June 8th is World Oceans Day, a day to “celebrate and honor the body of water which links us all, for what it provides humans and what it represents.” As a nod to World Oceans Day, the LA 3-D Club, in conjunction with San Diego-based PassmoreLab, is presenting the Los Angeles premiere of Ocean Voyagers 3D tomorrow night at the Downtown Independent. The 72-minute documentary features rare footage gathered by filmmakers with unprecedented access.

Narrated by Oscar, Golden Globe and Emmy Award winning actress Meryl Streep, and filmed over a 5-year span in the waters of French Polynesia, Hawaii, Alaska and beyond, the film follows a mother humpback whale and her newborn calf in a “coming of age” journey for the neonate giant.

Blogging.la is giving a pair of tickets to the screening to one commenter. Leave us a note and one lucky winner will be selected around Noon tomorrow.  See below for more details about the event:

Ocean Voyagers 3D Screening + Q&A
Sunday, June 5, 2011 at 8pm

Downtown Independent Theater is located at 251 S. Main St., Los Angeles, 90012

$5 for current LA3DClub members; $10 for non-members (admission is waived with USC Student ID)
FREE if your comment is selected at random!

“Vegas, baby. Vegas.”

The film that spawned one of the most overused Vegas quotes of our time isn’t about Las Vegas at all. Swingers is so L.A.

Location. Location. Location. For me, the thrill of watching Swingers is noticing all of the familiar locations around town. The characters in this film never stay in one spot for long, always on the move from one bar to another bar, to a Hollywood Hills party, then to a coffee shop for a late night breakfast. All in their own separate cars of course. It’s laughable, but even today I notice that most of my friends in L.A. drive separately, despite that we all live in close proximity of each other and are meeting at the same place.

When I relocated to L.A. in 2003, the very first bar a friend took me to was The Dresden Restaurant to see Marty and Elayne perform. Immortalized by the film, The Dresden remains one of my favorite lounges in L.A. Located at 1760 North Vermont Avenue in Los Feliz, The Dresden makes its appearance in the scene where Mike (Jon Read the rest of this entry →

L.A. Conservancy has announced their new season of Last Remaining Seats, their annual series of classic films and live entertainment in historic theatres. Tickets go on sale to Conservancy members on March 31 and the general public on April 14, but you should mark your calendars now with the following films and venues:

This is where you should be on Wednesday nights at 8pm:
May 26: How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1967) at Los Angeles Theatre
June 2: Strangers on a Train (1951) at Million Dollar Theatre
June 9: American Graffiti (1973) at Orpheum Theatre
June 16: The Graduate (1967) at Los Angeles Theatre
June 23: Flor silvestre (Wild Flower) (1943) — co-presented by the Latin American Cinemateca of Los Angeles at Million Dollar Theatre
June 30: Peter Pan (1924) at Orpheum Theatre

Advance tickets are $16 each for Conservancy members and $20 each for the general public. A limited number of series tickets are available, and discounts are available for groups of ten or more.

Crafters and craft enthusiasts, this is your moment!

This weekend is the Los Angeles premiere of Handmade Nation, presented to you by the good folks at Cinefamily.

In addition to screening the film, they’re having a mini-craft fair at the premiere and a Q+A with the director, plus  live silkscreening demos.

Saturday, August 15th
12:00 premiere $25 (includes swag bag)
7:00 $12

Sunday, August 16th, all screenings $12
3:00, 5:00, 7:00 & 9:00

Read the rest of this entry →

As April is coming to an end, we head on into May — nationally designated as Asian Pacific Islander (API) Heritage Month. API Heritage month commemorates and recognizes the diversity of API languages and cultures and celebrates of the achievements and contributions of API communities in America. In that spirit, 8Asians (another blog I contribute to) is celebrating Asian Americans in the arts with an “Asian American Arts Stimulus Package” giveaway (deadline: Friday at noon) to one lucky winner who will be the recipient of a pair of tickets to THREE amazing events in the L.A. area. Although you’re free to enter the giveaway, I wanted to note that just about all these shows have availability for low-priced tickets, too.

1) The Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival: 2009

Visual Communications, the nation’s premier Asian Pacifc American media arts center, established the Los Angeles Asian Pacifc Film & Video Festival in 1983 as a vehicle to promote Asian and Asian Pacifc American cinema. The Festival has grown from its humble beginnings as a weekend-long series into a major annual showcase presenting the best of Asian Pacifc American and Asian international media in the United States. As of 2008, the Film Festival is known by its permanent iteration The Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival.

2) Lodestone Theatre Ensemble: Ten to Life

A Census agent exposes a family’s perverse, hidden secret…A desperate loser turns to experimental surgery to seduce his high school crush…A happy homemaker struggles against an ancient evil that lurks in plain sight…A controlling psychologist must protect his life’s love from her memories. Lodestone kicks off its final season with four twisted one-acts touching on the bizarre and unnatural. It’s been ten years… Time to pay.

3) East West Players: Marry Me A Little & The Last Five Years, an evening of 2 one-act musicals!

MARRY ME A LITTLE: A compilation of songs, composed by Stephen Sondheim for many of his Broadway musicals but for various reasons didn’t make it into the final stage, are woven into a simple tale of two lonely people during one evening in their small, one-bedroom apartments. Featuring Mike Dalager & Jennifer Hubilla
THE LAST FIVE YEARS: There are two sides to every story…Jamie and Cathy’s 5-year old relationship is coming to an end, and through the funny , sweet and heart-breaking songs, you hear both versions of what happened–from beginning to end, and from the end to beginning. Featuring Michael K. Lee & Jennifer Paz

Over the years, I’ve attended events put on by each of these organizations and always come out feeling lucky that L.A. has such a vibrant Asian American arts scene. Why not take some time out in the month of May to do something for API Heritage Month, like attending one of the shows listed above? If you do, I’d love to hear what you think.

Los Angeles (Metblogs) – Just when you thought you’d have to wait until Festival De Cannes in May to spread that gooey brie all over your crusty baguette and stick it in your grosse bouche, a week of French films will be premiering in Hollywood April 20 – 26, 2009 as part of the 13th annual COL•COA French Film Festival.

Francois Truffart at the 2007 COL•COA Film Festival

Metblogs reader, Laure confirmed that tickets are available online NOW and will likely sell out! Click here to check out what’s available.

Beginning April 11, you can purchase advance tickets at the COL•COA box office (cash or checks only) located in the lobby of the Directors Guild of America. During the festival, the box office will open a half an hour before the first show time of the day. All films will be presented with English subtitles.

The event takes place at the Directors Guild of America Theater Complex at 7920 Sunset, LA, CA 90046.

So how many francs will this petite festival set you back? Read the rest of this entry →

It’s that time of the year again! Time to drag out the classics. From the Echo Park Film Center, whose last date of operation before it closes for the holidays is this Satruday (they won’t re-open until January):

What a wacky and wonderful year it’s been! Join us for EPFC’s last event of 2009… our annual screening of that ol’ holiday classic, It’s A Wonderful Life. Sentimental sobbing encouraged.

Also on the bill, a very rare and special treat: incredible Super 8 footage of the 1967 Echo Park Christmas Parade shot by the one and only Mr. Al Kasselman! Neighborhood history at its finest!

And for those who have been both naughty and nice, a very special presentation of Doug Harvey’s Moldy Slide Show.

The event is free, with eggnog, cookies & reindeer treats in attendance, as well as your lovely visage.

Last Friday I finally got around to seeing There Will Be Blood over at the Arclight Cinemas in Hollywood. I wanted to see the film under the best circumstances possible with particular consideration paid to the picture quality. TWBB was in fact shot and posted with a minimum of digital enhancement, most notably where the final color-timing is concerned. (You can read all about it in January’s edition of American Cinematographer Magazine).

Many movies these days go through what is called a digital intermediate. This means that the movie is shot on film, scanned into a computer at two or four thousand lines of resolution, digitally enhanced or altered (the intermediate), and then captured back to film using a laser camera. The “old” way of doing things was to shoot the film on film, then using a series of red, blue, and green printer lights, a colorist would adjust the luminance and chrominance values of the picture, then print the results from the negative directly to film (for more information, read Richard Crudo, ASC’s “A Call for Digital Printer Lights”).

This analogue method of coloring tends to work more within the parameters of a particular film stock’s unique “look”, unlike the DI process which can extend the colorist’s reach beyond the boundaries of the original negative’s capabilities.

That being said, TWBB is a gorgeous film. Having now seen it I can see why Elswit won the Oscar. Each scene has its own look and speaks with its own visual language. I was originally going to see it at the Dome on Sunset when it was playing there a few weeks ago, because as far as I knew the Dome had the best picture and sound in Hollywood. I asked a friend at work if he wanted to come along. He shook his head.

“If you’re going to see that movie, then don’t see it at the Dome,” he replied. “The Dome sucks.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because every movie I’ve seen there looks like shit,” he stated.

 Find out why after the jump…

Read the rest of this entry →