Shoppin' Around

Blue Ruin - NYC Premier - BAM

Macon Blair (left) and Jeremy Saulnier (right) at the New York premier of Blue Ruin at BAM

When I first met Jeremy Saulnier, he was selling me shoes at a stoop sale on our block Brooklyn. He told me they were props in a movie he made called Murder Party, and that as such they were very valuable.  I bought the shoes, and later rented his movie and I loved it. I saw Jeremy walking his dogs a couple weeks later and chatted him up and somehow after that we became friends.

In the years since Murder Party, Jeremy has shot tons of stuff for other people, most notably pairing with Matt Porterfield as the Director of Photography on a number of his films including Putty Hill and I Used To Be Darker. The New Yorker described those efforts thusly:

“...their collaboration is as fruitful and as essential as that of Jean-Luc Godard and Raoul Coutard in the nineteen-sixties, in that it’s not about lighting but, rather, about light. Saulnier’s daring attention to light and acceptance of shadow (no mere stunt but an essential aspect of Porterfield’s compositions and, for that matter, emotional world) should be a model for young directors of photography everywhere.”

After many years of making other people’s films, Jeremy set about making another of his own. He says it was a last-ditch effort to prove he belonged as a filmmaker. He would serve as writer, director of photography, and director. He cast his lifelong friend, Macon Blair, as the lead. He shot the film on a tight budget, cleaning out his savings and calling in favors. He bet the house to make Blue Ruin, and his gamble has paid off. 

Blue Ruin debuted as Cannes as part of their Directors’ Fortnight and within hours of its first screening was acquired by a major distributor. After almost a year on the festival circuit and a steady stream of awards and feature articles, the film had its New York premier last night at BAM in a theater filled with cast and crew, family and friends.   

I was thrilled to be there and to get to finally see the film I’d been hearing about for so long, and it exceeded all expectations. As expected for Saulnier, it looks absolutely gorgeous, and at times, delightfully gory. Blair is amazing as Dwight, the ungainly assassin. A revenge genre film at its core, the story is kept tight and tensions run high from beginning to end, but it’s not without moments of poetry and dark comedy and thoughtful introspection. 

Blue Ruin will be released tomorrow in theaters and on demand (including via iTunes) and I cannot recommend it highly enough.  You should see this movie.

I Forgot to Remember to Forget You

Is It So Strange?

Life Fades Away

Evening Shadows Make Me Blue

Ratking at Babycastles

The Golden Rule

Ben Gocker - Scaredy Cat City - P.P.O.W.

Ben Gocker at the opening of Scaredy Cat City at P.P.O.W. Gallery

I was going to write a whole thing but I was having trouble getting it right so I’ll do this as simply as possible:

I sincerely believe Ben Gocker is a genius, in the truest sense of the word. He’s a tireless polymath with gobs of talent, a unique aesthetic, and a psychotic work ethic.  His work is born from a sincere and urgent desire to connect with the world via whatever media he chooses; be it poetry, fiction, comics, performance, sculpture, assemblage, painting, etc.  I have followed Ben’s incredible output for many years and it has been a distinct pleasure to watch his work change and grow.

Scaredy Cat City represents an already-brilliant young artist’s declarative maturation, a watershed moment in the career of an artist with limitless potential.  It Is a beautiful, busy, wildly thrilling collection of work. It could appear at first glance deceptively simple, but when explored it is rich with a nuanced, joyous, chaotic beauty. The complexity of the compositions speaks to the thoughtful intention behind their painstaking construction.  The work contains elements of all the media listed above, cobbling them into a new and singular visual language. The work is narrative, figurative, poetic, rhythmic, like a map or hieroglyphics from a world that Ben alone can see, and which he is trying desperately to share.

Please, if you care about art, and if you have the chance, go and see this show while it is up.

P.P.O.W. press release, info etc can be found HERE.