cinema

Young Ali: those were the days title design process

seen below are some of the iterating on young ali: those were the days title designs. both the english and farsi versions where done first by hand by artist martin nilchian.

he went back to his graf roots to blend between our aesthetic & story considerations. you can see some designs really signal an authentic early 90’s socal graffiti style. in the end, we chose a design that had just enough flavor of that style, without it dominating, and showing transformation of time in the details.

the persian version had additional challenges that had us consulting some experts in the language to seek a proper translation.

three eleven or (a meditation on stillness inside chaos) - freely available

this work is now fully public without a paywall, originally released on 06/22/20.

*note: headphones advised*

On Wednesday, March 11, 2020, the United States went into shutdown to keep citizens sheltered from the threat of a mysterious global pandemic sweeping the world. In this meditative days-in-the-life-of work, a small family experiences the fog of time from a mandatory stay at home order, as a strange, comforting togetherness forms in a very uncertain time.

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directors statement:

"three eleven" is a meditation. It is a reflection of boredom, of togetherness, of uncertainty, and most of all, stillness. It intends to direct the viewer into the granularity of life in its most basic, mundane practicalities, and thus, direct focus into the beauty of routine, and of the nowness, all while under the umbrella of impending & uncertain chaos, a lingering scent of anxiety as the real outside world experiences shocks unlike any other in modern times.

It is intended as an experience, hypnosis, and a reflection. The stillness is the message. While stripping the “narrative” of the filmic medium into its most minimal building block, the frame clicks out of “narrative” time, and into clock time. It’s a universal acknowledgment of this very “moment in time”, and we intend for this to be a visual/audio documentation at its most basic level while conveying the beauty of togetherness and separation at its most minimal.

This work is indebted to Ozu & Kiarostami, who oddly enough (the latter), and without my prior knowledge shares his birthday with our release date.

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credits: Shot & Directed by Amir Motlagh
Produced by ANIMALS & Charles Borg
Story by Charles Borg & Amir Motlagh
Music by Amir Motlagh (three eleven zazen) - BMI © ANIMALS 2020

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release date: 06/22/20 trt: 33 min original aspect: 1:85:1

Amir Motlagh films now available on the streaming platform Tubi

Just a quick update I was alerted about a few days ago. Four of my feature works are now available on the US Streaming Platform Tubi, including THREE WORLDS (2018), MAN (2018), WHALE (2010) & RAINBOW SEASON (2019). Like most of these distro services, it is time-bound.

I believe Tubi is North America only, but, VPN, maybe….i dunno?

Cheers & enjoy the beautiful day my friend….

Things w/ Amir Motlagh Ep11

Slowly turning into a pod(web)cast, lol. This was longer than I wanted, but much quicker to get through on the backend. Still working it out. Fixed the audio drop-out issue, which is a weird Premiere Pro bug.

I have been feeling under the weather (not emotionally man!!), but pushed through to keep consistent.

This episode is more free flowing, as I go through some history of filmmaking in the last couple decades. Again, my preparation is next to nil, which is why so many important points where skipped over. The tradeoff is that I can actually deliver these in a weekly manner.


Film Pipeline Interviews Amir Motlagh and Charles Borg about the feature film MAN

This is a recent article conducted on Film Pipeline (Script Pipeline) about my latest film release, MAN. Both Charles and myself answer great questions posed by Script Pipeline about the process of MAN. You can read the whole interview by clicking here: 

Here a small snippet:
"Options and possibilities have opened quite a bit. Filmmakers tend to idolize the big names because they like the toys and scale that comes with moviemaking. Most of the time, that’s just a hindrance because it gets in the way of truth."

MAN is available on Amazon Prime (US/UK) and Vimeo On Demand (worldwide) with a host of other platforms coming soon.

Zebras in America Podcast Episode 54 with filmmaker Amir Motlagh

Was interviewed on the Zebras in America podcast with host Marcus Pinn (Pinnland Empire) and Scott Thorough. We discussed a range of topics, with the focus being my two latest 2018 films, Three Worlds + MAN.  

Come listen in to Marcus Pinn of Pinnland Empire describe Three Worlds "like jazz".

Filmmaker and musician Amir Motlagh comes through to have an insightful conversation about techmology, music, access, and singularity. He has two films slated to be released this year. Scott quotes Lil B. Favorite rapper lists are made. Friendships are formed. We read an email. Hot takes are made. Peep his work- https://www.amirmotlagh.com/ Follow Amir on Friendster or twitter @amirmotlagh Email us at ZebrasPod@gmail.com Tweet us at @ZebrasPod Scott is doing a charity walk https://www.theovernight.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=25411 Survey https://goo.gl/forms/tFjRm4p0aHFHds1h2

Double Feature Screening....

Looks like both the new features will be screening together late April. While MAN is locked, still working on finishing THREE WORLDS. My big aim all along was to be able to screen these two works along with CANYON in a single show. Basically, the THREE MARKS, TOO MANY SIGNALS series as one piece.

A long road indeed. Stay tuned. If all works well, I should be able to announce the location and date. One really big thing to note, it's not an LA show. We don't do arthouse well in LA :) 

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First teaser trailer goes live for our latest feature project MAN

Coming sometime in 2018 is my latest feature film, MAN. This is the first available teaser for the project. We are currently creating our release schedule though I have no estimates other than "sometime, 2018". If you'll make some noise about it, the sooner it will find its way. 

The film has yet to world premiere (working on securing dates/venue) although it has won its first award a little over a month ago at a private festival event (CICFF). 

This is 1/3 of the THREE MARKS, TOO MANY SIGNALS trilogy, which features the already released 2016 project, CANYON, and the forthcoming feature film, THREE WORLDS (also a 2018 release).

alternatively, on vimeo if you prefer:

Tomorrow is the LA premiere of "A DYING KING"

Tomorrow starts the limited theatrical run of my friend Bobak's documentary, A DYING KING. I spent a good amount of time on this production, which spanned many years. This was a real passion project for him, and never having made a film before, he took a giant leap of faith & unsurprisingly, saw it to the end. Most people will never realize the difficulty in completing an independent film, let alone a feature-length documentary. The amount of work just compounds & whenever you think you are finished, a whole new set of challenges appear. 

You can catch the film this week in LA, starting Wednesday at Laemmle Music Hall, Beverly Hills; Thursday at Laemmle Town Center 5, Encino. A New York run starts the following week and it will tour through several cities including some European ones.

The online release starts in 2018.  

Here is a link to the LA Times review:
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-dying-king-review-20171114-story.html

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And so I Wrote Something to be Read

Not only do you get a 2D cartoon representation of me, you also get some quotable gems I've probably (wisely) moved away from.

Cartoon Amir.

Cartoon Amir.

In all honestly, this is a cool film series published by FOCAL PRESS with some interesting, and talented(this word is meaningless in many ways, but not always) filmmakers.

I however, did not reread this after it was sent 6 months ago to be published, because, what is the point of revising archived opinion?

With that said, can it possible be the best thing I've ever written? Not sure. 

Enjoy, share and let me know your thoughts.

BIG BRAINS - SMALL BUDGETS: DIY FILMMAKING ADVICE

of YOUTUBE episodes and other expletives for the month of JAN....

Ok, so, here we are nearing the end of the first month of 2015, a wild month politically, and certainly, personally.

One thing that I promised myself, and I've made that socially clear as well is that I am going to commit to consistent communication. And Youtube is one of those streams I want to cultivate.

The only challenge now, is that while we at ANIMALS have been developing super material for the web, we have not figured out how to engage on a more simplistic, communicative level on channels like YOUTUBE

So, here and now, I keep to my word, while at the same time searching for ways to build the puzzle. Bear with me for awhile, since its not going to be pretty, but, soon enough we'll get into a flow .

For now, if you haven't, please subscribe. Do it. SUBSCRIBE NOW, not later. See, I'm not putting it off, and neither should you.

Enjoy this train wreck of a first attempt while it lasts.

the curious case of the James Francos.....

Whether you like it or not, JAMES FRANCO is the character of the future. He is constant, consistent & working in PRESENT TENSE. Franco is the stream. And that stream is not going away because the stream demands stuff now.

Gone are the days where you could sit and toil on a concept for years, or turn a MALICK and show up 15 years later. Gone are the days where you could do or be ONE THING (however, if you  love that one thing, more power too you).  Because the world is turning so fast, if you don't pivot when you are required too, the media you are on top of will turn into OPERA, and then you'll be bitter. And pivoting becomes increasingly difficult as time goes by. It's as skill you must learn to survive. 

Franco and his cohorts are also the few characters around who are almost completely immune to criticism. This is not unprecedented. Woody Allan has already mastered that art, by the only effective method. By not giving a shit and immediately moving to something else. The new school just does it faster.

In a world where media is completely ubiquitous and a million paths of communication exist, dealing with a bad review is akin to wiping your mouth after eating a bowl of spaghetti. Who gives a shit. And if you do, well, you're fucked.