Several years ago, the cruelly underrated Belgian band Soulwax- led by the Dewaale brothers Stephen and David aka production/remix/dj aces 2manydjs- released an album called Any Minute Now, which they followed with a dancefloor remixes album called Nite Versions. Then they embarked on a number of tours around the globe bringing the Nite Versions to life by playing live at dance clubs and parties under the banner of Radio Soulwax, which also included 2manydjs sets behind the turntables. Also on tour was the always-popular-with-EMERGE filmmaker Saam Faramand, who documented all the hijinks along the way. The resulting film "Part Of The Weekend Never Dies" is making it's debut at London's Ether Festival at the Southbank Centre in April. Get thee to London and check this out. And in the meantime, here's our favorite Soulwax video. It's a riot...




Posted by James Friedman

Here's a new video for Justice's "DVNO." It's not our favorite song by any stretch, but this video's riff on the awkward graphics before and after movies and tv shows is pretty well done by the folks from Machine Molle and co-director So Me:




Posted by James Friedman

Los Angeles may be ground zero for Hollywood blockbusters, but New York has a pretty storied relationship with film as well. To prove the point, New York's Tribeca Cinemas will play host to a remarkable event organized by Current.tv and Fader Films. "A Day of Dialogue: The Future of Non-Fiction Film" is a rare symposium featuring some of the leading names in documentary filmmaking will be talking about their craft as well as sharing advice and insights with emerging filmmakers and attendees alongside industry personnel such as sales agents, festival programmers and distribution execs. In addition to networking opportunities, the event will feature small group discussions as well as an hour long discussion about the "process and challenges of documentary filmmaking" entitled Inside the Directors Studio. The keynote speech will be given by former Vice President and Current co-founder Al Gore. Also in attendance: Heidi Ewing & Rachel Grady (Oscar-nominees for Jesus Camp), Albert Maysles (Oscar-nominated Director, Gimme Shelter, Grey Gardens), Morgan Spurlock (Oscar-nominated Director, Supersize Me) Alex Gibney (Oscar-nominated Director, Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room) Marc Levin (Emmy-Award Winning Director, Mr. Untouchable), John Sloss (Cinetic), Eammon Bowles (President, Magnolia Pictures) and Bimgham Ray (Founder of October Films)


Posted by James Friedman

When the teaser trailer for Transformers came out last year, it seemed like this summer's blockbuster success was going to be an epic robotic ass-whooping, but despite the direction of Michael Bay,the film really focuses on the human element, telling the tale of a coming-of-age guy trying to pick up a girl with his car. Sort of a buzz kill. However, the movie has put robots back on top of the pop-cultural dung heap, and if nothing else, the film is sparking lots of interesting and pretty comical debate about what robots should and shouldn't look like. Just check out this puff piece from CNN's Living section.

Would it have been so bad to just fill two hours with nothing but Autobots and Deceptacons duking it out, and the occasional car-bot dance party a la this amazing spot?

 

If nothing else, it would have made the film a whole lot more entertaining.

Not to harp on the aesthetics issue, but it is interesting to see how Transformers take the shape of current model cars and technologies like cell phones, whereas back in the B-Boy days, Blaster was a big hit. I guess its just a sign of the times, but given the futuristic slant of things, its strange to see the sensibility so linked with the current zeitgeist...


By the time Transformers gets remade again, the field of Roboethics will probably be more practice than theory. We'll have sorted out what we expect our machines to look like, and how we expect them to behave. And despite all the terrifyingly dystopic sci-fi out there, the future of our imagining is always bright, and if we have any say in the matter, there will be reinterpretations like these "real-life Transformers" all over the place very very soon...



Yes, its been everywhere on the web for a couple of weeks, but in recognition of their upcoming tour of the US (kicking off next week) and this peek into Transformer-mania, here is a bit of Daft Punk getting thrown into the mix with our old robotic friends.

Written by Vince Montelongo for EMERGE

Good Copy Bad Copy

�??All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated�?��?� �?? John Donne


Copyright has always been a fragile compromise between the needs of those who create and the cultural enrichment of the mass public. Enter the digital age and the line is more blurred than ever before. That�??s why Good Copy Bad Copy, a Danish documentary on the current state of copyright, is such a critical and cultural phenomenon right now.

Does copyright law stifle creativity rather than encourage it? Apparently our founding fathers thought not. They thought people wouldn�??t create unless their art was protected.

But they weren�??t around to hear the Grey Album, or Girl Talk�??s sample-based remixes from dozens of elements in pre-existing songs. Not only recent phenomena like this, but creations like the West Side Story show there�??s an equally convincing argument that mixing and sampling have been human nature since the beginning of time.

Plus, as human beings, we are at the same time bombarded and inspired by various stimuli. Cryptomnesia, or "concealed recollection," is a theoretical phenomenon involving �??forgotten�?� memories. So is it plagiarism if one does not remember from where or whom they were inspired?

Though the documentary is less about such theories and more about their implications on culture and commerce, you�??ll inevitably start googling everything you can find �?? from silly court cases like Three Boys Music v. Michael Bolton to poststructuralist dissertations by Rosalind Krauss. And paradoxically, the more you learn, the harder it will be to fully establish your opinion, since each perspective is just one piece of an increasingly intricate puzzle.

Consensus? See it. Not to get up to speed on legal jargon or hear awful mash-ups of Gnarls Barkley, but to see how things are changing because of the digital era and to realize how big a role you play in it.

Because in all seriousness, even a base level of consciousness on this is crucial.
Take it from us. We didn�??t even feel ironic downloading our copy of the film since the filmmakers are distributing it via torrent download off their site.

By Katie Facada for EMERGE

Hopefully, you have watched the acclaimed BAFTA-winning series from the BBC called The Power Of Nightmares. This was one of the most affecting pieces of documentary filmmaking EMERGE has ever seen.

Now filmmaker Adam Curtis is back with another three-part series for the BBC entitled The Trap: What Happened To Your Dream Of Freedom?, a similarly tough look at the socio-political foundations of Western society. Curtis' thesis is that "freedom" underpins so much of our notions of national and personal identity, yet there is little that is free at all. We live surrounded by social management systems in an unequal society. Using models developed during the cold war, "paranoid game theory" and models drawn from biology, anthropology, and econometrics, Curtis reveals new and subtle forms of control.

A bit frightening but absolutely riveting nonetheless, "The Trap" is must-see tv for anyone interested in the powers of persuasion, freedom and the changing dynamics of modern society.
If you don't live in England, some kind soul has put the first two episodes online as streaming files.
The third episode airs next Sunday, March 25 and should be online soon thereafter.
Check them out:
Part 1: F!@k You Buddy

Part 2: The Lonely Robot