April 11, 2017

Filmmaker In Focus Series: Texas Short and Texas High School Short Grand Jury Winners

Next up in our Filmmaker In Focus Series, are our SXSW 2017 Grand Jury Winners in the Texas Short and Texas High School Short categories. Explore Patrick Bresnan‘s and Atheena Frizzell‘s inspirations.

The Rabbit Hunt

Q: Tell us a little about your film?

A: “The film is about a family going out to hunt rabbits in the Florida Everglades.”

Q: What motivated you to tell this story?

A: “The film deals with complex issues of food and survival in rural America.”

Q:Tell us a random fact?

A: “I am no one important, I just married well.”

Better Late Than Never

Q: Tell us a little about your film?

A: “Better Late Than Never is a short film about a teenage girl who has to figure out a way to keep a secret from her devout family.”

Q: What motivated you to tell this story?

A:“I wasn’t raised in a religious environment, however many of my close friends and family members were. As a sort of outsider, religion and the impact it has on our world has always been a topic of interest to me. This story was motivated by my wanting to explore how human mistakes, being a teenage girl, family and religion interact together.”

Q:Tell us a random fact?

A: “The majority of my camera roll consists of cats and sunsets.”

Explore More Content From SXSW 2017

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Source: SxSW Film

April 11, 2017

Read Or Watch: How Do Americans Prefer To Get The News?

According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted last year, more Americans would rather watch the news (46%) than read it (35%) or listen to it (17%). Surprisingly, though, these numbers fluctuate considerably by age. According to the study, more Americans aged 50 and older preferred to watch the news over alternative methods: 52% of 50-64-year-olds and 58% of those 65 and older favored watching the news, whereas 29% and 27% respectively would rather read it. For Americans below the age of 50, about four-in-ten of those aged 18-29 and 30-49 preferred to read rather than watching it.

A deeper look into each method found that younger adults read most of their news through digital text instead of through traditional print methods. 81% of the 18- to 29-year-olds were found to have favored online means, while just 10% opted for a print newspaper. The results for those in the 30- to 49-year-old group were similar. Adults 50-64, however, were more equally divided between web-based news (41%) and print (40%). For those 65 and over, a vast majority still preferred to read printed news (63%).

The survey also found that the younger adults that favored watching their news were also becoming more likely to watch on a computer rather than on a television. 57% of the 18- to 29-year-olds stated that they preferred to watch the news on a television, but 37% said that online news sources were their preferred method. That number is higher than the other age groups and is double the amount of the 30- to 49-year old adults.

Even though the number of those that listen to the news isn’t as high as the other two categories, the survey showed that 18- to- 29-year-olds in this category were also making the transition to digital methods, roughly twice that of older listeners.

Although younger adults are generally less interested in the news, the research shows that when it comes to digital means, they are receiving news at equal or greater rates than older Americans and the shift to digital is continuing to increase.

[Via: Pew Research Center]

Source: Visual News

April 7, 2017

The Most Common Characters Throughout Film History

What characters are the most recurring throughout film history? The most memorable characters in a movie are usually leading or unique roles. However, films are large projects that sometimes require hundreds of people to play minor roles. Looking at the credits of a film always left me in awe. It took around 8 minutes to scroll through the ending credits of the 1996 animated film Space Jam even though it has a fairly short run time of 100 minutes. 

In 2016 the global box office revenue was $38.3 billion and the US film and TV industry supported 1.9 million jobs. With the staggering amount of people it takes to create movies, you would expect minor roles to make up a large portion of credited characters in a film. There roles for “Stormtrooper” or “Gladiator” that have been cast hundreds of times for multiple films, for example. We expect that extras would be the most common role but interestingly enough, the data tells us otherwise. The dataset is from IMDB and contains the year, title, names of the characters, actors, and actresses from 3 million films during the time period of 1894 to 2026 (films in future years are ones that have been announced by production studios or are currently in production and slated for a future release date).

I expected “Extra” to be the most common but the data shows that the role “Himself” tops the list. According to IMDB, the 1982 biopic Gandhi had 300,000 extras in one scene of the film. However, these roles are not credited. This explains why “Extra” isn’t the top spot. The next question would be who are the actors that play “Himself” most frequently?   

The actor that plays “Himself” most commonly would be Adolf Hitler. During his lifetime alone Adolf Hitler had 34 film credits as “Himself”. This would not count as characters named “Adolf Hitler”. Only for characters “Himself” with the actor being Adolf Hitler.

Characters credited as “Herself” are not nearly as common as roles titled as “Himself”. This can be attributed by the gender gap between roles available to actors and actresses. In fact, the amount of roles men have played is double the amount of roles that women have played over the history of film (men have had 2,440,028 roles where women have had 1,171,184 roles).

What turned out to be a look at the prevalence of minor characters throughout history actually turned out to uncover in interesting fact. The most repeated role is actually one of the most notorious and polarizing individual in history. Joseph Goebbels, the Reich Minister of Propaganda, is the man most attributed to the amount of films made about Hitler during his lifetime. However, 62.6% of the roles where Hitler was credited with playing “Himself” are in films released after his death. It seems that the fascination the rest of the world has about the infamous leader seems to be a bigger contributor to the amount of his self-credits.

Source: Visual News

April 7, 2017

2017 SXSW World Premiere of “The Son” Airs on AMC

If you missed the SXSW world premiere of “The Son,” which took place at the ZACH Theater on Sunday, March 12, you can now watch the first episode of the television series on Saturday at 9pm/8c on AMC.

Based on the New York Times best-selling and Pulitzer Prize finalist novel, “The Son” is a sweeping family saga that spans 150 years and three generations of the McCullough family, written by Philip Meyer. The ten-episode, one-hour drama traces the story of Eli McCullough’s transformation from good-natured innocence to calculated violence, as he loses everything on the wild frontier, setting him on the path to building a ranching-and-oil dynasty of unsurpassed wealth and privilege. “The Son” deftly explores how Eli’s ruthlessness and quest for power triggers consequences that span generations, as the McCullough’s rise to become one of the richest families reigning in Texas.

Get inspired by a multitude of diverse visionaries at SXSW – browse more 2017 Keynotes, Featured Sessions, Red Carpets, and Q&A’s on our YouTube Channel.

Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and SXSW News for the latest SXSW coverage, recaps, late-breaking announcements, and updates.

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Source: SxSW Film