Webcomic: Most of the time..
January 20, 2012 – 2:10 pm | No Comments
My Guantánamo Nightmare
January 18, 2012 – 10:31 am | No Comments
This is one of the greatest types of New York Times articles – newsworthy both because of its extraordinary content and because a newspaper of this caliber is ready to hold the story up to the world. Boumedine’s story is beautifully told and heartbreaking; empathy for an innocent man is lain upon a deep, sore, throbbing of cultural guilt that we have allowed this to happen, still allow this to happen. It’s wrong to trample on the lives of innocent people; it’s appalling when it is done so in such a systematic and preventible way: (NYTimes article)
I still had faith in American justice. I believed my captors would quickly realize their mistake and let me go. But when I would not give the interrogators the answers they wanted — how could I, when I had done nothing wrong? — they became more and more brutal. I was kept awake for many days straight. I was forced to remain in painful positions for hours at a time. These are things I do not want to write about; I want only to forget.
I went on a hunger strike for two years because no one would tell me why I was being imprisoned. Twice each day my captors would shove a tube up my nose, down my throat and into my stomach so they could pour food into me. It was excruciating, but I was innocent and so I kept up my protest.
In 2008, my demand for a fair legal process went all the way to America’s highest court. In a decision that bears my name, the Supreme Court declared that “the laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.” It ruled that prisoners like me, no matter how serious the accusations, have a right to a day in court. The Supreme Court recognized a basic truth: the government makes mistakes. And the court said that because “the consequence of error may be detention of persons for the duration of hostilities that may last a generation or more, this is a risk too significant to ignore.”
Five months later, Judge Richard J. Leon, of the Federal District Court in Washington, reviewed all of the reasons offered to justify my imprisonment, including secret information I never saw or heard. The government abandoned its claim of an embassy bomb plot just before the judge could hear it. After the hearing, he ordered the government to free me and four other men who had been arrested in Bosnia.
What if Tim Tebow were Muslim?
January 12, 2012 – 6:20 pm | 1 CommentThe systemic xenophobia in American discourse is so pervasive that this question feels a bit obvious and not nearly digging deep enough into the shitslinging that is American power today. But this Salon article is still revelatory in its comparison of Tim Tebow to Chris Jackson, a basketball player who in 1993 changed his name to Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf:
Everyone had an opinion, from fans to sports writers to radio hosts. Sports Illustrated reported that some people suggested Abdul-Rauf be deported. Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf was born in Mississippi, however, and deportation from Colorado to Mississippi is rare. Two Denver-area radio hosts even walked into a mosque with a stereo playing the Star Spangled Banner. One was wearing a turban. And a Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf T-shirt. While broadcasting live, on air.
Abdul-Rauf claimed in a 2010 interview with HoopsHype.com that “[a]fter the national anthem fiasco, nobody really wanted to touch me.” He played only three more seasons in the NBA before going overseas to play professionally. In that same interview, he discusses how his home in Mississippi was burned down just a few months prior to Sept. 11. He eventually left the state.
So Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf stood up (or in this case, sat down) for his religious beliefs. He made his religion a visible aspect of his life and a visible aspect of his professional basketball career. Just like Tim Tebow. The difference of course being that Tim Tebow was satirized on “Saturday Night Live.” Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf had his home burned down and felt blacklisted from the NBA.
Hate religion / love Jesus
January 11, 2012 – 4:20 pm | No CommentsThanks Rob. This is definitely worth a watch. Really nice to see someone explore and describe their faith, especially in a way that reconciles Christianity with the oft-monster that the Church has become. I don’t really believe in a man up there, but the story of Jesus is definitely one to learn from.
Saw RENT a few days ago.
December 28, 2011 – 1:16 pm | No Comments
Don’t see it at New World Stages.
And..another Shabbat Dinner test screening!
December 23, 2011 – 3:15 am | No Comments
Audience reaction was quite mixed the last time
Well, the edit is almost done. The color is quite close. The sound is off and the music is temp, but let’s never mind about that. What matters is that we are 90% done and we need your fresh eyes and ears to finish the job.
January 3, 2012(!) / 9:00pm at my place in the East Village / LES. Email rsvp@mjmfilms.com for the location. We have about 10 spots for this one. And of course, there will be wine!
Looking for a few bright interns!
December 20, 2011 – 12:35 am | No CommentsHello all,
I’m looking for 1-2 bright, talented interns for the Fall semester to help on a number of projects,including the following: Shabbat Dinner, a short film that is almost completed and is being submitted to film festivals; a short film about dealing with death that is in development; a nonprofit startup web site devoted to improving the lives of those living in refugee camps; and a t-shirt company startup.
The right intern will gain invaluable skills in starting projects and getting results in the media, web, and startup worlds. The internship demands flexibility and creativity, as the scope of the projects is likely to shift. The position is a minimum of 3 days/week and will begin on January 17. End date flexible, but I’d request at least 3 months.
I’m looking forward to seeing what we can create together! Please forward to anybody who you think may be interested, and have them email resumes to michael@everythingiseverything.com
Thanks!
Nobody knows what the heck is going on.
December 13, 2011 – 2:11 pm | No CommentsThere are visionaries we look up to who seem to have a preternatural sense of the world: Ghandi, Obama, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Aung San Suu Kyi, Hawking. These and so many others we trust to make decisions based on a deep understanding and insight.
But whatever they know about worldly things, like the rest of us these people have literally no clue about the deeper questions of life. They may be directed and driven, but they don’t know why we are on this planet, what the purpose of existence is. Merely because they invoke in us a sense of wonder does not mean that they are intimate with the wondrous. They, too, experience that fleeting existential vertigo. They, too, lurch from the precipice of the unanswerable. (And they are lying if they say they don’t.)
For the most part I find that comforting. We’re united in our cluelessness.
Idea to clean up New York
December 4, 2011 – 2:56 pm | No Comments
Purism has no place in film
December 4, 2011 – 2:16 pm | 5 CommentsPerhaps because it’s an industry where you have nothing to show for your skills until you have a movie out, young filmmakers develop ways to show that they are good at what they do. I’ve found myself in many a pissing contest over who has seen more Kurosawa films or tips on lighting a scene, and it’s all fairly annoying.
The worst and most insidious, though, is the idea of some technique or set of techniques as pure and fundamental to making films. “If you don’t use actual film, you’re not really making a movie.” Another one I heard last night, referring to punching in on a 4k image to reframe shots: “It’s cheating.”
Cheating is a funny word in a profession whose goal is to create the illusion of an artificial world that doesn’t actually exist. Cheating implies that using technology to the fullest is lazy and implies poor preparation – that there is something sacred and important about doing things the way they were done by previous generations. But that is not in line with the history of this great medium.
The history of film is the history of the down and dirty hack. Lights can be strung up with duct tape or on professional stands – what matters is only the final work you produce, and in producing that work film is about utilizing all your assets to the fullest. If a new tool makes one thing easy, then use the extra time or money you’ve been given to do something else better.
I love the look of 35mm film, though I rarely want it for my own work. Compared to digital, film to me feels like it sits between the viewer and the characters. It’s a (now expensive) stylistic choice, and if that works for you then do it..but don’t pretend your work is more important or correct from having made that one choice.
I punch into shots when I am editing. I relight scenes in color correction. (You can see a before and after of that here.) I shoot a bunch of takes and roll during rehearsal. Because of this, when a singular acting moment shines through on an actor’s face, I can use it…purity be damned.
