Here are some more “I-Search” projects which I help tutor through Writer Coach Connection. This week we take a look at kids who love sports.
Is ballet more of a sport or art? Eh, who cares? Those who do it are as athletic and hard working as they come.
Surf’s up.
Since this week’s flavah topic is “hunger,” I thought I’d make a stream-of-consciousness list of things that make me hungry:
Food.
The smell of food.
Pictures of food.
Pictures of people eating food.
Pictures of starving children in third world countries.
Sally Struthers.
Angelina Jolie.
Fantasizing about Angelina Jolie eating a hot dog.
Fantasizing about my hot new neighbor who likes to undress with her window open and the lights on eating a hot dog—after she’s finished undressing though ‘cause she doesn’t look like she can multi-task.
Hot dogs.
Hamburgers.
The McDonald’s Golden Arches.
Remembering that time when a guy dressed like Ronald McDonald asked if he could rub his crotch against my leg ‘cause he had an itch in his groin and his arms were too short to reach it.
Sitting here in Starbuck’s, reading an article in the paper entitled “We’d Zap Back To The 80’s If We Could,” I can’t help but notice what music they’re piping in: “Age Of Consent,” New Order (1983); “Only You,” Yazoo (1982); and “The Ghost In You,” Psychedelic Furs (1984). As I’m listening to the Starbuck’s new wave soundtrack, I’m also planning the best date for our next “80’s Party” at the bar…
(it’s gonna be Thursday, May 30th, btw, nine days from now. Pop by: I’ll be dj-ing and will buy you a drink or three)…and find myself shaking my head and asking myself the same question I’ve been asking for the last ten years:
(SPOILERS AHEAD for Star Trek Into Darkness, Iron Man 3, Die Another Day and Batman Begins)
We all know that Asians as the leads/protagonists in Hollywood movies is a rare thing, but I remember a time—not too long ago—when it was not so rare to see Asians as the villains. Whether it was the insidious Fu Manchu plotting revenge against some pasty British white dude or the Vietcong general biding his time before Rambo or Chuck Norris killed him, there seemed to be a regular stream of “Oriental” baddies. Sure, many of these roles were stereotypical, but at least they were real roles. Not like the nameless, faceless yellow hordes you see today in films like Red Dawn.
But all that seems to be a thing of the past because nowadays when a kickass villain does appear in a movie that should by all rights be Asian, he often turns out to be…well, that pasty British white dude that the Asian villain should be plotting against.
How do you feel about getting old? Maybe not in the physical but in an artistic way… Last Saturday evening UCLA Film & TV Archive did a mini-retrospective of two early features Flow and Drift that I made. I got a Facebook message from a friend who said “Thank you for friending him” as he showed Offender Justin’s and my early shorts in his cable program. In fact, Offender Justin shot “Fall 1990,” a majority of Flow when he was still an undergraduate at UCLA. In fact, it might have been his first and last DP gig. Correct me if I am wrong… my memory is fading!
Honestly I haven’t thought about getting old. I just kept making films the summer I graduated from Berkeley. I’m sure it will be challenging watching my early works and I’ll cringe at all the innocence and the rough edges of my craft. Nevertheless I still have the same enthusiasm and excitement about making films… and I still feel very much a beginner.
Maybe I’m a kid who refuses to grow up. How about you?
I’d be especially curious in hearing how Offender DHH (David Henry Hwang) feels as I was studying David’s works in college—before I became a filmmaker—and now I’ve worked with David and we are on the same blog!
In the world of advertising, it’s not just the content that’s important, but the context. And here are some examples of ads compiled by the good folks at Bored Panda (see all of them here) where their not-so-great placement unintentionally changes the intended message.
Song 6: “Express Yourself,” NWA
This is NWA’s take on a little known soul classic from 1971 by Charles Wright and the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band.
It’s something between a cover, a mashup, and a faithful homage. No gunplay, no misognyny, just a beat everyone from the jaded indie hipster to the 60-something jazz fiend can groove to – I’ve seen it on a Friday night at my bars – along with booze, music like this is the great equalizer, the uncommon common denominator.
Song 5: “I Know You Got Soul,” Eric B. and Rakim
Old school hip hop was better than today’s stuff. It just was. So was the break dancing. Check it out:
It’s so awesome even the weather arrow is pointing to it!
Being a Nor Cal snob, I always look down my nose when I’m in L.A. and see so-called “meteorologists” reporting the weather, with their ridiculous names, ridiculous hair, and ridiculous teeth. Yeah, I’m talking to you Dallas Reines (a weather-porn name if I ever heard one)…
…and Jackie Johnson…
…and Elita Loresca…
…oh, sorry, that last shot was tasteless. Here’s a more representative shot of Elita:
They’re obviously L.A. actor wannabes pretending to know something about the weather while we up here in the more sober north are “authentic.” We don’t care about looks. We’re about hard hitting journalism, minimal bullshit banter, and a dearth of cleavage.
Barney Cheng in “Hysterio Passio,” the first 16mm film I made at UCLA in 6 hours
Every UCLA graduate film student—to this day—still has to do their pre-410 exercise, a 2-minute short film that you have to make on 16mm in 6 hours. Fresh off a Deconstruction and experimental video background, I made this experimental short “Hysterio Passio” that required my Christian DP Scott Walker to photograph my penis in close-up. “Hysterio Passio” became part of Flow, an experimental feature compilation of my UCLA short films that will screen at the Hammer museum this Saturday evening at UCLA along with my second feature Drift.
In the mood of a retrospective, I am also thinking about ten films that have influenced me as a filmmaker in no particular order.
Besides wondering why their penises grow larger at inopportune moments, and why the “feminine hygiene” aisle in the drugstore is suddenly relevant.
I tutor kids in writing at the local middle school as part of a wonderful program called Writer Coach Connection, and every year, the eighth graders have a semester-long project called the “I-Search.”
“I” as in me, myself and I: they can pick any topic that interests them – any – and they put together an ambitious project which includes written reports, display panels, models, websites, artwork, you name it. It’s impressive. This is late high school level stuff. And it’s absolutely fascinating to me to see the range of subjects that grabs the attention of twelve and thirteen year olds in the beginning of the 21st century.
I was recently in New York for the Digital Newfronts which is the online world’s equivalent of TV upfronts where the big names trot out their content for the upcoming year to get advertisers and brands on board. All the biggies from YouTube to Hulu to Yahoo, etc… made their bid for internet dominance (I’ll write more on my thoughts later) but one thing was crystal clear–everyone is getting into creating original online video content and they’re putting real money behind it.
Along those lines, check out these YouTube stats that were recently released: 1 billion unique visitors watch YouTube every month–that’s a whooping 15% of the planet. And in a month, those 1 billion people watch 6 billion hours of content (up from 3 billion just one year ago). 93% of teens visit YouTube every week–the closest competition is Facebook where 65% of teens visit weekly. Those are staggering numbers. Imagine if a traditional outlet like ABC or CBS can claim to have 15% of the planet or 93% of teens watching–that would be unheard of. And how we consume online content is rapidly changing too. Almost 50% of online videos are consumed on mobile devices.
I can go on, but clearly the landscape is shifting and very quickly. As YOMYOMF has our own YouTube channel that’s supported by YouTube, we’re in an interesting position being in the middle of the storm.
So my question to everyone is how have these changes in the digital space affected you? Has it affected what you watch and how you watch things online? Most of us fall into the category of content creators so especially curious to know if these changes have also impacted how you create your work? The fact that we’re adapting Offender DHH’s play Yellow Face for YouTube–the first time anyone has ever done such a thing–is both exciting and scary since it’s unprecedented but that’s an example of taking risks in this space with no guideposts.
