Short Circuit
SXSWclick Finalists
By Marc Savlov, Fri., July 14, 2006
Bottom: "Playing Chicken"
"This is the third year of what was formerly called 'South by SouthWeb' – we changed the name of it last year to reflect the use of filmmaking devices other than the Web. Now, we're doing iPod downloads and various minimobile devices. We ended up getting 200 submissions this year."
That's SXSW Film's Jarod Neece speaking to the ever-expanding role of microformat and on-the-go filmmaking that's an emerging aspect of the megafestival/conference, and, in particular, SXSWclick, a juried, "year-round initiative created to showcase short-form storytelling via mobile devices and the Web."
Microformatted filmmaking? Well, yes. When even the Streets' Mike Skinner has penned a No. 1 grime-store couplet bemoaning the fact that those ubiquitous cell phone videos go straight off to YouTube post-backstage debauch, it's only fitting that the rest of the world catch up to all those suddenly omnipresent drop-trou documentaries and diminutive dispatches from the realm the mini-DV masterpiece theatre.
Hence SXSWclick, which this past week announced the three finalists in each of the competition's five categories: Old School Shorts, Really Real Shorts, Animate-it, Sound Checks (aka Music Videos), and What the F*#!? (aka Experimental and Machinima).
Bottom: "Birthed_Spilled_Blood"
There's Greg O'Bryant's mordantly comic Old School Short, Embedded, which takes a particularly hubristic representative of the fourth estate, one Harvey Shane, out of the limelight and into the strobe of whining ordnance ("I got the same treatment in '82 when I covered Che Guevara. And he's on a T-shirt now!"), where he does not belong.
David Marchesani's Animate-it entry, Two Guys and a Battle Ax, after much ballyhoo and titling, turns out to be a likely entry in next year's Spike & Mike's Sick and Twisted fest (nice use of color!), while giving those without the innate ability to schmooze something else to worry about.
And then there's Avram Dodson's locally lensed art/work, a way-too-relative-to-my-life minidoc on the trials and tribulations of creating art of any kind while holding down that all-important day job.
These and 12 other short pieces illuminate an newish corner of filmmaker's art, and one that's only becoming increasingly accessible – and doable – with every passing moment. And then, of course, there's SXSWclick's roster of 15 judges, which runs the gamut from documentarian Kirby Dick (This Film Is Not Yet Rated) to Cinematical.com's Karina Longworth to Thank You for Smoking's Jason Reitman.
"We've got a lot of media partners this year [MySpace.com, Film Threat, and The Hollywood Reporter, among others]," adds Neece, "which helped to bring in a surprising amount of submissions. Last year we only had five finalists, and this year there [are] 15, plus what we're calling 'The Popularity Contest Award,' where you can vote online for your favorite film in each category."
Fifteen hugely excellent microfilms await both your beady little eyes and the judges July 28 verdicts online at www.sxswclick.com.
