Learn Filmmaking Network Founder Gabriel Alexis on Building a Community
Bronx-born Gabriel Alexis’s love of visual storytelling began when he was a kid in his childhood home, capturing family moments, a prelude to a career in which he would devote himself to helping filmmakers connect, inspire each other, and grow. After learning the ropes himself on a variety of projects, from TV to commercials, from music videos to creating short videos for the New York State Bar Association, Alexis had a moment while driving his car in 2018.
How “Quantum Leap” DP Ana M. Amortegui Keeps the Show Dynamic Across the Centuries
The past is prologue, but on Quantum Leap, the past is also the present and the future as Dr. Ben Song (Raymond Lee) and his team embark on dangerous lifesaving excursions through history. The time travel epic is back with more mysteries that continue to escalate and may even threaten the project itself.
Director of photography Ana M. Amortegui kicked off the style of the series last season working on the pilot and several other episodes.
“Special Ops: Lioness” Cinematographer & Director Paul Cameron on Taylor Sheridan’s International Thriller – Part Two
As noted in part one of our interview with Paul Cameron, he took his first turns at directing for series helming two episodes of Westworld, and he drew on his experience as a cinematographer and from his work for some pretty important mentors. “I learned so much from working with Tony Scott,” Cameron said, referring to collaborating with Scott on films like Man on Fire and Déjà Vu.
“Special Ops: Lioness” Cinematographer & Director Paul Cameron on Taylor Sheridan’s International Thriller
As director of photography, Paul Cameron has shot such disparate films and series as Man On Fire, Collateral, Déjà Vu, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, and Westworld. He has worked with a slew of top-tier directors, including Michael Mann, Tony Scott, and Jonathan Nolan. Now, for Paramount+’s acclaimed limited series, Special Ops: Lioness, Paul Cameron – as he did with Westworld – worked both as a cinematographer and director.
“Story Ave” Writer/Director Aristotle Torres Brings the Bronx to the Big Screen
Writer/director Aristotle Torres‘ feature debut, Story Ave, is centered on Kadir (Asante Blackk), a bright teenager from the South Bronx with a gift for visual arts filled with promise. But when Kadir’s younger brother dies, the loss amplifies the pressure cooker of modern teenage life—the demands of school, the expectations of family—and specifically the life of a kid living life in the Bronx, where an entire world of opportunity and danger is just a few steps out of your front door.
“Fair Play” Writer/Director Chloe Domont Makes a Killing on Male Fragility
Fair Play, writer/director Chloe Domont‘s feature debut, is somehow both an old-school erotic thriller and a shrewd, scalpel-sharp dissection of how far we have and have not come with gender equality in the workplace and in the headspace of men, even those who consider themselves allies.
The film is largely set at the hedge fund One Crest Capitol, where Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich) are low-level but promising analysts trying to take the next step in their careers.
“Ahsoka” Cinematographer Eric Steelberg on Lensing a Rebel Jedi’s Journey Through Time & Space
For Ahsoka cinematographer Eric Steelberg, lensing the latest live-action Star Wars series was a dream come true. Growing up in thrall to George Lucas’s original trilogy, Steelberg would find himself on set while filming the new series, surrounded by massive spaceships both practical and virtual (the latter thanks to Industrial Light & Magic’s LED immersive soundstage the Volume), astonished by his own job.
“You’re sitting there trying to figure this out and tell the story because it is a job,
“Dumb Money” Music Supervisor Susan Jacobs Takes it to the Bank With Cardi B, Kendrick Lamar, & Unknown Artists
In telling the true story of the 2021 Wall Street GameStop meltdown, Dumb Money (in theaters now) needed to transport audiences straight back to their Pandemic-era head spaces when grassroots investors led by Keith “Roaring Kitty” Gill (Paul Dano) defied hedge fund managers to boost the stock value of a previously obscure company. Intent on setting a period-perfect tone, director Craig Gillespie asked music supervisor Susan Jacobs to wrangle hip-hop tracks redolent of the COVID era.
“The Creator” Production Designer James Clyne Fabricates the Future
When writer-director Gareth Edwards finished Rogue One, he took a road trip to his girlfriend’s home in Iowa. Along the way, he noticed a Japanese factory in the middle of a cornfield and started dreaming up a new story. Seven years later, Edwards has delivered The Creator. Set in 2065, the movie pits American humans against highly evolved AI robots from “New Asia.”
Starring John David Washington,
Composer Kelly Mac Captures the Celestial Spirit of “Donyale Luna: Supermodel”
Donyale Luna was a whimsical invention. Born Peggy Ann Freeman in Detroit, she molded herself into a star. Luna conceived of and then captured remote dreams of glamour, fame, and adventure in the fashion industry. A tragically forgotten figure, the new documentary Donyale Luna: Supermodel – from director Nailah Jefferson – is a much-needed exploration into the making of an icon.
Composer Kelly Mac absorbs and reflects the complexity of Luna’s life through the film’s score.
“Reptile” Director Grant Singer on His Slithery Mystery Feature With Benicio Del Toro
A big fan of classic film noir and thrillers, Grant Singer knew that when it was time to make the leap from directing music videos for the likes of The Weeknd and Lorde to features, he wanted it to be a film filled with twists where every turn is clouded in mystery. Reptile delivers exactly that.
Premiering September 29 on Netflix, Singer’s first directing effort begins with a murder.
“Air” Costume Designer Charlese Antoinette Jones on Designing the Near-Jordan World of 1980s Nike
Except for a glimpse of his back, we never once see Michael Jordan in person in Amazon Prime’s Air. This Ben Affleck-directed film, in which Affleck also stars as Nike founder Phil Knight, tracks the course of Nike’s surprise successful bid for an endorsement from the greatest basketball player of all time, leading to the 1980s creation of Air Jordan sneakers, which, four decades on, are a multi-billionaire dollar icon of fashion history.
“Dumb Money” Director Craig Gillespie Dissects the Wall Street GameStop Debacle
Dumb Money director Craig Gillespie already knew all about “Roaring Kitty” when screenwriters Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo sent him their script detailing Wall Street’s Pandemic-era GameStop fiasco. The David and Goliath showdown pitted YouTube financial guru Keith Gill, AKA “Screaming Kitty,” against hedge fund billionaires who were “short-selling” GameStop stocks so they could drive down the value of the then-obscure video game retail outlet. Gill’s defiant advice to buy GameStop shares attracted some eight million followers.
Framing Big Laughs & Real Emotion With “Only Murders in the Building” Emmy-Nominated Editor Peggy Tachdjian
Emmy-nominated editor Peggy Tachdjian had never really cut comedy before leaping into the Building, as it were, of Hulu’s hit Only Murders in the Building. The series was created by comedy legend Steven Martin and John Hoffman and is led by Martin, fellow comedy icon Martin Short, and a perfectly cast Selena Gomez as three true crime obsessives living in the same New York City building, the Arconia, who quickly find themselves in the middle of a true crime scenario themselves.
“A Million Miles Away” Co-Writer/Director Alejandra Márquez Abella on Capturing a Dream Come True
Filmmaker Alejandra Márquez Abella learned of José Hernández 15 years ago when his inspirational story made headlines: Hernández, who toiled in the fields as a child alongside his family, is the first migrant farmworker to become a NASA astronaut and go into space — a lifelong dream he realized after nearly a decade of perseverance and pluck and with the unwavering support of his family and friends. When producers Mark Ciardi and Campbell McInnes approached Abella about bringing Hernández’s story to the screen,
“A Haunting in Venice” Editor Lucy Donaldson on Cutting Hercule Poirot’s Crisis of Confidence
Kenneth Branagh is back as director and star with his latest Agatha Christie film adaptation, A Haunting in Venice, based on Christie’s novel “Hallowe’en Party.” As with his other adaptations, A Haunting in Venice is a who-done-it in which a great cast joins Branagh’s twisted tale, which in the latest installment includes Tina Fey, Michelle Yeoh, Jamie Dornan, and Kelly Reilly.
Branagh once again plays famed Belgian detective Hercule Poirot,
How “A Haunting in Venice” Production Designer John Paul Kelly Built a Possessed Venetian Palazzo
There’s a chilling haunt in Kenneth Branagh’s latest Agatha Christie adaptation of famed detective Hercule Poirot that will make the hair on the back of your neck tingle.
Following the success of Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, this third whodunit sinks into darker waters and unravels a tale along the canals of Venice where the crime solver is asked by friend and author Ardiane Oliver (Tina Fey) to attend a séance with her to prove that the medium (Michelle Yeoh) performing the spiritual ritual is a fake.
“Winning Time” Production Designer Richard Toyon on Capturing the Lakers Highs & Lows in Season 2
A Los Angeles native and longtime Lakers fan, production designer Richard Toyon had a good idea of how the HBO series Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty should look. After all, he was there when it originally happened.
Opening in 1979, season 1 saw Jerry Buss (John C. Reilly) buying the Lakers and drafting rookie sensation Earvin “Magic” Johnson (Quincy Isaiah) in the quest for a championship.
“Winning Time” Costume Designer Emma Potter on Bringing Magic and Larry Bird Into the 1980s
In all their gold and purple splendor, the Lakers are back for a second season of HBO’s Winning Time, which tracks the rise of the team’s path to glory during the late 1970s and early 1980s. The show’s first season focused on Magic Johnson’s (Quincy Isaiah) rookie season and the team’s unlikely title win. This time around, the returning champs get off to a rocky start, with Magic out with a knee injury,
“The Equalizer 3” Director Antoine Fuqua on Re-Teaming With Denzel Washington For Ferocious Finale
The Equalizer trilogy is a wrap. For the latest and supposedly final addition to the franchise, filmmaker Antoine Fuqua and his crew take Robert McCall (Denzel Washington, Fuqua’s longtime collaborator) to Southern Italy. Once again, this man of deep compassion but with an unparalleled gift for violence is tasked with protecting underdogs in a small seaside town on the Amalfi Coast under the bloody thumb of the mob.
It’s a lean,
