2 min listen
Violet Columbus & Ben Klein (The Exiles)
Violet Columbus & Ben Klein (The Exiles)
ratings:
Length:
36 minutes
Released:
Mar 9, 2023
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
“How would I describe myself? Fuck you. You can describe me.” Fair enough. The Oscar-nominated director of 1988’s essential documentary “Who Killed Vincent Chin?” before she became a NYU professor famous for drinking vodka on the rocks during class, Shanghai-born filmmaker Christine Choy is a character so incandescent that she’s every bit as powerful in front of the camera as she is behind it — a fact that “The Exiles” seizes upon from the moment it starts. In their debut feature film, Ben Klein and Violet Columbus follow their former professor Christine as she tracks down three exiled dissidents from the Tiananmen Square massacre to help her find closure on an abandoned film she began shooting in 1989. "The Exiles" premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and was awarded the Grand Jury Prize for U.S. Documentary. In today's episode, Ben and Violet reflect on being mentored by Christine Choy (3:10), pitching the film premise to Christine (6:21), getting the film off the ground (10:30), replicating Christine’s archival footage with modern cinematography (15:58), building the interview setup in an empty movie theater (18:12), persuading Steven Soderberg to be an Executive Producer (22:12), deciding when to screen the film (28:50), and winning the Grand Jury Prize at a virtual Sundance (32:15).
Released:
Mar 9, 2023
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (48)
Introducing: The Dangerous Art of the Documentary with Tiller Russell: Hosted by acclaimed filmmaker Tiller Russell (Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer, Operation Odessa, The Last Narc, The Seven-Five), THE DANGEROUS ART OF THE DOCUMENTARY is a new series that reveals the wild stories behind some of the world’s most successful and iconic documentaries. Exchanging his camera for a microphone, Russell sits down with a who's-who of documentary filmmakers for riveting, in-depth conversations surrounding the intricate process of producing an engrossing documentary. In season one—debuting August 11, 2022—listeners can hear from documentarians including Allen Hughes (The Defiant Ones), James Gay-Rees (Amy, Senna), Maclain and Chapman Way (Wild Wild Country, Untold), Jaimie D’Cruz (Exit Through the Gift Shop), Joe Berlinger (Conversations with a Serial Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes), Mark Lewis (Don’t F**k With Cats) and Emmett Malloy (Biggie: I Got A Story To Tell). New episodes appear by The Dangerous Art of the Documentary