New Feature Documentary Premiere at Tribeca
I am super excited that White Tide: The Legend of Culebra will be premiering at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival. This is a so-true-it’s-almost-unbelievable tale of campfire stories, $2 million dollars of buried cocaine, and a quixotic quest to find it. Accurately billed as ‘a documentary treasure hunt’, it’s a wild story told on a big scale, and we got to go huge with the sound design. There are airplanes and car chases and all sorts of hijinks and stylistic craziness and I can’t wait for it to be seen by audiences. It was pure uncut joy to sound design and mix!
Big Awards at Sundance and SXSW
Both Shirkers and On Her Shoulders won major awards at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Shirkers won Best Director – World Documentary Competition, and On Her Shoulders won Best Director – US Documentary Competition, and I couldn’t be prouder for Sandi and Alexandria and those projects as a whole.
On Her Shoulders then also took home hardware at SXSW, winning the Luna Chicken & Egg Award for Documentary filmmaking.
All three Sundance films played incredibly and compiled a list of jaw-droppingly good reviews.
Bisbee ’17 was described as ‘Sterling’ by Variety, ‘deeply moving’ by the Hollywood Reporter, Indiewire called it ‘fascinating and dream-like’, and RogerEbert.com stated ‘The result is a lyrical, powerful piece of work that will certainly stand among the best documentaries you’ll see this year’.
On Her Shoulders was called ‘remarkable’ and ‘an essential portrait’ by IndieWire, ‘passionately attentive’ by the Hollywood Reporter, and ‘essential viewing’ by Variety. RogerEbert.com touched on the film’s ’emotional delicacy’.
Shirkers was described as ‘fascinating’ and ‘has the handmade delicacy of a scrapbook come to life’ by Indiewire, the Hollywood Reporter stated it has a ‘gumshoe pulse and casts a hypnotic spell’, and RogerEbert.com described it as ‘a dazzling tapestry that’s unlike many narrative or documentary films’ and stated ‘Sometimes you see certain movies at festivals and you know they are bound to be someone’s favorite film. That’s undoubtedly the case with Sandi Tan’s documentary Shirkers‘.
But my favorites were when multiple of the films were listed in best-of-festival roundups, such as Shirkers and Bisbee both appearing in the New Yorkers ‘Three Inspired Movies from the 2018 Sundance Film Festival’ article, or POV Magazine’s ‘Summing up Sundance’, or On Her Shoulders and Bisbee appearing atop FlavorWire’s ‘Best of the Fest’. It’s an incredible feeling and I’m so proud to be a part of all three of these projects.
The Film Festival Circuit Continues
Next up Shirkers will be playing True/False, Full Frame, Sheffield, Copenhagen DOX, San Francisco, Hot Docs and more
On Her Shoulders will play Full Frame, Doc10 Chicago, Hot Docs and more
Bisbee will play True/False, Full Frame, Copenhagen DOX, San Francisco, Cleveland, Doc10 Chicago, Hot Docs and more.
DVD and Streaming Releases and New Updates
Spettacolo was released on Blu Ray and DVD and Streaming (and comes with a slew of bonus extras and a recipe for homemade picci!!), meanwhile A River Below is distributed by Netflix for North and South America and was released March 1st on their platform.
At SXSW Vimeo released their top 100 short films of the past decade, and I’m proud Speaking is Difficult made the list
And lastly, Mothers Day played on PBS as part of their POV series.
Next Up
Well first I’ll be taking a nap, the last few months have been a blur, but then more exciting projects! Including new feature films, a documentary short for the NY Times, and new commercial work. Plus a studio revamp, and maybe even a few more naps if I’m lucky!
