I had the opportunity to attend the screening of Desert Bayou at the MOMA on Thursday night. It was a terrific presentation.

Desert Bayou first played at the Full Frame Documentary Festival in April of 2006, just 8 months after the Katrina event. Filmmaker Alex LeMay (from Chicago) had read about the relocation of 600 citizens of New Orleans to a National Guard Camp near Salt Lake City, Utah and was immediately caught by the story. His film was selected by Full Frame as part of their “Katrina Experience” slate of films. Shortly after the festival, IndiePix and Full Frame teamed up to bring 7 of the 9 films to the library and educational market. Alex was the first filmmaker to commit to that project, and we have a close relationship to this project. (Thank you, Alex, for including us in the “special thanks” credits!)

Desert Bayou is a clear-eyed, troubling look at the whole event. No easy rush to judgment, no simple solutions, no rhetoric. The lives of the people who experienced “the worst disaster in American history” were complicated before it happened, and complicated afterwards. In the process of telling this story, the fears and prejudices across racial, social, political, and cultural lines seem like ragged tears in the social fabric. How on earth will this ever be put back together?

The presentation was introduced by Jimmy Finkl, Executive Producer, who asked a simple question: “I thought Americans cared about each other, took care of each other. What happened here?” It’s through work like this film from Alex LeMay and his team at TapRoot Productions, the judgment of Nancy Buirski, Artistic Director at Full Frame, the commitment of Philippe Diaz and Cinema Libre Studios (who are distributing the film theatrically in a few weeks) — that (using Nancy Buirski’s phrase) “the power of culture to heal” may offer some positive outcome.

We are very pleased to have been able to be part of this project and we are very pleased to be able to represent it, along with 6 other outstanding films from the Full Frame track “The Katrina Experience” to the library and school communities. Our goal is to put enough of these sets in the public and school libraries that a documentary record of the event from top independent filmmakers will stand for all to see.

Here are some additional links …
The Movie Site on the web
Press Release on the MOMA screening
IndieWire interview with Alex
The mySpace page

Okay, so a week has passed since the whirlwind of schmooze and celluloid known as the IFP Market (or Independent Film Week, for those who mistrust brevity). I’ve had some time to process, to recover from the impact of all the phenomenal shorts, documentaries, and works in progress (or is it work in progresses…) I was exposed to. And now I’d like to share about a few of the projects that I sense you’ll be hearing about, and hopefully experiencing, in the near future. These movies jumped out from the pack, and that’s a pretty rockin’ pack, considering the difficult road to acceptance into the IFP Market. This is by no means an inclusive list, and is completely this guy’s opinion — so don’t blame IndiePix if I’m wrong about these. But after all, a bunch of folks with much deeper pockets and a substantially fancier pedigree than I somehow greenlit the pile of putrefaction known as Pearl Harbor.

Here’s some of the pics I really enjoyed:

Satan and Adam - a documentary work in progress, detailing the rise of the unlikely blues duo from Harlem street act into international acclaim. A great New York story with a huge (and aching) heart. Well shot, with a phenomenal soundtrack. Check out www.satanandadam.com for more information.

Salim Baba - a 35mm short about a man from Kolkata, India, who has been screening discarded film scraps for local children on a century-old, hand cranked projector for the past forty years. Beautiful, funny, and impactful, like an Indian Cinema Paradiso in a single exhale, the film is the directorial debut of award-winning editor and sound man Tim Sternberg. Film website.

Cornered - a work in progress, the film reveals the dark underbelly of the boxing world through the story of ex-prizefighter Luis Resto, who experienced an epic fall amidst the shadowy details surrounding a controversial MSG bout and the death of a boxer. This movie made me care about boxing, and the people who risk their lives to be a part of this controversial, dying sport. And director Eric Drath goes far beyond exhaustive researching — he treats his subject like an empathic, protective mother. This one’ll be big.
Find out more at www.theycame2fight.com

Urban Explorers: Into the Darkness - A feature doc which unearths the growing international subculture of adventure-seekers exploring the hidden, abandoned, decrepit and/or disgusting mysteries buried beneath our feet and beyond our boundaries. This movie was great fun, with intriguing characters, a sick rock/punk soundtrack, and more buried goodies revealed than in a year’s worth of Weird NJ magazines. www.urbanexplorersfilm.com

Unattached - A short film which depicts the Orthodox Jewish community’s struggles with a ’singles crisis’. Filmmaker J.J. Adler takes you inside the somewhat desperate world of young marriage-hopefuls who congregate on the Upper West Side, hunting for a soul mate in the modern world under the intense pressure of traditional family values. Illuminating and sad, this short may end up with expanded life as a feature — the story clearly merits it. Email the director at jjadler@gmail.com for more information.

Frontrunners - a quirky, hilarious-without-trying documentary which follows a recent election for class president at the country’s most competitive high school. It was unbelievable, and yet made perfect sense, how reflective this was of American politics in general. And it proves that as much as generations change, at heart we’re all the same. For once, a film about teenagers that didn’t make me feel old! Find out more at www.frontrunnersthefilm.com

Okay, that’s all for now. I’ll return in a bit with a breakdown of the industry’s take on the state of independent film, which I experienced during one of the IFP panel sessions. After I wipe the tears from my blurry vision…

I just wanna see some good indies…

The Independent Feature Project’s Annual Market kicked off on Sunday for the 29th straight year, bringing established and aspiring Indie Filmmakers from all parts of the globe to learn from, pitch to, and mingle with hundreds of industry luminaries. Companies both large and small are in attendance, from primary sponsor HBO Films, to Magnolia Pictures, to programmers from Sundance and SXSW, to production, representation, and distribution shingles from LA, London, Montreal, Atlanta, and all points in between.

This year’s opening night film was also the U.S. premiere for John Sayles’ beautiful and throughly entertaining Honeydripper. The film thrilled the audience at the Lincoln Center AMC Theatre, where Mr. Sayles and longtime producing partner Maggie Renzi received a warm, prolonged ovation. A true genius and inspiration to all independent filmmakers, Mr. Sayles’ has a long history with the Market — his film The Return of the Secaucus Seven premiered at the very first IFP Market in 1978.

While on the lookout for the next potential standouts from the dozens of documentary features, shorts and works in progress screening at the Angelika theatre, the IndiePix Staff also took time out to mix with current IndiePix Filmmakers Alex Karpovsky (The Hole Story), David Dixon (Unloosened and Root), and Michael Tully (Cocaine Angel) at events in and around the Market. As they continue to develop and pitch their latest projects please support their efforts by checking out their fantastic, award-winning films already available through IndiePix.

Stay tuned for more reports from IFP’s Market, including reviews of films so new they can’t be found anywhere…well, until they’re found in our collection. And check out Honeydripper when it enters it’s New York release this fall! Danny Glover, Charles Dutton, Keb ‘Mo as a blind blues man, and the gorgeous and talented relative newcomer (and Harlem native) Yaya DaCosta…what else could you want?!

I don’t know, maybe it’s a waste of time, maybe it’s research (I sure hope it is, or else all these ‘business expense’ deductions are gonna bite me mightily on the rear…), but I spend a good chunk of my waking hours exploring various production companies and filmmakers’ websites. It’s truly an illuminating process. The sites are very often as eclectic, odd, or cutting edge as the films themselves, and can often leave as indelible a mark on your consciousness. But what makes a good one? What has an Indie film site stand out from the masses, define itself out of the chunky soup that is the Internet?

I have no idea. Look, I’m a blogger, not a freakin’ college professor. I only know something works if I like it. Branding is a funny game, especially with cinema. On one hand, films are eternal — you commit them to celluloid (or tape…or hard drive) and presumably they are there forever. On the other hand, there are just so many films that one is exposed to every year that the majority of them come and go leaving only the tiniest of footprints, or are altogether forgotten. Filmmakers have to seize whatever moment they have to make their impression, and one way to do that in today’s information-rich society is online, with a memorable web presence.

Here’s some sites I’ve seen lately that I think are cool. Some are film related, some are not, but they’re all worth a spin. Feel free to add to this list - I’m always on the lookout for more!

Ovie

Universcale

Manda Bala

Self Medicated

David Lynch

Desktopography

J.J. Lask

Oh, and stay tuned for updates from this week’s IFP Market!