Cutting Room #200: 10 Films by Indigenous Filmmakers to stream this holiday

Sh*t. Full Moon Tonight. Happy weekend from GEP.

LATE PHASES BTS Photo by Bahram Foroughi

TBT: Shooting Inserts for DEPRAVED

2018: At the Glass Eye HQ:
Fessenden and filmworkers Rigo Garay and Chris Skotchdopole
prep pickup shots for DEPRAVED.

Tagged with: TBT

Cutting Room #199: Film Forum NYC presents: Road Movies series

NYT: Five Horror Movies to Steam Now: “DASHCAM”

From THE NEW YORK TIMES:

By Erik Piepenburg

Already missing Halloween? Stay at home for this year’s virtual New York City Horror Film Festival (Dec. 2-9) or for this month’s streaming picks, which include mutants in love and mushrooms out for blood.

‘Dashcam’

Rent or buy it on Google Play, Vudu or Amazon.

Who would have thought my pulse would race watching a guy work on his home computer during the pandemic? That’s what happened during this taut conspiracy thriller written and directed by Christian Nilsson. (Don’t confuse it with the other new horror film called “Dashcam.”)

It’s Halloween night, and Jake (an intense Eric Tabach) is a video editor working out of his New York City apartment on a local TV news story about a fatal traffic stop that involved a police officer and a former state attorney general. When Jake gets an email from the state’s press office marked “Confidential,” he opens it to find dashcam evidence suggesting that what happened on the road that night might have been an assassination.

The spooked-out Jake, who dreams of being a reporter, leaves his apartment to look for a clue he thinks is hidden in Washington Square Park. But what’s with the car idling outside his apartment?

Nilsson has cited Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Conversation” as an inspiration, and it shows. “Dashcam” is at its creepiest when just audio and video clips, and Jake’s surgical adjustments to them, steer the paranoia-driven story. Over 82 unnerving minutes, Nilsson squeezes big suspense out of seemingly throwaway moments, as when Jake just sits and listens to audio tracks. The muted underscoring that sounds like it’s coming from the next apartment adds a sinister sonic edge.

Featuring Fessenden as “the Attorney General”

GEP MINIDOC: “FEVER” BTS

In May 2020 after 3 months of lockdown, Fessenden, the wife and kid made a short film
in an act of creativity that broke the Covid-quarantine-induced monotony of the time.
Thanks to an invitation from film-maker Nathan Crooker, Fessenden’s short FEVER
was created, and is part of the anthology film ISOLATION, now streaming.

We are posting this video today in honor of the DP’s 22nd Birthday.
Happy Birthday, Jack.

TAKE TWO: THR revises FOXHOLE headline

War is Hell but FOXHOLE is not a horror film. The Hollywood Reporter revises Headline.

Veteran’s Day Announcement: Jack Fessenden’s FOXHOLE nabs distribution deals

Samuel Goldwyn Films has acquired the North American rights to Jack Fessenden’s war film Foxhole after a world premiere at Oldenberg.

The drama — which stars Motell Gyn Foster, Alex Hurt and Cody Kostro — over a span of 36 hours captures Americans in three separate wars — the U.S. Civil War, World War I and the Iraq war. Foxhole follows a small group of soldiers trapped in a confined space as they grapple with morality, futility and volatile combat.

The movie casts the same five actors in each of the three wars as the film captures changing roles of race and gender with each conflict. The ensemble cast for Foxhole includes Angus O’Brien, Andi Matichak, Alex Breaux and James Le Gros.

Bleiberg Entertainment acquired the international rights to the follow-up feature to Fessenden’s Stray Bullets. “I am thrilled that Foxhole will reach its audience through Samuel Goldwyn and Bleiberg Entertainment. The film has been my passion for many years and I could not be more excited to share it with the world,” Fessenden said in a statement.

In its Oldenberg festival review, The Hollywood Reporter said of Foxhole: “Fessenden directs and edits tense dialogue sequences with skill” as the film “rises to the heights of its ambitions.” Foxhole was produced by Fessenden’s father and genre fixture Larry Fessenden through his New York based indie shingle Glass Eye Pix, along with Adam Scherr of Nous Entertainment.

The producer credits are shared by James Felix McKenney and Chris Ingvordsen, while Franklin Laviola and Scott Russo executive produce, along with co-executive producers Andrew Mer and Jack Foley.

Negotiations for the filmmakers were handled by Jerry Dasti and Mel Pudig.

Read the article at Hollywood Reporter.com

Read original Press Release