’m a little late on this particular meme but it seemed so appropriate for independence day.  Have a safe and fun one!

About a dozen people sent me Mark Gill’s speech from the LA Film Festival.  (http://www.indiewire.com/biz/2008/06/irst_person_fil.html) in which he declared that the sky was falling on independent filmmaking (but it wouldn’t hit the ground… yay!)  Reading it the first time through I wasn’t pleased but I couldn’t tell if it was because he was spitting on my floor or if it was because I generally loathe prognostications.

But reading it through again, and considering the arguments he puts forth I have to say Mark Gill is wrong.

Mostly he is wrong because he isn’t talking about independent film.  He’s talking about two things: the independent labels that are/were part of the studio system, created to market “smaller” films to a smaller audience and the movies that fit within those specialty labels distribution models.  We’ve called this kind of distribution a lot of things: platform releasing, specialty releasing, and unfortunately we’ve also called it independent filmmaking.  It isn’t.  And when a movie is acquired by a studio, even the specialty arm, it is being acquired to perform within a strict set of corporate parameters.  So whether created by or purchased by this distributors, these films are already subject to rules that prohibit a fair number of good art films.

Independent filmmaking is making a movie outside the corporate production and distribution model.  Nothing more, nothing less.  You can make a movie with independent flavor (Pan’s Labyrinth) with independent style (Peter Berg and Jon Favreau do these well) or with independent talent (Diablo Cody’s new horror movie directed by indie director Karyn Kusama) but none of that makes the movie an independent film.

So lets look at Mark Gill’s examples.  First we have Picturehouse, Warner Independent, New Line, Paramount Vantage and Sidney Kimmel.  Well, Bob Shaye said himself at the 2007 Sundance Fest where he was being honored that he didn’t consider himself a part of independent film.  So lets take that Viacom holding out of the picture.  Picturehouse, Warner Indie, Par Vantage… all were just specialty labels of multi-billion dollar companies.  Of these only Sidney Kimmel moving away from independent film financing is a loss to up-and-coming and established filmmakers.  And for every loss there is a gain, notably Overture creating a distribution model with a cable outet and funding new indies.

The rest of his remarks are about Hollywood acquisition and distribution.  And that has very little to do with actual independent filmmaking.

The sky isn’t falling on us.  But Mark wants us to make better movies.  And by better he means funnier, faster and more marketable.  I don’t think that makes a movie better.  I think it makes it more homogenous.

If your goal is to make an independent film at an independent budget level and then get distribution like a big movie you have to ask yourself — how are you an independent filmmaker?  The modes of distribution for large movies should not and can not apply to 99% of indie films. But there are ways to get your movie out there and I think that the biggest danger right now is filmmakers trying to make a small movie that will appeal to a large audience.  When we judge our small budget films based on opening weekends we fail our films.  That isn’t what we do.  That isn’t who we are.  When we expect a movie like THE VISITOR to produce thousands of dollars per screen and that becomes our method of judging success we have truly failed some of the best and brightest working in film today.

I think that the biggest hurdle is not Hollywood but our own internal and external prejudices against alternate distribution.  When we begin to embrace VOD, DVD releases, cable television and the internet as the right and just way to send our movie to its intended audience we will start to see an emotional and financial uptick in the independent film community.  We’ve forgotten why we do this.

We have to stop expecting independent films to be more than they are and find ways to keep them safe, to show them to their audience, and to keep the voices who make these movies engaged in their own process.  The HBO doc series on Monday nights is a great start and proof that movies find their audiences if released appropriately.  Gill is addressing a symptom of a much bigger issue as if it was the disease itself.  I understand the temptation - it is a hell of a lot easier to get people to invest in your indie if they think it will lead to the Oscars but that isn’t why we make movies.

Look, I get the appeal of claiming that the sky is falling on independent film.  I just don’t think that is where the sky is falling.  I think it is falling on Hollywood filmmaking and I think it is falling on the smaller specialty pictures first.  Can independent filmmakers take credit for some of those films, and some of those failures?  Of course.  But I think that telling filmmakers to act like little studio executives is a terrible message to send, and a terrible way for filmmakers to behave.  I think responsible filmmaking, like responsible sex, leads to fewer accidents.  And by responsible I mean making a movie at the right budget level and understanding the limitations of distribution before you make it.  If it isn’t a blackbuster on the page it isn’t going to be one in the multi-plex but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t get made.  Fantastic art and decent commerce comes out of creative filmmaking.  Mark Gill is wrong about this and I, for one, think it matters.  You know, in case anyone asks.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117988068.html?categoryid=18&cs=1

So WGA President Patric Strike Em If You Got Em Verrone went to the FCC and presented a letter abotu product integration.  Product integration is when, in exchange for money, a company gets a product on air and the writers agree to a certain level of inclusion within the storylines.  A hero may drive a certain car and hold forth about that car and Ford may pay for that.

Verrone described product integration as “the embedding of commercial products within the storyline of a program, so as to subliminally advertise to viewers. The hope is that consumers, not expecting to find a commercial within their program, will fail to realize they are actually being advertised to. This practice exploits the emotional connection viewers have with shows and their characters in order to sell a product.”

Verrone also reiterated a point he and other guild members have been making about the creative consequences of product integration.

“When writers are told we must incorporate a commercial product into the storylines we have written, we cease to be creators,” he wrote. “Instead, we run the risk of alienating an audience that expects compelling television, not commercials.”

So it sounds sleazy, right?  I mean, how dare they hurt television by using it to pimp products.  Except that network television has revenue streams based entirely, ENTIRELY, on the fact that programming makes you sit thru commercials.  TV shows are nothing more than a way to make you watch commercials.  The good news is that quality often wins out which is why a great show may last for years and years and bring in money at a level that reflects quality as well as marketability.

So product integration is taking those ads and making them a little less visible.  Still feed dirty and weird?  Spend tomorrow counting how many times you say a brand name.  Go on, count.  We’ll be here waiting.

On average I’d guess you throw out a dozen or so brand names, from Starbucks to the car you’ll be driving or the shoes you’ll be wearing. You don’t stop and apologize for saying them.  Brand names are part of common vernacular.

For my money, product integration is a more honest way to make companies keep paying for more seasons of Breaking Bad and Mad Men.  If companies work directly with the shows the shows get the money, they get the control and the budget of the show itself (and not the network) is helped.  Cutting off product integration cuts off funding for new shows.  A show like Dirty, Sexy, Money may get to stay on the air and get noticed by more people if they let Nokia supply phones for product integration.  But without it, that show will die quickly as it doesn’t prove to the network that it increases the per second value of its ad time.

You with me now?  You see now how that was the president of my union suggesting that funding for programming and new shows which employ writers get cut off?  And how there is really no logical explanation for it?  Yeah, I’m real proud.

Check out more/better vitriol at Artful Writer.

After Barack Obama spoke in support of SCOTUS’ decision to allow Guatanamo prisoners to access the federal court system to appeal and progress their cases, based on the basic premise that these prisoners should be afforded the habeus corpus protections of the Constitution, John McCain claimed Barack Obama had a “September 10th Mentality.”

My first thought? Thank god he does.

Then I spent the better part of the evening thinking about this phrase, the “September 10th Mentality” and the idea that after September 11th we understood the world as it really was and were no longer “innocents.”

I want a President with a September 10th mentality; one who sees the Arab world as a place with potential and not as a place that requires complete and total destruction. Because lets be honest about our current President’s plan. If we were really honest, we would admit that after 9/11 we were so hurt and angry that we allowed the leader of the country to transform us from a country to a empire. We are the invaders, and because we lost so many we felt as if we deserved to destroy a foreign country. What pisses so many off about President Bush is not that he transformed us into an empire but that he didn’t go after the people who really deserved our first strike capabilities.

So, given the choice, which would you rather have? A President with a September 10th mentality: a belief that peace and prosperity is possible if you advocate peace and prosperity or a President with a September 12th mentality: a belief that we have every right to rain down untempered punishment on whomever most looks like the enemy we believe we may have.

I don’t see the 9/12 guy leading a country I want to live in.