Giulia Rozzi
December 29, 2008 | 8:27 am EST
Conservation International recently joined the cast of Kung Fu Panda on the red carpet and received generous support from Dreamworks to help protect pandas. The Panda Protection Plan helps to preserve the remaining populations and habitat of this iconic and endangered species. Check out the panda’s Hollywood appearance with Jack Black, Angelina Jolie and Dustin Hoffman:
takepart by joining Conservation International’s Team Earth and help protect the panda and other endangered species and resources.
Okay, I get that talking during a movie may annoy you so much you want to kill someone, but not like literally, right?
Well 29-year old James Joseph Cialella Jr. of Philadelphia got so mad when a father and son were talking during a Christmas showing of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button he pulled a .380-caliber gun and shot the father! WHAT!?
Apparently Cialella told the family to be quiet and then threw popcorn at the son. After exchanging words, Cialella shot the father in the arm then sat down to watch the movie! The police arrived shortly after to arrest him.
Oh man, talk about anger issues. If you or someone you know is the type to flip out frantically and violently, you may want to takepart and check out The American Psychological Association’s page on anger management at http://www.apa.org/topics/controlanger.html
And you also may want to leave your gun at home next time you see a movie. Yikes!
So while in Ohio to vote and help the Obama camp, I also took advantage of the nice weather and my flip cam and took some video. And more than that, I took video while on my bicycle. I figured this little episode was perfect for our blog, because
1) It was taken on election day and in its own way I think it reflects on the general vibe of that day (sunny, bright and looking up) 2) In the video the benefits of my current job become clear 3) It is now winter and I think those of us on the East coast could use a little reminder of the beauty of fall.
When I Want To : 11/4/08 from Gina Telaroli on Vimeo.
Also - Danny’s earlier post got me excited about bike videos! If you’re like me and like taking video while on your bike or about bikes, takepart by submitting a film to next year’s Bicycle Film Festival coming to a town near you.
If you happen to be in Portland, OR this weekend I urge you to go see The Way Bobby Sees It at the Bicycle Film Festival, a remarkable documentary about a competitive mountain biker training to race one of the most difficult courses. Did I mention that Bobby is legally blind? This film looks incredible:
takepart by submitting your own remarkable film to next year’s Bicycle Film Festival coming to a town near you.
While many stars make no secret of championing their environmental efforts, the film and television industry as a whole has lagged behind and still maintains a massive carbon footprint. And while many production companies are working hard to reduce waste and energy consumption at their studios and offices, the biggest waste tends to take place on location. Film and TV producer Judith James writes about the excesses in Traction, an online publication for women in Hollywood:
Consider how much fuel we use. Generators, night shoots, ‘distant locations,’ trucks per shoot, idling trucks, moving cranes, moving everything, people, wardrobe, grip equipment, out to the set and back, move locations, fly crews and helicopters.
In 2007 major studios, including Fox, Disney, Paramount, NBC, and CBS redirected 20,862 tons of studio sets and other solid waste that would have gone to landfills, and instead reused and recycled the materials, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. This combined reduction of waste eliminated
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I was just telling my friend how there are so many movies I’ve been wanting to watch but just haven’t had the time lately. Well Suresh Joachim of Toronto, and Claudia Wavra, of Germany certainly found time. These two claim to have broken the world record for continuous movie watching, after seeing 57 films in 123 hours at Netflix Movie Watching World Championship. The movie-watching took place in a plexi-glass house in Times Square. Wow!
Filmmaker Magazine has released their list of the “25 New Faces of Independent Film.” The list is always an interesting read and as a filmmaker, I find it be motivation to get working on my own projects.
But what made the list totally awesome this year was the inclusion of the great Jesse Epstein! Jesse’s work mainly deals with body image and perceptions of beauty - a subject that definitely needs more discussion. Her film Wet Dreams and False Images takes us inside a barber shop where the patrons admire glossy pictures of famous women in little clothing and then to an airbrushing studio where we learn the truth about the ladies in the pictures.
One of my personal favorites, The Guarantee, is a hand drawn, animated story of a male dancer who is forced to make a decision regarding his nose and plastic surgery. It’s funny, poignant and the pacing is such that you have time to think about the issue at hand whilst simultaneously being entertained.
Another thing that makes Jesse super cool is that she works for Shooting People, an awesome group that works to connect and help promote independent filmmakers and their work! (You can even watch the film Wendy and I made with Meerkat Media on their site :
The TakePart Top 10 Weekly Roundup is a compilation of the week’s most notable stories from our entertainment-meets-social-action blogging network. Check out some of our most popular stories of the week, as well as a few TakePart blogger favorites!
TakePart Gang:
Obama Global Love Fest by Martin Musatov
Interview with Lawrence Lessig by Wendy Cohen
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Nicole Hughes:
Top 10 Ways to Green Your Move
Climate Change Activist Superglues Himself to UK Prime Minister
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Google Maps Adds Walking Directions
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Jon Popham:
Recycling Building Materials Greens Up Home Improvement
CA Hotel Owner’s Anti Same-Sex Marriage Donation Brings Boycott Calls
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Gina Telaroli:
If you’re in NYC today (and tomorrow) you should stop by New York International Latino Film Festival and catch a film. One that I recommend seeing is called La Americana. It’s a simple, moving portrait of a women caught between the realities of being an illegal immigrant and the love she feels for her family.
It was announced yesterday that Ebert and Roeper were both stepping down from their show “At The Movies”, Ebert for heath reasons, Roeper for contractual ones. And it was also announced that Ben Lyons and Ben Mankiewicz would be taking over for them. And to me, this begs the question, why not a lady? Growing up I always wondered why two older white men had to tell America what movies they should see, why couldn’t there be some variety? So now I wonder why do two younger white men get to tell America what movies they should see?
Of course most critics are men (and are also white…) so it isn’t ridiculous that there would be many able white male candidates available, but given that “At The Movies” is a television show and the point is actually to see the critics, couldn’t the show at least try to move things forward and show an awesome woman talking about movies? Especially since both ABC and Disney have claimed the show is moving forward in a “new direction?”
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Andy Kondrat:
