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The News & Observer
"Critics aplenty online"
September 28, 2008
"New York film blogger Karina Longworth (blog.spout.com) believes that Web film criticism gives movie fans an option, an alternative to the cookie-cutter wire reviews appearing in many papers now. 'I don't think print criticism lacks thoughtfulness and introspection as a rule,' Longworth said by email. 'If you care about a particular film and want to have a serious conversation about it (or, if it's an independent, foreign or classic film, really any conversation about it at all), you're more likely to find that online than in your local newspaper or a magazine like Entertainment Weekly.'"
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IndieWIRE
"TORONTO '08 | "Still Walking," "Goodbye Solo," "The Wrestler" Tops With TIFF Critics, Bloggers"
by Eugene Hernandez
September 15, 2008
Hirokazu Kore-Eda's "Still Walking," from Japan, was selected as the best film at the Toronto International Film Festival in a poll of film critics and bloggers conducted this weekend by indieWIRE. The story of a family coming together on the anniversary of a son's passing, the film is Kore-Eda's latest after the acclaimed "Nobody Knows." "Still Walking" edged out Ramin Bahrani's "Goodbye Solo" and Darren Aronofsky's "The Wrestler," two new American films produced and financed independently. More than 30 writers - ranging from AO Scott and Roger Ebert to B Ruby Rich and Karina Longworth, were surveyed. The group singled out "The Wrestler" star Mickey Rourke as the best actor by wide margin, while Agnes Varda's "Les Plages d'Agnes" was chosen as the best documentary at the festival.
"I was more than happy with the ratio of good to bad that I saw here, but it's telling that I first saw the film I named as my absolute favorite of the fest in the market at Cannes four months ago," noted Karina Longworth from Spout.com. "Of the three films that seemed to monopolize conversations during the fest -- 'The Wrestler,' 'The Hurt Locker,' and 'Rachel Getting Married' -- all premiered first in Venice." And citing a lack of new would be Oscar contenders in Toronto, she added, "If the professional prognosticators aren't going to pick their horses here, where will they find them? Has the mystery "There Will Be Blood" slot at Fantastic Fest suddenly become that much more important?"
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inDecatur
"Paste Launches Ad Network"
September 3, 2008
"Paste, the Decatur, Georgia-based music magazine, today announced the launch of an online advertising network—"Paste Nation"—that it hopes will entice advertisers to spend their marketing dollars in a single ad buy.
The network of 14 "tastemaking" sites covering music, film and culture includes influential music blogs Brooklyn Vegan, Largehearted Boy and Aquarium Drunkard, social networks Virb and Spout, PopMatters and the Web site of Seattle’s KEXP radio station.
According to Paste publisher Nick Purdy, the network’s combined traffic averages about 4.3 million visitors per month and 28 million page views. The network has already brought in large, music-friendly accounts such as Google, Apple, Microsoft Zune, Dr. Martens and Southern Comfort, as well as Live Nation and Universal Music.
The annual IFP Independent Film Conference kicks off today. Massify co-founder Kenneth Woo will speak at a panel today at 4pm on Crowdsourcing: Building a fan base. He will be speaking with Blair Erikson of Millions of Us, Paul Moore of Spout, Zach Mortenson of Ghost Robot and Space Unicorn, and Lance Weiler of Head Trauma. The conference spans a variety of filmmaking topics, from funding to production to distribution. If you’re in New York, check it out."
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Filmmaker
"Paul Schrader and Ox Goring"
September 3, 2008
"This piece by Karina Longworth discussing a panel discussion at Telluride on the crisis in independent film is essential reading. Ann Thompson, director Danny Boyle, distributor Michael Barker, critic and professor Annette Insdorf and writer/director Paul Schrader all talk about changing models and whether or not independent film as we know it is dead."
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CinemaTech
"On the Web, no 'Seinfeld' yet ... Paul Schrader on What Happens Next ... More 3-D Screens at Small Theater Chains"
September 2, 2008
Karina Longworth has the world's best job. She was out at Telluride this past week, and offered up some notes from a panel called "Snip Snip: Are Cutbacks in Film Distribution and Criticism Affecting Quality Filmmaking?" Here was the section I found interesting:
"Technology is leaving behind much that we are fond of," [screenwriter & dirctor Paul] Schrader warned. "I personally believe that movies are a 20th century art form, and they’re basically over." Several times over the course of the session, Schrader expressed enthusiasm for short-form episodic work made on low budgets for small screens. Referencing the rise number of "professional" media makers who have jumped to the webseries format, Schrader announced that he’s currently planning a film that would exist in a couple of different versions: one feature designed for arthouses, and one "X-rated" version, cut into 12, 5-minute episodes, for viewing on cellphones and/or on the web. Schrader’s not planning to go this route because it's lucrative, but because it’s what he sees as our inevitable future. "There's [currently] no money in it, but it's much better to gore the ox than to hold the ox that’s being gored."
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Infinicine
"And… Cut! Pessimism at Telluride"
September 02, 2008
From Spout's Telluride coverage (and brand new web look), Karina Longworth reports on a panel called "Snip Snip: Are Cutbacks in Film Distribution and Criticism Affecting Quality Filmmaking?"- the predetermined answer reiterated repeatedly as Karina describes the various doomy takes on the internet's evil influence and some unmitigating weak sauce “positive sides” such as Paul Schrader’s pithy " 'There's [currently] no money in it, but it's much better to gore the ox than to hold the ox that’s being gored.' "
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Burbanked
"Spouting off about Telluride."
August 29, 2008
"Pal-O-Burbanked Chris Thilk of Spout sent me a nifty little blog widget that links to his site's coverage of this year's Telluride Film Festival.telluride-a-riffic
You can see a scrolling list of movie posters below the Featured Article area on my homepage, and as the Spout site adds more content, the movies in the widget will link to their respective coverage. Additionally, you can keep an eye on comprehensive Telluride coverage from the terrific Spout team right here."
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Filmmaker
"Girlfriend Experience"
July 29, 2008
While we here at Filmmaker were busy trying to be so ahead-of-the-curve with our 25 New Faces list, we were dreadfully behind-the-curve in another area: figuring out an appropriately smart and knowing take on Comic-Con that would enable us to preserve our indie cred while attracting a fair share of fanboy surfers. Next year we'll figure it out, but as for this year, I'm glad we didn't try because we wouldn't have beaten Karina Longworth's take on the event, which benefits from her own experience at a Comic-Con of days past.
Her lede:
"When I first went to Comic-Con, almost a decade ago, it was purely as a girlfriend. My then-love interest and I had gone to our respective home towns for the summer, and one day he called and asked for my measurements––he was making me an Uhura dress.
Longworth goes on to look at the expanded female presence at this year's Comic-Con, which is initially exciting but soon reveals itself to be kind of depressing. Surveying the upcoming crop of action flicks and their female screen heroes, she writes, 'What we're seeing is the ghettoization of the female action star to below-the-title, near-disposable status. Even as eye candy, the sex appeal that many of these girls bring to a given film are just one element of an overall production design designed to keep aural erections intact for the duration.'" The rest of her piece is recommended at the link below.
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Filmmaker
"Submitting to Hitchcock"
June 04, 2008
A couple of new writers have been added to the Spout Blog, and one, Lauren Wissot, has her first post up today. Wissot is a filmmaker and writer who has written for her own blog, Beyond the Green Door, as well as The House Next Door. Her debut piece for Spout is entitled "Dial S/M for Marnie" and it looks at Hitchcock's film through the lens of kink:
An excerpt:
"What neither the feminists nor cinephiles seem to appreciate is that Marnie is one of the greatest bondage and discipline (B&D in sadomasochistic parlance) pics of all time. Artfully disguised as a psychosexual thriller, Hitchcock’s classic is actually kin to The Story of O with Hedren's O-like Marnie at the sole mercy of Sir Connery's sexy daddy (think Sir Stephen), reduced to being trapped like a wild animal to be broken and trained, owned and cared for, eventually becoming Rutland’s wife/slave. This ain't misogyny – it's erotic art!"
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AdPulp
"Blogs Mean Buisiness"
April 18, 2008
"Paste Magazine is looking to aggregate for advertisers via its new Paste Nation network. The new partnership brings 11 music and movie blogs to the Paste online network (including PopMatters, Spout and Virb), totaling 4.3 million unique visitors and over 28 million page views per month. Not only is it a scale play for Paste, it's a targeting opportunity for non-endemic advertisers seeking to seeking to align their brands to different music- and movie-based activities."
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New York Times
"Now on the Endangered Species List: Movie Critics in Print"
byDavid Carr
April 1, 2008
But are print critics really so all-important and sacrosanct with the Web full of debates about all manner of film in places like indiewire.com, cinematical.com and blog.spout.com?
"Honestly, I think that a lot of the viewers of serious films have already migrated to the Web," said S. T. VanAirsdale, a senior editor at defamer.com and the founder of thereeler.com, a site devoted to coverage of the New York film world. "Serious movies can always be helped by a boost from anywhere, but almost anyone who is interested can find plenty of information about a film before it even opens because of all the coverage in the blogs about festivals and screenings."
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