Inspiration and fuel for film makers

Glasgow Film Festival is on until the 22nd. If you are in the area do go and catch some films. Film festivals are great because they ought to show a large number of films shorts and features which don't normally get screened. If you write you should read a lot and if you are a film maker or have ambitions to be one then you should see lots of different films.

Saw Milk this week myself- fantastic.

the two week turnaround tour

Filmblazer a community film making project will visit 14 cities in the next 17 months in the US and will write, shoot, edit and screen a short film in each city in two weeks.

More info here

Shorts for St Valentines day

article over at the Guardian

Rushes Soho Shorts Festival - call for entries

The entry form for this year's Rushes Soho Shorts Festival can now be downloaded at http://www.sohoshorts.com/.

The festival provides many programmes and events for free, intending to encourage, inspire and promote talented filmmakers to the public and the huge number of production companies and creative organisations in and around London and the UK.It is also free to enter your film to the festival, sumbit it on DVD along with an entry form to: Rushes Soho Shorts, 66 Old Compton Street, London, W1D 4UH, UK.

Films can be submitted up until Thursday 23 April with the shortlisted films being announced early June and the full programme available from 1 July. The festival will open on Wednesday 22 July and will culminate, as is tradition, with the Rushes Awards hosted by Terry Christian on Thursday 30 July 2009.

Further information can be found at http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=7Ec_m&m=1cuCXlhybY4y01&b=leSFAqqe.jV2EqaaZddi3g.

Satyajit Ray Foundation's Short Film Competition

call for entries
This competition is open to all filmmakers either resident or studying in the UK. The closing date, after which no entries can be considered, is Sunday 1 March 2009.

Films should express and inform aspects of the experiences of South Asians (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) either within their own countries or the Diaspora. Films must also have been completed within two years of the award deadline, and not have been previously submitted.There is one cash prize for Best Film of £1,000.For more information and to download a submission form, please visit www.satyajitray.org.uk

Super 8

The short film format par excellence - just found this fab site Super8.org which looks like a feast of treasures.

Using new media to fund and distribute films

interesting article over at Netribution

smallest short film festival ever?

but biggest audience ? more info at Netribution.

Edinburgh International Film Festival submissons now open

just a wee reminder - go here

shadowplay

David Cairns of the incredibly erudite film blog Shadowplay is blogging once a week about Hitchcock's entire oevre. If you feel your film history knowledge is lacking you need to spend time over there.

Underground shorts film maker - Jeff Keen

"Keen started making films in the late 1950s, when he was 37. His muse and wife-to-be, Jackie Foulds, was attending college in Brighton as an art student, and Keen, then working as a gardener for Brighton council's parks department, was running a film society. He recalls his decision to become a film-maker with characteristic nonchalance. "Looking back, I didn't really think about a trajectory. I just asked to borrow a camera. I always worked with borrowed cameras. Once I started filming, I just had to carry on. I couldn't stop. It was natural."

More from the Guardian

Arvon Foundation Courses

I have to recommend these highly - I've been on two (one tutored and one untutored) both helped me onto the next level with my writing.They are pricy but have incredibly generous bursaries for students and low income people.

more info here

Book as soon as possible as they fill fast.