 |
Marc Israel is a filmmaker and musician. He started his career as a traveling "one-man band", but later changed his focus to making documentaries and films about his life.
|
Marc Israel is a filmmaker and musician. He started his career as a traveling "one-man band", but later changed his focus to making documentaries and films about his life.
Marc Israel was born and raised in Cinnaminson Township, New Jersey. A graduate of the New School for Social Research, Israel spent the remainder of his twenties hitchhiking the world and performing as a one-man-band. His often-improvised songs were of a humorous and sometimes bawdy nature, based on early American musical forms such as Delta Blues and primitive country music. Beginning in 1994, Israel lived and performed with Allen Ginsberg on and off until the poet's death. [1] His first feature-length film, How I Spent My Summer Vacation (1997), documented one of his cross-country hitchhikes as well as the effects and aftershocks of Ginsberg's passing on his close friends. It featured conversations with futurist Geoff Manaugh, poet Anne Waldman, and a host of strangers in their cars.
In 1999, due to mounting stage fright, Israel ceased performing music, but continued creating films of various lengths, genres, and styles, often focusing on his own emotional troubles, presented with candor and humor. In 2000, he completed the low-budget comic/horror fiction film Frankenstein's Little Monster, a re-visioning of Mary Shelley's novel focusing on the monster's frenzied sexual desires and eventual spiritual awakening. It included Beat Generation poet Peter Orlovsky in the role of Hindu holyman Rick Shaw. The documentary La Hamburguesa Magica (2003) presents a plagued and near-fatal Mexico misadventure undertaken by Israel and then-girlfriend Elyse Allen. By film's end they have separated and Marc is in a mental hospital. Nearer My God to Thee (2005), then follows a heartbroken and fragile Israel to Brazil, where he is seeking the help of famed "miracle man" João de Deus (medium) (John of God). It also explores the previous year's difficulties leading to this journey, including tendinitis, an invasion of ants into his house, an accidental wound to his penis, the aforementioned heartbreak, and a newly failed relationship. [2] A Balancing Act (2007), which won "Best Comedy Documentary" at both the Atlanta International Documentary Film Festival [3] and Montezuma International Film Festival, begins by tracking Israel as he presents Nearer My God to Thee at festivals, but departs from his trademark self-surveillance style as he learns about a mysterious event in Vietnam where contestants balance various objects on motorbikes. His curiosity leads him first to the Museum of Ephemerata in Texas where the curators restore him to health with their life-affirming attitudes and endless supply of Kombucha tea, [4] then to Iowa City where he develops a strong kinship with an eccentric university scholar who lectures on the balancing contest, and eventually to Southeast Asia, hitchhiking through Thailand, Cambodia, and finally Vietnam, where the contest takes place. [5]
After A Balancing Act, Marc Israel has created a series of short films including Encounters With Sarah [6] (commissioned by Found Magazine founder Davy Rothbart), a music video about his cat Barkley, [7] a documentary about folk music legend Michael Hurley, [8] and "an epic sea odyssey" filmed entirely in his bathtub using rubber duckies.
While Israel's personal documentaries have been lauded for their emotional honesty, [9] some viewers have questioned the legitimacy of Israel's claims to mental illness. "Supposedly suffering from an undiagnosable condition....the more he dwells on himself, the more convinced he is (and the less convinced the viewer is) of his mysterious handicaps", writes one film critic. [10] Alternately, there has been some speculation about whether the Museum of Ephemerata's "unique" Kombucha brew really had the positive mental health effects Israel claimed. "I no longer wanted to kill myself or anyone else. It caused a 'rebirth of wonder' within my whole molecular structure", says Israel in A Balancing Act. Mr. Israel started his own Kombucha brand, Phenomenal World Kombucha (named after his production company Phenomenal World Cinema), but halted operations due to an overwhelming increase of supply and demand inspired by word-of-mouth, association with his films, and endorsements by Michael Hurley.
Billy Childish is an English painter, author, poet, photographer, film maker, singer and guitarist. Since the late 1970s, Childish has been prolific in creating music, writing and visual art. He has led and played in bands including the Thee Milkshakes, Thee Headcoats, and the Musicians of the British Empire, primarily working in the genres of garage rock, punk and surf and releasing more than 100 albums.
Marc Evans is a Welsh director of film and television, whose credits include the films House of America, Resurrection Man and My Little Eye.
Jake Shimabukuro is a ukulele virtuoso and composer from Hawaii known for his fast and complex finger work. His music combines elements of jazz, blues, funk, rock, bluegrass, classical, folk, and flamenco. Shimabukuro has written numerous original compositions, including the entire soundtracks to two Japanese films, Hula Girls (2007) and Sideways (2009), the Japanese remake of the same name.
John Greyson is a Canadian director, writer, video artist, producer, and political activist, whose work frequently deals with queer characters and themes. He was part of a loosely affiliated group of filmmakers to emerge in the 1980s from Toronto known as the Toronto New Wave.
Marc Levin is an American independent film producer and director. He is best known for his Brick City TV series, which won the 2010 Peabody award and was nominated for an Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Nonfiction Filmmaking and his dramatic feature film, Slam, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and the Caméra d'Or at Cannes in 1998. He also has received three Emmy Awards and the 1997 DuPont-Columbia Award.
"Nearer, My God, to Thee" is a 19th-century Christian hymn by Sarah Flower Adams, which retells the story of Jacob's dream. Genesis 28:11–12 can be translated as follows: "So he came to a certain place and stayed there all night because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of that place and put it at his head, and he lay down in that place to sleep. Then he dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it..."
The Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles(IFFLA) is an annual film festival held in Los Angeles, California. Established by Christina Marouda in 2003, as a nonprofit organization devoted to paving the way for a greater appreciation of Indian cinema and diverse culture by providing the public with a selection of films from and about the Indian diaspora by Indian and international filmmakers.
Michael Hurley is an American folk singer-songwriter who was a part of the Greenwich Village folk music scene of the 1960s and 1970s. In addition to playing a wide variety of instruments, Hurley is also a cartoonist and a painter.
Khosrow Sinai was an Iranian film director, screenwriter, composer, poet and scholar.
Angus Cameron is a BAFTA Scotland nominated director.
Udi Aloni is an Israeli American filmmaker, writer, visual artist and political activist whose works focus on the interrelationships between art, theory, and action.
My Winnipeg is a 2007 Canadian film directed and written by Guy Maddin with dialogue by George Toles. Described by Maddin as a "docu-fantasia", that melds "personal history, civic tragedy, and mystical hypothesizing", the film is a surrealist mockumentary about Winnipeg, Maddin's home town. A New York Times article described the film's unconventional take on the documentary style by noting that it "skates along an icy edge between dreams and lucidity, fact and fiction, cinema and psychotherapy".
Rosto, was a Dutch artist and filmmaker best known for his award-winning short film trilogy and online graphic novel Mind My Gap. Rosto is the founder and owner of Studio Rosto A.D, a film production company, animation studio and atelier in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Yair Qedar is an Israeli documentary filmmaker, social activist and former journalist. In his project "the Hebrews", he had been Chronicling the lives of Jewish and Israeli figures of the modern Hebrew literary canon, Qedar's 19 feature length documentaries have all premiered at film festivals and have won the director over 30 prizes. Also, Qedar is a leading LGBTQ activist. He created several Queer films and the first Israeli LGBTQ newspaper.
Barry Michael Avrich is a Canadian film director, film producer, author, marketing executive, and arts philanthropist. Avrich's film career has included critically acclaimed films about the entertainment business including The Last Mogul about film producer Lew Wasserman (2005), Glitter Palace about the Motion Picture Country Home (2005), and Guilty Pleasure about the Vanity Fair columnist and author Dominick Dunne (2004). In addition, Avrich produced the Gemini-nominated television special Caesar and Cleopatra (2009) with Christopher Plummer. Avrich also produced Canada's Sports Hall of Fame Awards (2015) as well as the Canadian Screen Awards (2015-2017) and The Scotiabank Giller Prize (2015-Current).
Psalm 71 is the 71st psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in English in the King James Version: "In thee, O LORD, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion". It has no title in the Hebrew version. In the slightly different numbering system used in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate translations of the Bible, this psalm is Psalm 70. In Latin, it is known as "In te Domine speravi".
Psalm 84 is the 84th psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in the English of the King James Version: "How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts!". The Book of Psalms forms part of the Ketuvim section of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Christian Old Testament. In the slightly different numbering system of the Greek Septuagint version of the bible, and in its Latin translations, the Vulgate, this psalm is Psalm 83. In Latin, the psalm is known as "Quam dilecta tabernacula tua Domine virtutum". The psalm is a hymn psalm, more specifically a pilgrimage psalm, attributed to the sons of Korah.
Psalm 87 is the 87th psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in English in the King James Version: "His foundation is in the holy mountains.". In the slightly different numbering system used in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate translations of the Bible, this psalm is Psalm 86. In Latin, it is known as "Fundamenta eius in montibus sanctis". It was written by the sons of Korach. It describes Jerusalem as the center of the world or the "mother of nations", where God placed the Torah.
David Fisher is an Israeli documentary film director, producer and lecturer. In 1999–2008, he was Director General of The New Fund for Cinema and Television (NFCT).
Waxie Moon is a gender-bending neo-burlesque persona of the performer Marc Kenison. Kenison studied modern dance at Juilliard School and acting at University of Washington. During his six years dancing for the José Limón Company, Kenison performed for the White House and toured other parts of the world, including the war-torn Sarajevo and El Salvador. After co-founding the Washington Ensemble Theater in Seattle, Kenison turned to burlesque and created Waxie Moon, whom he describes as "the gender-blending queer lady boylesque performance art solo stripping sensation".