A short film that is beautiful, strange, sad and true. It reminded me of Jen’s post.

Today is May Day, a “national day of multi-ethnic unity with youth, labor, and peace and justice communities in solidarity with immigrant workers to build a new immigrant rights and civil rights movement” (Source: mayday2007.org).

I love that May Day, which has its roots in labor organizing, has expanded to include a broad social justice agenda. This is exactly the kind of movement-building that we need today, when progressives so often fight tooth and nail for their one cause (environment, gay rights, ending the war, etc.) rather than recognizing the interconnectedness of all these issues.

I went to a discussion on March 20th at the Brecht Forum called “Steppin’ It Up: Confronting Challenges Faced by the Anti-War Movement.” Moderated by an editor at Left Turn Magazine, the panel was composed of anti-war activists and addressed the questions of whether there is an “anti-war movement” and whether or not it is being effective.

It was refreshing to hear activist leaders speak so candidly about their challenges and concerns. One of the themes that emerged was this issue of fractioning within the left and the importance of connecting the war to other struggles for justice (women’s rights, immigrants rights, healthcare, etc.). One of the panelists (I’m sorry, he wasn’t originally scheduled to speak so I can’t find his name online anywhere!) spoke eloquently about the idea that we shouldn’t even be focusing on the anti-war movement or any issue-specific campaign. Rather, we should be working together, cross-agenda, to envision a radically different society in which another war like the Iraq war could not and will not ensue, a society in which all people (animals included) are empowered and self-actualized—a just world.

I think this really sums up our challenge as activists today. Rather than reacting to all of our problems, we ought to spend more time imagining an alternative and trying to make it a reality. As Gandhi said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”

Well this May Day hopefully you will spend some time imagining and being the change you wish to see. And if you can’t take to the streets today, you can at least watch a movie about others who have. I’ll be there:

May Day Post March Open House and Film: ¡Gigante: Despierta!

Screening of ¡Gigante: Despierta! (Giant: Awake!)
Tuesday, May 1, 8pm
AJ Muste Institute
339 Lafayette Street 3rd Floor
NYC, New York 10012

HOSTED BY: Socialist Party NYC and Neoyorquinos Socialistas

FREE!

For more details or to RSVP, please visit:
http://giant.bravenewtheaters.com/screening/show/9306

About ¡Gigante: Despierta!:

In 2006, a historic mobilization for immigrant rights swept the USA as millions took the streets. Mainstream news media predictably covered the marches with a mix of surprise, ignorance and racism, yet grassroots media activists were there to document the voices and the stories behind this mass movement. ¡Gigante Despierta! is a DVD compilation of compelling short films from all around the country, due to hit the streets in the weeks before Mayday 2007. It is a collective memory and a tool to inspire action this MayDay 2007, when the Giant will raise its voice again to say: we are one people, without borders. We are here, and we are here to stay!

Lorna Simpson, one of my favorite photographers, has an exhibit at The Whitney here in NYC. Most of her work examines racial and gender identity, though I am not sure she would want to be fully defined that way. I was not as familiar with her video work and was pretty impressed by it. They are calling this exhibition a “mid-career survey.” (I wonder how one can decide when they are mid-career. Is that something that someone decides for you?) You should check out her exhibit. It ends in three days.

There is also a Gordon Matta-Clark retrospective that lasts until June. I was completely unfamiliar with him and was blown away by the amount of work he accomplished in his ten year career as an artist. Matta-Clark went to architecture school but never pursued a career as an architect. He simply became obsessed with urban spaces and created drawings, films, photographs, notebooks, and documentaries. The museum rotates the video pieces that they show so each visit is a new experience.

CNET’s News.com is reporting that, after much debate and valid worries over vulnerabilities in the system, Florida has decided to ditch touch-screen voting machines.

As a big gadget-geek, I thought this article was interesting because I completely agree with the decision. While having an electronic voting system would eliminate some problems, it would open a completely different can of worms. Working in technology teaches you that we don’t pay attention to security issues enough! Not to mention that the election day process could not happen without volunteers, many of whom may not be proficient enough with technology to understand how to troubleshoot a problem when things go wrong. How much government oversight must there be of the process to ensure it doesn’t get hacked? How much government oversight is too much? Don’t get me wrong, I think it would be great to somehow implement a more efficient system but I think anything digital needs a great amount of thought. And even then, you know what they say about even the best laid plans.

Found this amusing:

As an employee at a nonprofit independent media organization and as a freelance filmmaker and designer, I find myself swimming in Apple products. With my iPod, iMac, iCal, etc, that little “i” feels more and more like “me.” As with all beloved (and not so beloved) brands, it was a matter of time before consumers and activist organizations started to ask some tough questions about Apple’s environmental footprint, a topic which has been left out of Steve Jobs’ infamous keynote addresses. We all know about Mac’s growing profit-margin, but what about their eco-margin?

Greenpeace has been leading the way with their “Green My Apple” campaign, a call for Apple to stop using toxic chemicals, stop dumping discarded machines in Asia, and enable consumers to recycle their iProducts in the U.S. and globally. With a cleverly-designed website that mimics Apple’s look, they have invited consumers to make their own t-shirts, ads and videos, asking Apple to go green.

The response? Apple recently announced some significant changes in their policies and for the first time unveiled a timeline for upping their recycling program. Greenpeace is psyched, but they also think the pressure needs to stay on to get Apple to go global with their environmental promises. In this article they respond to Steve Jobs’ statement, point-by-point.

All-in-all, this offers an inspiring example of how a good company can get better by responding to consumer demand. Good job, Greenpeace! Good job, Apple!

This morning, while reading all my aggregated news, I came across what seems to be a really interesting intersection of mash-ups, music and documentary film. OpenSourceCinema.org is attempting to create a documentary about the changing role of copyright today using mostly user-generated or user-edited content. The project was inspired by the debate in the music industry over filesharing which creator Brett Gaylor adeptly puts in perspective.

The above quote is really indicative of the shift in how people perceive media. The traditional conception of media is very static; it appears on your television or plays from your radio and that is where the interaction ends. Meanwhile, the new interpretation of media is as something tangible and dynamic. Movies are re-cut into trailers that change the plot of a film, television shows are posted to YouTube the day after first airing, and songs are available for download before an album is released. All of these are then remixed, responded to and redistributed far and wide. With such a departure from what used to be the norm, it is easy to see why both sides of the argument clash so often. However, OpenSourceCinema.org is a great example of the positive results that can come out of having a culture that is less about consuming and more about participating.

Best Online Documentaries: Creationism to evolution, Al Gore to Arundhati Roy.

Freedocumentaries.org: It’s legal, honest. The Road to Guantanamo (Winner of the Silver Bear at Berlin International Film Festival), Fahrenheit 9/11 among others.

Atom Films Documentary Channel: I didn’t know one of their highest rated documentaries was Fast and Reliable, an official selection of the fifth annual Media That Matters Festival.

YouTube: The Documentary Group: 378 members, 637 videos and counting.

Frontline: Most recently added — Gangs of Iraq.

NOVA: One of the best and longest-running science shows.

Internet Archive: Includes a 30-minute film about astronaut/Senator John Glenn. (If you’d like to see more of John Glenn, stay tuned for the seventh annual Media That Matters Festival!)

Any others?

As a vegan, I’ve got to say up front that fish are friends, not food. That being said, sometimes the only way to get humans to protect co-habitants of this planet, is to examine the ways that their endangerment hurts us, too.

Paul Greenberg, Arts Engine’s former grant writer, has been exploring the state of fishes in our oceans as a Food and Society Policy Fellow. His most recent contribution to the discussion is an article that appeared in last weekend’s New York Times Magazine entitled Ocean Blues.

In the article Paul addresses the serious population crisis that is taking place in wild fish colonies do to overfishing. History shows, Paul explains, that the best thing to do when fishes are dwindling is to stop killing them for awhile and let the population restore itself.

Apparently this concept has gotten through to President Bush who recently declared a swath of ocean around Hawaii to be a protected marine area, forbidden to fishermen. Paul applauds W’s gesture, but suggests that if he really wants to make a difference, he should bring this policy to a national level:

I agree. Although I wish we could speak for fishes under the guise of compassion, rather than for an economic or food supply agenda. That would be truly forward-thinking.

Read Paul’s article.

Watch One More Dead Fish from Media That Matters: Good Food.

Have you noticed a reoccurring pattern in the streets of NYC?

Everywhere I look I see that little fellow, not sure if he’s a friend or foe yet, but he is everywhere. The skull and crossbones is here to stay. Yesterday I was sitting next to a person on the subway and I was admiring their Spring blouse, which at first glance looked like it had little white flowers printed on it, but after a closer look I realized it was him, the little fellow. He is cuter now, more rounded and in repeating patterns. Now that I am aware of him, I notice that he is everywhere. He is printed on shoes, shirts, bracelets and other more unexpected places.

He is definitely in fashion, an edgy pattern for designers reaching out to younger markets. But is he more than a commodification of rebellious youth? Could he be a sign of our times? Are we looking at death and coming to terms with it? Bringing it into our daily lives, as is done in other cultures. Mexico’s Dia de los Muertos, comes to mind, a day to honor and celebrate loved ones who have passed. Maybe American culture is coming to terms with death?

To me the connection is clear, unending wars in the East, daily violence here. We can’t stop it but now we can wear it.

At the top of YouTube’s picks, a video about stereotypes.

Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed is an exhibition on Soviet architecture from the ’70s and ’80s. It should be an eye-opening experience for those who assumed that Soviet architecture died with the rise of Stalin.

Covering a period that has largely been ignored by academics and mainstream architects, the show is packed with obscure architectural gems. Its subject feels particularly timely given that young architects are now beginning to re-examine the work of the Soviets’ cold war counterparts in Western cities like Rotterdam and São Paulo.

Read full review by NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF at www.nytimes.com.

“CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed” continues through June 16 at the Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, Little Italy; (212) 431-5795, storefrontnews.org.

*Photograph - Igor Vasilevsky’s Druzhba Sanitarium in Yalta, Ukraine.

Yesterday morning, while listening to NPR’s Morning Edition in bed, I was brought to consciousness by a lovely little “fair use in action” moment. Steve Inskeep was interviewing the band Pink Martini. The lead singer, China Forbes, was talking about being influenced in her youth by TV themes songs from “The Jeffersons” and “Good Times.” Steve Inskeep asked her to sing one of the songs and she said, “well, I don’t think I can because we don’t have clearance — we’ll get sued, right?” I cringed as her question was met with silence by her bandmate, who didn’t know the answer. Luckily Steve Inskeep jumped in with “It’s a news program! You can sing anything you want if it’s under a minute. (**not sure he’s right about the under a minute thing — the law might be more permissive than that.) It’s called fair use!” And with that China Forbes started wailing “well, we’re movin’ on up, movin’ on up, to a delux apartment in the sky-y-y.” It was beautiful and in a 10-second exchange millions of NPR listeners had the power of fair use law demonstrated to them as they started their day.

I own an iPod with close to twenty gigabytes of music on it (in laymen’s terms that’s 2,756 songs). While I have a lot to listen to, every now and then I get bored and seek new music. In that case, I’ve frequented some pretty cool internet radio stations and in turn found out about some brilliant musicians that I would never see or hear on traditional media outlets. In light of this, it disturbs me that the internet radio I enjoy is now in danger of being priced out of existence. Basically, the Copyright Royalty Board is increasing the royalties these stations have to pay. Considering that many of these radio stations are not profiting from the services they offer, the increases are likely to cripple some. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg when talking about the plight faced by public broadcasters. NPR, PBS, and APTS Action Inc. are sponsoring a great campaign, TellThemPublicMatters.org, that explains the issues, why you should care and how you can take action.

Last week, Programs Manager, Diana Lee and I went to the New York Theatrical Premiere of Amu, the story of a young Indian-American named Kaju who visits her home country for the first time since the age of five.

In Kaju’s efforts to discover the “real India,” she unravels the story behind her adoption and her refuge in the United States. Her life is directly linked to the 1984, four-day, Anti-Sikh genocide in the heart of New Delhi.

For Shonali Bose, director of Amu, the story of Kaju, is used to bring to light the the political situation in India and four days of genocide after the assassination of Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi. When asked about her motivations in making the film, she said that above all her aim was to shed a little bit of light on the tragic, state-sponsored massacre that had been denied by the Indian government for years.

Mira Nair introduced Amu and eloquently commented on the importance of telling our own story. Her words had particular strength because this was an Indian film made by an Indian woman, offering a very intimate portrait of a charged and controversial political situation.

While storytellers should aspire to have no nationality or cultural baggage, seeing an Indian experience from the perspective of an Indian woman has a different weight. This is not to say, however, that the immigrant experience can’t be told truthfully by a non-immigrant or that the civil rights struggle can’t be accurately told by a white filmmaker. These lenses carry their own weight. But knowing that this was a film aiming to reconcile a very personal and political history made me read it differently. And I think this is what Mira Nair meant when she talked about the importance of telling our stories.

During our post-movie dinner, Diana and I got to chatting about what lenses, films, stories told by whom, legitimize the voice or history of a community, a country, a historical recount… Questions we had no answers for, but that all of those in media making and distribution should ponder on.

We also talked about storytelling techniques — what is needed to capture an audience, get distribution and ultimately, make money. As the ex-Director of Asian CineVision, these are issues she always brings up. Diana said, “I loved the film, but at the same time, it can be so sad that filmmakers have to resort to storytelling techniques that have nothing to do with their message. If the story aimed to offer powerful insight into a tragic massacre that it has not been able to reconcile, it loses strength. The message gets muddied up by delving too deep into love story, telenovela type, pull at your hearts strings drama.” While it was a powerful and compelling story, the issue of the 1984 Sikh riots were probably not done justice in the edit room.

All in all, the New York Theatrical experience of Amu brought to light issues of community voice, storytelling techniques and distribution, issues that all of us making media or working in media should have as daily bread, but too often ignore.

A bevy of familiar Disney characters explain copyright and fair use in a way that’s funny and informative. The film came out of Stanford University’s Documentary Film Program. This is the one time you may want to read the FBI warning.

Watch a Fair(y) Use Tale

I am on every film mailing list there is so I guess I asked for this. But honestly, how many Cannes emails can a person get? And for goodness sake, what the heck is Jessica Simpson doing there?!?! And didn’t Zodiac already come out? What is it doing “premiering” there? And what is Pam Anderson doing there? At least my close friends, Angie & Brad have movies there. It’s not their fault that the media (and I) are totally obsessed with them.

I know I am just a hater. I am just jealous that it is not me lying on the beach watching walking ads for subpar movies pass me by. But what has happened to Cannes? As a teenager, I was obsessed with the mystery and prestige of Cannes. There were all of these European celebrities, all of these amazing films that would never come out in the US because we are too short sighted to see brilliance in cinema. Now, there is still the prestige but like so many festivals, it has become a slave to the publicity machine. Films that are actually in the festival are completely overshadowed by the films with big budgets trying to get some buzz.

It was nice amidst all of the fluff emails to learn that at Cannes, Martin Scorsese announced the launch of the World Cinema Foundation on Tuesday in a bid to preserve neglected films for posterity and restore others that have been damaged. I have always been impressed by his involvement with film preservation.

I am going to be on a panel about Web 2.0 for Silverdocs. I am putting a call out to folks about their thoughts on it. How many of you even know what it is? Web 2.0 hints at an improved form of the World Wide Web. Do you think this is true? What role does it all play in engaging new audiences? Instead of saying what I think our community is thinking, I’d love to hear it from you guys! Anyone who feels in a commenting mood, feel free to drop me a line.

According to CNN.com, New York City’s yellow cabs will be gas-electric hybrids by the year 2012. This comes on the heels of another record breaking day in gasoline prices. While this is great news, it seems like the environmental impact is not as motivating as the economics behind it.

Last weekend, Manhattan Country School celebrated its 40th Anniversary. MCS is a great, progressive, private school, which I was lucky enough to attend for three years when I was in grade school.

It’s truly a unique place — they were founded in 1966 with the spirit of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. guiding all of their plans — from pedagogy to creating a truly racially and economically diverse student body. It was an amazing experience for me to go to this school for a few years, sandwiched between two very different NYC public schools I also attended.

So now, here I am, 25 years later (scary!) and MCS presented 19 alums of the school, one of which was myself, with “Living the Dream” awards for our work in the arts and social justice, which was fun and very gratifying. But even better, they asked me to say a few words about legendary filmmaker Sidney Lumet, to whom they presented a special award for his influential 50-year body of work. They gave me a script to read about Lumet — thank goodness — but I took the liberty of going off the script briefly when talking about his debut film, Twelve Angry Men.

Lumet was sitting in the front row of the banquet hall and so I looked at him and told him how I had seen this amazing 1957 film when I was a kid — maybe junior high — and that it had impressed me then. And the reason it impressed me was because while the film takes place almost entirely in a hot room where the jury is arguing a case, the drama and suspense of the film centers around ideas — people talking about them, arguing about them, trying to change each other’s minds. So I think I understood even then that you don’t have to make a film that has exotic locations or car chases in order to create suspense and drama; people’s impassioned conversation and interactions can do a lot on their own. And this in a film whose entire cast is twelve white men which is proof to me that great films don’t have to be about your own experience to speak to universal themes that we can all draw something from.

Anyway, it didn’t appear that my words made a big impact on Lumet at the time — he looked at me with a sort of confused expression, actually, but I figured that regardless of his reaction it was worth saying it to him there, publicly. I mean, how often can you compliment a filmmaker about how a film they made 50 years ago affected you? I figured I should take advantage of that opportunity while I had it.

Did you know that the first instances of sound and image coming together into what we now consider a “film” was done with shorts? The “vitaphones” were sent to theaters throughout the US in a can!

Learn about the early days of short filmmaking and distribution by checking out this great piece by filmmaker, radio producer and Arts Engine friend, Ben Shapiro. The story originally aired on NPR’s Weekend All Things Considered.

The Vitaphone Shorts
Produced by Ben Shapiro
Edited by Deborah George

Contrary to popular myth, the first talking picture wasn’t the Jazz Singer…The Vitaphone shorts were “canned acts” that brought big city entertainment to thousands of theaters across America. Hundreds of Vitaphone shorts were made in just a few years, with everyone from the New York Philharmonic, to vaudeville comics, dancers and jazz bands. Soon obsolete, and forgotten for the next 70 years, the Vitaphone shorts are remnants of a forgotten world of American entertainment.

With Al Jolson, Rudy Vallee, an 13 piece all-girl banjo orchestra…and Baby Rose Marie.

Listen: http://www.npr.org/

Ben has also done great camera work for Arts Engine films, The Dishes and Election Day.

If you’re interested in films that matter, here are some blogs that might matter to you.

TrueFilms: Kevin Kelly presents “the best general interest true films” he’s found. If you’re searching for something good to watch, this is a great place to start.

Docs That Inspire: Joel Heller offers festival reports in the form of entries and podcasts. The sidebar of links is also worth checking out.

MediaShift: PBS’s new blog is “your guide to the digital media revolution.” Hosted by Mark Glaser.

About.com: Documentaries: Erik Moe highlights documentaries and documentary news. His picks list includes the top 9 docs on 2008 presidential candidates.

SPRINGBOARDMEDIA: Brian Newman’s “rambling comments on the future of the media arts field.” Food for thought on copyright and distribution.

Re:Sources: Agnes Varnum on everything from media policy to outreach. A blog project of Renew Media.