Life is busy — with IATSE negotiations, TikTok bans, plus that whole total eclipse of the sun you already probably forgot about. It can be tough to stay up-to-date on all the film industry news, profiles, analysis, and advice. That’s why we’ve curated some essential reads you may have missed over the past month. So take some time to catch up with this month’s good reads!
This Month’s Good Reads (April 2024)
Adventures in Mini Moviegoing (via Isabel Stevens for Sight and Sound)
How to make children’s movies that aren’t dumbed down.
Hollywood’s Bravest and Most Foolhardy Memoir Wasn’t Written by a Movie Star (via Carolyn Kellogg for Los Angeles Times)
Reflections on producer Julia Phillips’s infamous tell-all You’ll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again.
When Tom Ripley Stares Into the Mirror, He Sees Us (via Alissa Wilkinson for The New York Times)
Why filmmakers have been fascinated by Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley books for over 50 years.
Barbra Streisand, Auteur (via Kayleigh Donaldson for Mubi Notebook)
Analyzing the behind-the-camera efforts of the legendary singer/actress/filmmaker.
More Than Just an Auteur’s Wife: The Extraordinary Life and Work of Eleanor Coppola (via Glenn Kenny for Decider)
Memorializing the Coppola matriarch and Hearts of Darkness filmmaker.
Doc Producers Release Guidelines to End the Practice of Free Work (via Megan Gilbride for Dear Producer)
The Documentary Producers Alliance puts its labor recommendations into writing.
End Of An Indie Era? Sundance Could Leave Park City As Festival Opens Bids For New Location In 2027; Utah Resort Town Vows Fight To Keep It (via Dominic Patten and Anthony D’Alessandro for Deadline)
Is the Sundance Film Festival on the move?
Hollywood Mourns Participant, the Oscar-Winning Studio that Wanted to Save the World (via Matt Donnelly for Variety)
The company that combined activism and entertainment shutters.
50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee in 2024 (via Tim Molloy for MovieMaker Magazine)
Where to get your screening on this year.
If You Want to Make Movies, Make Your Own Luck (via Rod Blackhurst for Talkhouse)
How to avoid the sophomore slump.
Streaming Behind Bars (via Phillip Vance Smith II for Film Comment)
How film-watching has become an outlet for incarcerated people.
Encyclopedia Brown: A Story for My Brother, Philip Seymour Hoffman (via Emily Barr for The Paris Review)
A sister memorializes her late brother.
The Godfather of American Comedy (via Adrienne La France for The Atlantic)
How Albert Brooks became one of cinema’s biggest comedic influences.
The Life and Death of Hollywood (via Daniel Bessner for Harper’s Magazine)
A recapping of the existential threats facing today’s creative industries.
In case you were ignoring us (aka blatant self-promotion)
Stowe Story Labs SAGindie Fellowship
Congrats to our 2024 SAGindie Fellows!
Filmmaker Interview: Joanna Arnow, writer/director/star of The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed
Our interview with the award-winning actor/filmmaker.
Videos worth watching
SAG-AFTRA’s new low-budget sizzle reel (via SAG-AFTRA)
How ’bout you? Read anything good this month?
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If you’re an independent filmmaker or know of an independent film-related topic we should write about, email blogadmin@sagindie.org for consideration.