Mardi Gras: Made in China
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is currently available to institutions, non-profits, schools & universities. Order Now
News
PLEASE SEE OUR NEW WEBPAGE FOR CURRENT NEWS:
www.carnivalesquefilms.com
Directors David Redmon and Ashley Sabin are currently booking college, theatrical, and public screenings for Mardi Gras: Made in China and Kamp Katrina. Contact David Redmon (mgmadeinchina@yahoo.com) to set up a screening for your organization, theater, or class.
Click here for a review of Mardi Gras: Made in China by Teaching Sociology. Contact David Redmon (mgmadeinchina@yahoo.com) for screenings and consumer copies of the DVD.
PLEASE SEE OUR NEW WEBPAGE FOR CURRENT NEWS: www.carnivalesquefilms.com
February 16 - Ashley and I have started another shooting another project and we're currently in rural Louisiana on bicycles making our way to a sacred destination with Charles the Prophet (if you've seen Kamp Katrina, then you'll know a little about Charles). Charles is doing well so far and we're currently 6 days into the bicycling trip. Below are images that Ashley has taken since we've started our trip. Matthew Dougherty, the musician for Mardi Gras; Made in China, is also joining us on the modern day pilgrimage. We will post more information as soon as we get the chance. However, there's limited access to internet.
February 6 - We've been in Brooklyn for one week, working on the final details for KAMP KATRINA's world premiere at the SXSW (South by Southwest) Film Festival in March! Ashley and I are incredibly excited and relieved that our film will screen in Austin, TX at one of the most enthusiastic festivals in the US. Honored. Humbled. Frightened. Like most documentaries, Kamp Katrina was difficult to make for many reasons; I'm still surprised we completed the film during those first 6 months after the storm. A HUGE thanks goes out to Mark Becker, Nadine Maleh, Marshall Curry, and Deborah and Dale Smith for sticking with the film and encouraging us to complete it. Our first-time co-editor, Tim Messler, was also amazing (as illustrated by the storytelling in Kamp Katrina).
In case people are wondering, we were already making a documentary film about Ms. Pearl before Hurricane Katrina made its way to the Gulf Coast (though we were shooting INTIMIDAD in Reynosa, Mexico when it hit). Afterwards, Ms. Pearl - displaced by the storm - called us from various hotels in Texas and we met during her first day back in New Orleans. From there Ashley and I continued documenting the original story until Ms. Pearl walked into Washington Park where she volunteered her backyard to several people during a spontaneous meeting. That moment defined the direction of the new story and KAMP KATRINA was created.
A special screening of Kamp Katrina will take place March 3 at one of my favorite film festivals of all time: True/False Film Festival in Columbia, MO. Both Ashley and I are absolutely thrilled that our film will play in front of so many enthusiastic people in Columbia. And we're excited to meet with Paul and David (festival founders). Mardi Gras: Made in China first played at True/False after Sundance in 2005 and I was overwhelmed by the friendliness of the town and quality of films at the festival. We are indeed honored to return to such a filmmaker friendly festival and screen Kamp Katrina.
After SXSW we travel to Orlando and screen Kamp Katrina at another favorite festival: the Florida Film Festival (where Mardi Gras: Made in China won the Grand Jury Award for best documentary in 2005). Another "special screening" will occur at the Magnolia Film Festival in Mississippi (again, where Mardi Gras: Made in China was awarded Best Documentary in 2006). Then, Kamp Katrina will screen at a festival that neither of us would intentionally miss (and plan to attend for as long as it exists): The Independent Film Festival of Boston!
There's more news coming in the next few weeks, and more documentary films coming from Carnivalesque Films in the next year - some of which I have already written about and other films which will appear as surprises. I'll try to post some reviews of KAMP KATRINA in the upcoming weeks. For now, here's a few quotes from people who have already seen our film:
"An unbelievable raw and honest story told in a non-judgemental way. Gut wrenching." Michael Tully, Indiewire
“Kamp Katrina is a refreshing, unbiased turn that promises to keep the movie fresh for years to come, rather than expiring with irrelevance after the next election cycle.” Matt Cale, Ruthless Reviews
January 19 - Ashley and I have returned from Reynosa where we completed the shooting of our documentary INTIMIDAD. We expect to complete the film in 6 months, depending on what happens with KAMP KATRINA. We're currently booking KAMP KATRINA faster than we expected. I'll soon post various images of our trip to Reynosa. For now, here's a picture of Lola, one of my mom's three dogs!
January 12 - Mark Becker's feature documentary, ROMANTICO, opens this week at the Nuart Theater in LA. Click here to read an article about how he made the film (posted on Apple's front page). Here's one of many excellent reviews for ROMANTICO.
LA Weekly
ROMÁNTICO If ever a life was defined by Sisyphean struggle it’s that of Carmelo, an itinerant mariachi who works San Francisco’s Mission District, cranking out melancholy love songs with his beloved but sporadically drunk partner, Arturo. Caught between dire poverty and the desire to keep his suffering family together, the 57-year-old Carmelo must choose between making $100 on a good night in an American city and 30 pesos a day — an improvement on his hardscrabble childhood — servicing weddings in his down-at-heel Mexican town. Mark Becker spent more than three years following Carmelo back and forth, and the result is a rich, devastating portrait of a man gifted with great charm and burdened by the painful combination of determination and fatalism that so often comes with adversity. Inventively shot on 16 mm, Romántico echoes the changing rhythms of Carmelo’s world. If this terrific documentary doesn’t adjust your idea of what it means to have a hard life and a good attitude, you haven’t been paying attention. (Nuart) (Ella Taylor)
LA City Beat Review
Director Mark Becker’s fascinating and moving documentary starts out as a portrait of illegal immigrant mariachi singers in San Francisco – in particular Carmelo and Arturo, a pair of paunchy, hard-bitten minstrels who wander from bar to restaurant, working for tips. It’s a hard life, and both singers, who frequently squabble personally but have a tight professional partnership, make enough cash to send home to their families in Mexico. Yet, a few short weeks into filming, Carmelo gets homesick and decides to move back home. From this point, the story shifts into a sort of rags-to-even-more-raggedy-rags tale, as he is reunited with his wife and daughters but slips into a downward mobility that will inevitably force him to try to cross the border again. Becker’s film has an intimacy, an unvarnished truthfulness, and a real-world sense of unpredictability that make for an unusually engrossing experience. By the end, Becker has made Carmelo and Arturo feel like our personal friends. With his paunch and pitted, jowly face, Carmelo makes for an unusual leading man, but his story is gripping and his dignity as he faces appalling travails puts those of us who are better off to shame. (Paul Birchall) (Nuart)
January 11, 2007 - Carnivalesque Films will soon release fantastic news regarding the world and regional premieres of KAMP KATRINA! Please see the description of the film at our new webpage www.carnivalesquefilms.com Press screenings will be announced shortly.
At this moment we are diligently working to complete INTIMIDAD, a feature documentary that we have been working on for over three years. We will soon begin shooting and editing our 4th and 5th feature documentaries which we will describe in late April.
MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA is STILL doing well in its theatrical, college, and public screenings. We receive emails everyday from individuals and organizations wanting to screen the film. Please see our "screening" page to find out where it's screening next.
January 8, 2007 - Press release from Indiewire.com
Helen Hill: 1970 - 2007 - Independent filmmaker Helen Hill (36) was shot and killed on Thursday (January 4, 2007) in New Orleans, LA where she lived. Hill, and her husband Dr. Paul Gailiunas, were both shot at their home in the city. Gailiunas survived the attack, as did their young son. An obituary was published Sunday in South Carolina, where Hill will be buried this week. In a Renew Media bio, Hill is described as an animator whose work has screened at numerous festivals, including the Ann Arbor, Vancouver, and Atlantic festivals. She was a founding member of the New Orleans Film Collective and a regular instructor. A lengthy bio online noted that she graduated from Harvard in 1992, later receiving a Masters in Fine Arts from Cal Arts and teaching animation techniques to inner-city children in Los Angeles. She was an organizer of the Reel Vision Festival for female filmmakers in Nova Scotia. Her work is described as standing out for its, "eclectic use of materials, employing everything from cut-outs and puppets to a square mile of cotton candy." Her 1999 film "Mouseholes" received considerable acclaim at festivals, while in 2004 she received a Rockefeller Media Arts Fellowship Grant for the animated film, "The Florestine Collection." For more information, please visit the memorial website that has been created, including photos, videos, memories and other details.
January 4, 2007 - Happy New Year! Ashley and I are in Mexico/Texas, completing INTIMIDAD and brainstorming about our uncertain future regarding our new company CARNIVALESQUE FILMS. Our new webpage is currently working, though we need to reword the descriptions for INTIMIDAD and KAMP KATRINA. www.carnivalesquefilms.com
We hope to announce some very good news regarding KAMP KATRINA in a few weeks. For now, it's suffice to say that we're finding an engaged and understanding audience for the film and interest is already slowly building, even though it has not been released. In the next few weeks we'll also post some reviews of KAMP KATRINA and provide updates on where you can see the film and order the DVD.
December 20 - Our friends Aaron and Brianne - based in Southwestern Louisiana - are currently offering fair-trade and organic products as alternatives to the issues presented in MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA. See their webpage for details and gifts for the holidays.
Both Ashley and I will be in Mexico during late December and early January to complete INTIMIDAD - our documentary about the seductions of all seductions: intimacy and Victoria's Secret bras! We've been working on this documentary for over three years and expect its completion in 8 months. Another announcement: we've finally completed KAMP KATRINA.
Although we think KAMP KATRINA is told in a more complex manner than MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA, the "problem" with the film is that it's just too damn honest because the story tells itself with no voiceover. It's a story that visualizes issues that people prefer to ignore and/or not believe, or simply deny. It doesn't appeal to "conservatives" or "liberals" in the sense of orienting the film to a particular ideology. Instead, the documentary narrative is an extremely compelling story filled with complex people who allowed us to live with them for 6 months in post-Katrina New Orleans (almost everyone lived in tents while staying in one backyard).
The story has a built-in arc, external and internal conflict, an ending that is marked by the birth of a baby on Mardi Gras day, and a plot that an active audience has to figure out themselves. We don't tell anyone what to think or how to understand the material. It's a story that generates the driving existential and ethical questions, "What will happen to the people in the backyard?" "Who are the people in the backyard?" and "What does this story mean and what are its implications?" The film's aesthetic tone is poetic and nuanced, focusing on the mood and feeling of post-Katrina New Orleans as shown from the perspective of the people in the backyard.
Despite the provocative characteristics of the story, it's a film that possibly leaves an audience filled with despair and the demanding question of, "What did I just watch?" Indiewire's Michael Tully (director of COCAINE ANGEL) described the film as "An unbelievable raw and honest story told in a non-judgemental way. Gut wrenching."
November 21 - Last weekend Mardi Gras: Made in China continued its college/university screenings in Boston where it played at Harvard and Northeastern. We are close to signing a distribution deal with California Newsreel, a deal which will provide DVDs for a much wider audience. Ashley started editing our third documentary, INTIMIDAD, last week and we expect to complete it in about one year. We are still waiting for our second documentary - KAMP KATRINA - to find a home.
November 13 - Mark Becker's 35mm documentary ROMANTICO has been extended for one week at the IFC (highly recommend it). It is one of my favorite docs of 2005 and will soon be released on DVD through Kino International.
November 12 - James Longley's poetic and stunning documentary, IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS, opened this week at the Film Forum. The Brooklyn Rail contains an interview with James about his years spent in Iraq, observations about democracy vs occupation, and conversations about the making of his incredible film.
November 7 - It's been a while since I've updated the webpage; too much is happening in life right now. Ashley and I just returned from a long road trip where we've been screening Mardi Gras: Made in China (MGMIC) and KAMP KATRINA as a work in progress in cities such as Reynosa, Mexico, Edinburg, San Marcos, Austin, Monroe, LA and New Orleans. Tomorrow we leave to show the two films in Springfield, MA in a social justice series of films. MGMIC is still screening almost everyday in different parts of the world (in fact, it just won another award at the International Festival of Human Rights in Buenos Aires, Argentina). Recently it screened in San Marcos, Texas (at Texas State iversity) to a huge crowd of about 250-300 people during a versity wide event.
Last week we completed the shooting of our third documentary titled INTIMIDAD (in Reynosa, Mexico) and will be done with KAMP KATRINA (working title) in 2 weeks (more details about KAMP KATRINA coming soon). So far, the responses to the work in progress screenings have been incredible. Thanks to Rod Murphy, the short version of KAMP KATRINA will be screening as a work in progress at the Asheville Film Festival on November 9th in order to raise money for the housing organization ACORN in New Orleans.
We also have a new webpage coming soon: www.carnivalesquefilms.com
IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS opens this week at Film Forum!
September 6 - More good news! (Hope I don't jinx myself...). Mardi Gras: Made in China was selected to project on a 20' x 8’ x 8 shipping container in Santa Barbara during an art show at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (the same type of shipping container in which the beads are sent to New Orleans). I'll soon provide more good and bad news about other events related to Mardi Gras.
Here's the information.
Santa Barbara Museum of Art Hosts Labor Exchange Temporary exhibition from September 1-11, 2006. Closing reception Sunday, September 10, from 4-7 pm behind the Museum. The reception follows a talk by photographer Sze Tsung Leong speaking about the transformation of modern Chinese cities, at 2pm in SBMA's Mary Craig Auditorium.
The Labor Exchange project, headed by artist and errsity of California's Institute for Research in the Arts (UCIRA) co-director Kim Yasuda, expands the content of the museum’s current contemporary Chinese photography and video exhibition through identification with global economic and cultural exchange via the shipping container. Participating artists include Billy Hood, Calico Brown, Tiffany Chung, Jennifer Figg, Mike Godwin, Cleveland Motley, and Jennifer Vanderpool. The documentary film Mardi Gras: Made in China by David Redmon will be projected continuously throughout the show.
A standard 20' x 8’ x 8' shipping container donated by J. Staal Storage Solutions was modified with an expandable/contractable internal display unit that has the capacity to extend 20 feet beyond the existing shell. In response to the dynamic issues surrounding the past 50 years of the container’s existence and its pivotal influence on global trade, labor, and the distribution of cheaply manufactured goods, artists included in this temporary exhibition were offered a $100 commission each to generate works of art that utilized materials purchased at $1 Stores.
A majority of these imported goods are made in China and distributed worldwide and brought into the US through big-box chains like Wal-Mart, the largest retailer and importer of manufactured goods from Asia, and the biggest customer in the shipping industry. The massive importation of consumable goods into the US and with few exportable goods made here to fill these boxes and make their journey back to China economically viable, these shipping containers continue to pile up at loading docks and poorer neighborhoods across the US, while Americans continue to buy, store and discard foreign-made products at an ever-increasing rate of consumption. Through their reconsideration of the shipping container and its new forms of re-use, these artists pose the possibilities for more sustainable models for material culture and, at the same time, point to relevant issues surrounding the value placed on human labor within a global market of exchange. The worth of one’s work becomes further challenged by the cultural currency placed on artistic production and creative expression, which generally receives less compensation than other forms of manual labor.
The installation includes a mobile interactive drawing station by artist Mike Godwin and a film viewing space designed by Billy Hood which will feature related films including Mardi Gras: Made in China, a documentary by David Redmon which traces the Mardi Gras beads manufactured by laborers in Chinese factories to the festive streets of pre-Katrina New Orleans. A public performance by Jennifer Vanderpool will take place on Wednesday, September 6 at 4 pm, enacting a live, labor-intensive piece on the roof of the container itself. Other works in the exhibition include artist Jennifer Figg’s $100 worth of washcloths (34 dozen) bought at Wal Mart and arranged in piles next to US and Chinese currency equivalents and the colorful Styrofoam sculptures surfaced with decorative stickers and tape purchased at Japanese 100 yen (= $1) shops in Japan and Los Angeles by Vietnam/LA based artist, Tiffany Chung. Calico Brown assembles a display of culturally conflicting items, while Cleveland Motley purchased film from a dollar shop to re-photograph its inventory in meticulous detail.
To further illustrate the emphasis on exchange, visitors will be able to participate in the labor efforts of the artists. Younger viewers will be provided with hand held paper “fortune-tellers” that encourage them to consider potential uses of the container. Labor Exchange will be on view outside the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s Park Wing entrance September 1 – 11. Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China is on view at SBMA through September 17.
September 3 - It's official. MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA will be a "broadway" play in Vienna, Austria. It'd be interesting if the workers could travel there to see it. I wonder what they'd think of it? Heck, I'd like to see it! The Maysles' documentary GREY GARDENS was turned into a play recently in NYC, too.
August 30 - A small theater in Austria is turning MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA into a theatrical play. We are currently negotiation the rights. This is interesting, as I've never thought of the documentary as a performance or play. Here's the webpage of the company.
August 28 - Thanks to everyone who attended the rough cut of 712 ALVAR STREET last week. It was a relief to watch the characters come alive on screen with a small group of people. Tim, Ashley and I are trying to garner enough energy to keep editing in a way that allows the story to unfold as a dramatic plot. We've read all the feedback and have noticed two common patterns that we'll be working on for the next two months. Thanks to everyone who helped us with feedback.
PLEASE SEE OUR NEW WEBPAGE FOR CURRENT NEWS:
www.carnivalesquefilms.com
Directors David Redmon and Ashley Sabin are currently booking college, theatrical, and public screenings for Mardi Gras: Made in China and Kamp Katrina. Contact David Redmon (mgmadeinchina@yahoo.com) to set up a screening for your organization, theater, or class.
DR 6-3-08 MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA
DVD available on July 29, 2008
Review copies available now
Pre-order at Amazon.com
Nominated for the Grand Jury Award at the Sundance Film Festival
Winner of 20 awards, Theatrically Released in the U.S.
Curated by the Sundance Channel as one of the "Classical Festival Moments" of all Sundance films
New York Time's Critics Pick
"Punchy documentary critique of globalization looks at the conditions in a factory in the Chinese city of Fuzhou where young workers make the beads showered onto revelers in New Orleans in exchange for baring their breasts at Mardi Gras." New York Times
"Cleverly juxtaposes the apex of American bacchanalian excess with the sweatshop-like conditions that facilitate the fun." Los Angeles Times
"This is one of the best films I know about real (as opposed to op-ed) globalization. Please welcome it." The Nation
June 3, 2008 - Carnivalesque Films will release the Award Winning documentary MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA in stores everywhere on July 29, 2008. Winner of twenty national and international awards, Mardi Gras: Made in China follows the path of Mardi Gras beads from the naked streets of New Orleans during Carnival – where revelers party and exchange beads for sexual acts – to the disciplined factories in Fuzhou, China – where teenage girls live and sew beads together all day and night. Blending curiosity with comedy, Mardi Gras: Made in China is the only film to explore how the toxic products directly affect the people who both make and consume them.
Carnivalesque Films is a new production and distribution company whose goal is to explore how personal stories relate to complex social issues. David Redmon and Ashley Sabin - directors of the award winning films KAMP KATRINA and INTIMIDAD - founded Carnivalesque Films and will release three award winning films ORPHANS (Ry Russo-Young), THE HOLY MODAL ROUNDERS: BOUND TO LOSE (Paul Lovelace and Sam Douglas), and MANHATTAN, KANSAS (Tara Wray) on September 28, October 30, and November 16, 2008.
For screeners, publicity and interviews contact David Redmon and Ashley Sabin, 203 417 3136 and 347 282 6132
info@carnivalesquefilms.com
For Sales (national and international) please contact Ewa Bigio at Smiley Films
Pre-book date: July 4, 2008
Street Date: July 29, 2008
SRP: $19.95
Bonus features: PG version, deleted scenes, extra scenes, 7 min version, clips from upcoming films,
and a worker's diary.
Click here for a review of Mardi Gras: Made in China by Teaching Sociology. Contact David Redmon (mgmadeinchina@yahoo.com) for screenings and consumer copies of the DVD.
PLEASE SEE OUR NEW WEBPAGE FOR CURRENT NEWS: www.carnivalesquefilms.com
February 16 - Ashley and I have started another shooting another project and we're currently in rural Louisiana on bicycles making our way to a sacred destination with Charles the Prophet (if you've seen Kamp Katrina, then you'll know a little about Charles). Charles is doing well so far and we're currently 6 days into the bicycling trip. Below are images that Ashley has taken since we've started our trip. Matthew Dougherty, the musician for Mardi Gras; Made in China, is also joining us on the modern day pilgrimage. We will post more information as soon as we get the chance. However, there's limited access to internet.
February 6 - We've been in Brooklyn for one week, working on the final details for KAMP KATRINA's world premiere at the SXSW (South by Southwest) Film Festival in March! Ashley and I are incredibly excited and relieved that our film will screen in Austin, TX at one of the most enthusiastic festivals in the US. Honored. Humbled. Frightened. Like most documentaries, Kamp Katrina was difficult to make for many reasons; I'm still surprised we completed the film during those first 6 months after the storm. A HUGE thanks goes out to Mark Becker, Nadine Maleh, Marshall Curry, and Deborah and Dale Smith for sticking with the film and encouraging us to complete it. Our first-time co-editor, Tim Messler, was also amazing (as illustrated by the storytelling in Kamp Katrina).
In case people are wondering, we were already making a documentary film about Ms. Pearl before Hurricane Katrina made its way to the Gulf Coast (though we were shooting INTIMIDAD in Reynosa, Mexico when it hit). Afterwards, Ms. Pearl - displaced by the storm - called us from various hotels in Texas and we met during her first day back in New Orleans. From there Ashley and I continued documenting the original story until Ms. Pearl walked into Washington Park where she volunteered her backyard to several people during a spontaneous meeting. That moment defined the direction of the new story and KAMP KATRINA was created.
A special screening of Kamp Katrina will take place March 3 at one of my favorite film festivals of all time: True/False Film Festival in Columbia, MO. Both Ashley and I are absolutely thrilled that our film will play in front of so many enthusiastic people in Columbia. And we're excited to meet with Paul and David (festival founders). Mardi Gras: Made in China first played at True/False after Sundance in 2005 and I was overwhelmed by the friendliness of the town and quality of films at the festival. We are indeed honored to return to such a filmmaker friendly festival and screen Kamp Katrina.
After SXSW we travel to Orlando and screen Kamp Katrina at another favorite festival: the Florida Film Festival (where Mardi Gras: Made in China won the Grand Jury Award for best documentary in 2005). Another "special screening" will occur at the Magnolia Film Festival in Mississippi (again, where Mardi Gras: Made in China was awarded Best Documentary in 2006). Then, Kamp Katrina will screen at a festival that neither of us would intentionally miss (and plan to attend for as long as it exists): The Independent Film Festival of Boston!
There's more news coming in the next few weeks, and more documentary films coming from Carnivalesque Films in the next year - some of which I have already written about and other films which will appear as surprises. I'll try to post some reviews of KAMP KATRINA in the upcoming weeks. For now, here's a few quotes from people who have already seen our film:
"An unbelievable raw and honest story told in a non-judgemental way. Gut wrenching." Michael Tully, Indiewire
“Kamp Katrina is a refreshing, unbiased turn that promises to keep the movie fresh for years to come, rather than expiring with irrelevance after the next election cycle.” Matt Cale, Ruthless Reviews
January 19 - Ashley and I have returned from Reynosa where we completed the shooting of our documentary INTIMIDAD. We expect to complete the film in 6 months, depending on what happens with KAMP KATRINA. We're currently booking KAMP KATRINA faster than we expected. I'll soon post various images of our trip to Reynosa. For now, here's a picture of Lola, one of my mom's three dogs!
January 12 - Mark Becker's feature documentary, ROMANTICO, opens this week at the Nuart Theater in LA. Click here to read an article about how he made the film (posted on Apple's front page). Here's one of many excellent reviews for ROMANTICO.
LA Weekly
ROMÁNTICO If ever a life was defined by Sisyphean struggle it’s that of Carmelo, an itinerant mariachi who works San Francisco’s Mission District, cranking out melancholy love songs with his beloved but sporadically drunk partner, Arturo. Caught between dire poverty and the desire to keep his suffering family together, the 57-year-old Carmelo must choose between making $100 on a good night in an American city and 30 pesos a day — an improvement on his hardscrabble childhood — servicing weddings in his down-at-heel Mexican town. Mark Becker spent more than three years following Carmelo back and forth, and the result is a rich, devastating portrait of a man gifted with great charm and burdened by the painful combination of determination and fatalism that so often comes with adversity. Inventively shot on 16 mm, Romántico echoes the changing rhythms of Carmelo’s world. If this terrific documentary doesn’t adjust your idea of what it means to have a hard life and a good attitude, you haven’t been paying attention. (Nuart) (Ella Taylor)
LA City Beat Review
Director Mark Becker’s fascinating and moving documentary starts out as a portrait of illegal immigrant mariachi singers in San Francisco – in particular Carmelo and Arturo, a pair of paunchy, hard-bitten minstrels who wander from bar to restaurant, working for tips. It’s a hard life, and both singers, who frequently squabble personally but have a tight professional partnership, make enough cash to send home to their families in Mexico. Yet, a few short weeks into filming, Carmelo gets homesick and decides to move back home. From this point, the story shifts into a sort of rags-to-even-more-raggedy-rags tale, as he is reunited with his wife and daughters but slips into a downward mobility that will inevitably force him to try to cross the border again. Becker’s film has an intimacy, an unvarnished truthfulness, and a real-world sense of unpredictability that make for an unusually engrossing experience. By the end, Becker has made Carmelo and Arturo feel like our personal friends. With his paunch and pitted, jowly face, Carmelo makes for an unusual leading man, but his story is gripping and his dignity as he faces appalling travails puts those of us who are better off to shame. (Paul Birchall) (Nuart)
January 11, 2007 - Carnivalesque Films will soon release fantastic news regarding the world and regional premieres of KAMP KATRINA! Please see the description of the film at our new webpage www.carnivalesquefilms.com Press screenings will be announced shortly.
At this moment we are diligently working to complete INTIMIDAD, a feature documentary that we have been working on for over three years. We will soon begin shooting and editing our 4th and 5th feature documentaries which we will describe in late April.
MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA is STILL doing well in its theatrical, college, and public screenings. We receive emails everyday from individuals and organizations wanting to screen the film. Please see our "screening" page to find out where it's screening next.
January 8, 2007 - Press release from Indiewire.com
Helen Hill: 1970 - 2007 - Independent filmmaker Helen Hill (36) was shot and killed on Thursday (January 4, 2007) in New Orleans, LA where she lived. Hill, and her husband Dr. Paul Gailiunas, were both shot at their home in the city. Gailiunas survived the attack, as did their young son. An obituary was published Sunday in South Carolina, where Hill will be buried this week. In a Renew Media bio, Hill is described as an animator whose work has screened at numerous festivals, including the Ann Arbor, Vancouver, and Atlantic festivals. She was a founding member of the New Orleans Film Collective and a regular instructor. A lengthy bio online noted that she graduated from Harvard in 1992, later receiving a Masters in Fine Arts from Cal Arts and teaching animation techniques to inner-city children in Los Angeles. She was an organizer of the Reel Vision Festival for female filmmakers in Nova Scotia. Her work is described as standing out for its, "eclectic use of materials, employing everything from cut-outs and puppets to a square mile of cotton candy." Her 1999 film "Mouseholes" received considerable acclaim at festivals, while in 2004 she received a Rockefeller Media Arts Fellowship Grant for the animated film, "The Florestine Collection." For more information, please visit the memorial website that has been created, including photos, videos, memories and other details.
January 4, 2007 - Happy New Year! Ashley and I are in Mexico/Texas, completing INTIMIDAD and brainstorming about our uncertain future regarding our new company CARNIVALESQUE FILMS. Our new webpage is currently working, though we need to reword the descriptions for INTIMIDAD and KAMP KATRINA. www.carnivalesquefilms.com
We hope to announce some very good news regarding KAMP KATRINA in a few weeks. For now, it's suffice to say that we're finding an engaged and understanding audience for the film and interest is already slowly building, even though it has not been released. In the next few weeks we'll also post some reviews of KAMP KATRINA and provide updates on where you can see the film and order the DVD.
December 20 - Our friends Aaron and Brianne - based in Southwestern Louisiana - are currently offering fair-trade and organic products as alternatives to the issues presented in MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA. See their webpage for details and gifts for the holidays.
Both Ashley and I will be in Mexico during late December and early January to complete INTIMIDAD - our documentary about the seductions of all seductions: intimacy and Victoria's Secret bras! We've been working on this documentary for over three years and expect its completion in 8 months. Another announcement: we've finally completed KAMP KATRINA.
Although we think KAMP KATRINA is told in a more complex manner than MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA, the "problem" with the film is that it's just too damn honest because the story tells itself with no voiceover. It's a story that visualizes issues that people prefer to ignore and/or not believe, or simply deny. It doesn't appeal to "conservatives" or "liberals" in the sense of orienting the film to a particular ideology. Instead, the documentary narrative is an extremely compelling story filled with complex people who allowed us to live with them for 6 months in post-Katrina New Orleans (almost everyone lived in tents while staying in one backyard).
The story has a built-in arc, external and internal conflict, an ending that is marked by the birth of a baby on Mardi Gras day, and a plot that an active audience has to figure out themselves. We don't tell anyone what to think or how to understand the material. It's a story that generates the driving existential and ethical questions, "What will happen to the people in the backyard?" "Who are the people in the backyard?" and "What does this story mean and what are its implications?" The film's aesthetic tone is poetic and nuanced, focusing on the mood and feeling of post-Katrina New Orleans as shown from the perspective of the people in the backyard.
Despite the provocative characteristics of the story, it's a film that possibly leaves an audience filled with despair and the demanding question of, "What did I just watch?" Indiewire's Michael Tully (director of COCAINE ANGEL) described the film as "An unbelievable raw and honest story told in a non-judgemental way. Gut wrenching."
November 21 - Last weekend Mardi Gras: Made in China continued its college/university screenings in Boston where it played at Harvard and Northeastern. We are close to signing a distribution deal with California Newsreel, a deal which will provide DVDs for a much wider audience. Ashley started editing our third documentary, INTIMIDAD, last week and we expect to complete it in about one year. We are still waiting for our second documentary - KAMP KATRINA - to find a home.
November 13 - Mark Becker's 35mm documentary ROMANTICO has been extended for one week at the IFC (highly recommend it). It is one of my favorite docs of 2005 and will soon be released on DVD through Kino International.
November 12 - James Longley's poetic and stunning documentary, IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS, opened this week at the Film Forum. The Brooklyn Rail contains an interview with James about his years spent in Iraq, observations about democracy vs occupation, and conversations about the making of his incredible film.
November 7 - It's been a while since I've updated the webpage; too much is happening in life right now. Ashley and I just returned from a long road trip where we've been screening Mardi Gras: Made in China (MGMIC) and KAMP KATRINA as a work in progress in cities such as Reynosa, Mexico, Edinburg, San Marcos, Austin, Monroe, LA and New Orleans. Tomorrow we leave to show the two films in Springfield, MA in a social justice series of films. MGMIC is still screening almost everyday in different parts of the world (in fact, it just won another award at the International Festival of Human Rights in Buenos Aires, Argentina). Recently it screened in San Marcos, Texas (at Texas State iversity) to a huge crowd of about 250-300 people during a versity wide event.
Last week we completed the shooting of our third documentary titled INTIMIDAD (in Reynosa, Mexico) and will be done with KAMP KATRINA (working title) in 2 weeks (more details about KAMP KATRINA coming soon). So far, the responses to the work in progress screenings have been incredible. Thanks to Rod Murphy, the short version of KAMP KATRINA will be screening as a work in progress at the Asheville Film Festival on November 9th in order to raise money for the housing organization ACORN in New Orleans.
We also have a new webpage coming soon: www.carnivalesquefilms.com
IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS opens this week at Film Forum!
September 6 - More good news! (Hope I don't jinx myself...). Mardi Gras: Made in China was selected to project on a 20' x 8’ x 8 shipping container in Santa Barbara during an art show at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (the same type of shipping container in which the beads are sent to New Orleans). I'll soon provide more good and bad news about other events related to Mardi Gras.
Here's the information.
Santa Barbara Museum of Art Hosts Labor Exchange Temporary exhibition from September 1-11, 2006. Closing reception Sunday, September 10, from 4-7 pm behind the Museum. The reception follows a talk by photographer Sze Tsung Leong speaking about the transformation of modern Chinese cities, at 2pm in SBMA's Mary Craig Auditorium.
The Labor Exchange project, headed by artist and errsity of California's Institute for Research in the Arts (UCIRA) co-director Kim Yasuda, expands the content of the museum’s current contemporary Chinese photography and video exhibition through identification with global economic and cultural exchange via the shipping container. Participating artists include Billy Hood, Calico Brown, Tiffany Chung, Jennifer Figg, Mike Godwin, Cleveland Motley, and Jennifer Vanderpool. The documentary film Mardi Gras: Made in China by David Redmon will be projected continuously throughout the show.
A standard 20' x 8’ x 8' shipping container donated by J. Staal Storage Solutions was modified with an expandable/contractable internal display unit that has the capacity to extend 20 feet beyond the existing shell. In response to the dynamic issues surrounding the past 50 years of the container’s existence and its pivotal influence on global trade, labor, and the distribution of cheaply manufactured goods, artists included in this temporary exhibition were offered a $100 commission each to generate works of art that utilized materials purchased at $1 Stores.
A majority of these imported goods are made in China and distributed worldwide and brought into the US through big-box chains like Wal-Mart, the largest retailer and importer of manufactured goods from Asia, and the biggest customer in the shipping industry. The massive importation of consumable goods into the US and with few exportable goods made here to fill these boxes and make their journey back to China economically viable, these shipping containers continue to pile up at loading docks and poorer neighborhoods across the US, while Americans continue to buy, store and discard foreign-made products at an ever-increasing rate of consumption. Through their reconsideration of the shipping container and its new forms of re-use, these artists pose the possibilities for more sustainable models for material culture and, at the same time, point to relevant issues surrounding the value placed on human labor within a global market of exchange. The worth of one’s work becomes further challenged by the cultural currency placed on artistic production and creative expression, which generally receives less compensation than other forms of manual labor.
The installation includes a mobile interactive drawing station by artist Mike Godwin and a film viewing space designed by Billy Hood which will feature related films including Mardi Gras: Made in China, a documentary by David Redmon which traces the Mardi Gras beads manufactured by laborers in Chinese factories to the festive streets of pre-Katrina New Orleans. A public performance by Jennifer Vanderpool will take place on Wednesday, September 6 at 4 pm, enacting a live, labor-intensive piece on the roof of the container itself. Other works in the exhibition include artist Jennifer Figg’s $100 worth of washcloths (34 dozen) bought at Wal Mart and arranged in piles next to US and Chinese currency equivalents and the colorful Styrofoam sculptures surfaced with decorative stickers and tape purchased at Japanese 100 yen (= $1) shops in Japan and Los Angeles by Vietnam/LA based artist, Tiffany Chung. Calico Brown assembles a display of culturally conflicting items, while Cleveland Motley purchased film from a dollar shop to re-photograph its inventory in meticulous detail.
To further illustrate the emphasis on exchange, visitors will be able to participate in the labor efforts of the artists. Younger viewers will be provided with hand held paper “fortune-tellers” that encourage them to consider potential uses of the container. Labor Exchange will be on view outside the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s Park Wing entrance September 1 – 11. Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China is on view at SBMA through September 17.
September 3 - It's official. MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA will be a "broadway" play in Vienna, Austria. It'd be interesting if the workers could travel there to see it. I wonder what they'd think of it? Heck, I'd like to see it! The Maysles' documentary GREY GARDENS was turned into a play recently in NYC, too.
August 30 - A small theater in Austria is turning MARDI GRAS: MADE IN CHINA into a theatrical play. We are currently negotiation the rights. This is interesting, as I've never thought of the documentary as a performance or play. Here's the webpage of the company.
August 28 - Thanks to everyone who attended the rough cut of 712 ALVAR STREET last week. It was a relief to watch the characters come alive on screen with a small group of people. Tim, Ashley and I are trying to garner enough energy to keep editing in a way that allows the story to unfold as a dramatic plot. We've read all the feedback and have noticed two common patterns that we'll be working on for the next two months. Thanks to everyone who helped us with feedback.
August 25 - The screening of 712 ALVAR STREET at Cinema Village went well, really well. We're almost there, almost to the end. I'm not saying everything that happens in the film is positive, but it is a story and I'm nervous for people to see the film when it's complete (and I mean COMPLETE - from our decisions). No one else will edit this film - it's 100% our vision, good and poor decisions; and when we're done, I'm not taking another year to make changes (like I did for Mardi Gras: Made in China). Still, it's been a strange experience making this film. I sometimes wonder if it's all been a dream, or nightmare. I look back and ask, What the hell happened?
David Redmon © 2006