There is a kind of film I have noticed that I will refer to as 'Sittin'-Around Films' They're marked by the fact that it's the effects of sittin' around, typically half-heartedly chatting while often doing other things, like watching TV or reading. The entire Mumblecore movement might have evolved out of that. Clerks damn near qualifies. Selfie by Megan St. Cin is one of them, and while it would be easy to dismiss as overly simplistic, I went through with it and was greatly rewarded. 

The key to Selfie is the understanding of what young women today go through as far as social media and dating. Pics and messaging are two of the most important aspects, and when a girl is trying to entice a guy through phone-based means, there are things that have to happen, methods that must be observed. 

I'm so glad I'm not a teen starting out on the dating scene today. 

The acting is kinda simple, not showy, and not dulled. The story goes in a somewhat predictable direction, but it also doesn't over-play that hand. Instead, in the two-and-a-half minutes we get, we see a simple, smart, and most importantly, clean short which tells its story economically, but not distantly. To someone who doesn't understand this world, the performances might feel as if they are disconnected from the scenario, and potentially one another. In a way, that is the point of the short. Superficially, it is a story of a young woman coming up against the possibilities of her sexuality. Taken more deeply, it's the story of two of girls navigating today as two girls would navigate the current world of relationships, sex, and attraction. in that mode, this is an important short that documents how much the world has changed for the young, but the strong shooting and editing, the lack of adornment, and my personal favorite part, the restraint shown by director Megan St. Cin in not taking this into the realm of titillation. That's an obvious place for a short like this to go, and the fact that it didn't took this short from being merely interesting, to being really smart. 

zzz is Playing: Grip
Arguably the Most Montreal of all videos ever made in The Netherlands. zzz is a Dutch band that, at least at first, consisted of an organ and a drum kit... and the guys that played them. It's grown, as I've understood it. They produce a wide-range of really cool music, and Grip is one of their coolest songs. The video was made as a short film, and has played around the world at art and film festivals. I first saw it at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Montreal, which seems appropriate as it's basically what happens when the Cirque de Soleil concept merges with art rock. The video features three trampolinists jumping which displaying plaques that carry video editing terms like 'pulse' 'A/B cross-fade' and 'particle burst'. At the top of the screen, there's a guy and he's painting a progress bar. The band's at the top too. There's even a loading cycle where a rainbow umbrella spins. It's full of awesome references, and it's on e of those things that took incredible amounts of planning, didn't turn out 100%, but is actually better for it. 

The Royalty - I Want You
The 1980s were a great decade for music videos. We've never really come close to that level since. The Royalty is a wonderful band, and their song I Want You is a wonderful power pop song. The video for the song, which is sorta like The Sundays meet The Smithereeens, is pure 1980s effect-heavy wonder. Lots of motion blur, lots of mirroring, and color-altered imagery over black-and-white stock footage. That technique, more than anything, SCREAMS 1980s. The video is a lot of fun, and it plays so well with the song. The reason I need to write it up? It's the perfect example of what you can do with over-editing. There's a TON of effects work, including some purposely weak green screen (to simulate old Blue Screen work) and it's gorgeous. I love the way it plays out, especially how the way the title graphics appear at the front of the video for like a second. It's the idea of the 1980s video that has managed to run through our veins to today that this video is celebrating, and thus, it's awesome!

What this documentary does is strange. It equates three forms of expression - performance art, bodybuilding, and meditation. Those first two are closely related, and while prior to this doc I'd have said the latter was incredibly distant, this proved me wrong, at least to myself. The arts they practice are specifically designed to help them deal with themselves, their experiences. The Bodybuilder is only trying to improve on his yesterday, the meditator is trying to deal with the negativity of her life, the performance artist is trying to deal with a world that is, perhaps, not her own. The clarity of presentation, mixed with incredibly smart editing, makes this a mental and a visual treat. The film is obviously influenced by 1970s documentary concepts (Woodstock came to mind almost instantly) and the way the focus flowed reminded me of works like Errol Morris' Fast, Cheap, and Out-of-Control. The piece moves through these three people, and it is more an internalist documentary than an externalist. This is not a story of what they do, but rather, who they are that do these things. That makes this a powerful documentary, and the precision of the piece makes it a great film. 

Discovering Electronic Music
This short documentary has been making the rounds, I believe it was featured on io9, which means it's been everywhere. I have an interesting perspective, as I'm a documentarian, a film programmer who has made his bones in programming Docs, and a Computer Historian specializing in computer graphics, music, and art. This short works in many ways, but falls short in many ways if you're looking at it through a couple of different lenses, though if you're adding them together, it's incredibly cool. The early 1980s were an important time in Electronic music, not only had we seen about 30 years of experimentation in Computer Music (The Experimental Music Studio at Illinois, the CSIRAC's compositions, people dicking about with PDP-1s, and IBM 1401s, and every other computer after hours), but the mainstream of music was being forever changed. We'd seen some of the earliest pop hits that were solely produced with Synths had hit the charts, and the world of production had started to go digital. None of that is really covered in Discovering Electronic Music, probably because it was all too new, or possibly because they suspected there'd be rights issues. This is done in the classic 1970s educational documentary style, which hasn't necessarily aged well. The footage is great, and it's some of the only footage of that era that isn't concert footage. The doc guy in me was annoyed by the lack of identification throughout. Interviewees, technologies, and especially musical pieces. Some IDs would have really helped. The use of a FAIRLIGHT CMI on a piece. That section, more than anything, has stood the test of time because the methodologies it's documenting are so different from today. 30+ years later, that sort of demo is all we have of some systems, and that makes this kind of doc stand the test of time.

Streetkids United II - The Girls from Rio - Maria Clara
The sports documentary is, perhaps, the most important to the history of docs. The natural structure of a sporting event leads most naturally to exciting film making, not to mention that physical action can make for exciting shooting and editing possibilities. In Streetkids United II - The Girls from Rio, director Maria Clara brings us into the world of the Street Child World Cup. A group of young woman from the favelas of Rio do battle in football with teams of homeless girls from around the world. There's also a boys' tourney, but here, we focus on the girls of Brazil, and it's an amazing collection of impressive, sometimes cocky, often pained, and sometimes wacky, young girls. The way the girls are profiled, and the games shot, shows the skill the director brings to the project, as well as the ways in which these girls story are far more universal than you would expect. The troubles of the young ladies in my life are the same as the ones faced by these young women, only with the added problems that come from being steeped in poverty. The tourney is a feel-good moving piece of filmmaking, and the post-film updates are both up-lifting, and at least a little bittersweet. The desires of these young woman are often so simple, and they manage amazing things, but we are left to wonder, at the end of it all, what did these small segment of their lives mean in relationship to everything else they've been through, and will go through. At least we know THIS moment, and these young woman as they existed at that moment. Perhaps that's enough, but it also thoroughly made me want to go out and support my local at-risk youth soccer groups, because this doc proved that you can stamp a moment of magic on to young people. You can find more at ​http://www.streetkidsunited.com/

I readily admit, I have difficulty with the films of some countries. I have yet to find a Korea live action feature I enjoy, as an example. The Cinema of India is one of my favorites. Let me take that back - Bollywood, that all-singing, all-dancing love child of the American Musical and traditional Indian dramatics. Non-Bollywood pics, those can be a tougher sell. Bongshojo isn't my cup of tea. It's a well-constructed drama, no doubt, but the acting leaves me cold. The story is that of an alcoholic, but more than that, it's the story of what we do for each other, for our families, for ourselves. It's also the story of what we do TO each other, to our families, and ultimately, to ourselves. That makes the film powerful in message, and to those who get the broad, nearly-melodrama-level presentation, they'll get it and I imagine find it a wonderful piece. I, sadly, can't cross that bridge, but absolutely do recognise that there's an audience for this film. The way this is shot is highly intelligent, especially the use of close-up and the interplay between light and dark within an individual scene acts as a punctuation in a very smart way. 

I Am The Killer - Dominic Sawicki
I am torn about I Am The Killer. It's a fun little movie, a hitman turns on his hit structure and there's fighting. LOTS OF FIGHTING! The fighting is of varying levels of awesome; at times swings seem timid, and the choreography is off at points. The story is clear, and fairly secondary, and yeah, there's fighting. And blood. And it's like watching a short film from about a decade ago called Kwoon that didn't make a lick of sense, but was lots of fun fighting. Here, I had trouble with a few parts of the filmmaking, while it was shot well, and the pacing was good, when  you're basically making a one-note film (in this case, brawling!),  you better well do that one thing really well. Here, the fighting's decent, at times even really good, but it doesn't go far enough into the "OHMYGHODTHATSAWESOME!" realm to make it a must-see. The Cinematography is really smart, especially the use of harsh lighting to set up the fight scenes. The filming drew me in, and maybe it's just the amount of fighting I've watched both live and on video, but the fights lost me at time. For example, a largely wonderful fight between our 'hero' and a masked villain goes on damn-near perfectly paced, and with a few cinematic moments that are really strong, but then there's a drop kick, and it's used as the highlight of the fight, and it's an obvious miss, and in one take a glancing blow, that HAD to connect to sell the entire scene and the coup de grace. A drop kick is an easy move to throw, but a hard move to film and make it look like it can actually knock a sucker out! Watch pro wrestling sometime and you'll  see just about the only way to film it and make it look killer. Here, it let the scene down, though I will give them points for trying to be very Jackie Chan with that as the finisher. 

Ultimately, it's a short that's got a lot of fun elements, but that just doesn't hold together. I would love to see what these folks could put together with a bit more fight training time, because they obviously know how to shoot this kind of action. 

The Dream - Agent Production
A science fiction film meets an awkward teen love story. It's an odd mix, but one that works well when executed properly. What's interesting about The Dream isn't the intersection of these two kinds of movies: it's the fact that it eschewed with the entire dialogue thing and just went at it silent-style. Filmmakers, let me give you a piece of advice - don't go silent. Yes, I know The Artist was great, and so was Call of Cthulhu, but honestly, unless you're doing a period piece, or something where silent storytelling adds to the impact of the plot, write some freakin' dialogue. I know, I know, it adds a layer of complexity, and synchsound is both hard and potentially expensive, but just do it. Here, it distracts a bit. You can tell these actors are doing fairly well, but there's a lack of connection with the material because we're not given them speaking to one another. That said, it's well shot, and the plot is smart, and though it might go on a couple of minutes too long, it's not a bad picture; I just wish they'd given us some sound to hang the emotional impact on.

Sunny Rain - 
It is easy to fall in love. It's easy to communicate. It's also incredibly easy to fall in love, and then fail at the entire communication thing by totally misreading the object of your affection. That's the central line in Sunny Rain, a well-made, and all-too-real short film out of Romania. The acting here is absolutely top-notch, and the film has a visual appeal beyond the simple documenting of two characters as they interact. in fact, the way it's shot is as a love story, while the way it is performed as a heartbreak drama. The mixing of the two makes this such a great film, and one that made me recall so many terrible moments in my own dating history.