me and you and everyone we know

[noyes]

The L Magazine has a "Me and You.." ad in and around the first page. You can use it to get in to the advance screening just a day before on Thursday, June 16th at IFC Center. First come, first serve, and its starts at 9, so be there around.. you get the idea.

-mg

[MacGuffin]

Her own lights, camera, action
Performance and video artist Miranda July did things a little differently when it came time to make a feature film.
Source: Los Angeles Times



When, on her third try, Miranda July finally got into the Sundance Screenwriting Labs, she had already established herself as a performance and video artist and was eager to turn her attention to a narrative feature film project. At Sundance, she says, people were aware of her fine-art background as well as her outspoken decision to make a movie her own way — as a hybrid of conventional features and the dreamy landscapes of her earlier work. So they approached her a little differently than they would someone trying to write the next "Pulp Fiction."

"People knew I was pretty skeptical. They would sort of be like, 'Do you know about three-act structure?' 'No.' 'Well, are you interested?' And I'd be like, 'Tell me what it is,' and then I wouldn't be," she said in the slightly spacey, drawn-out way one might expect from someone who grew up in Berkeley, then spent some 10 years in the artist-friendly environs of Portland, Ore. (July recently moved to Los Angeles.)

As the filmmaking process went on, she came to appreciate some of the rules of narrative filmmaking. "I was more interested in structure when I got to the editing stage," she continues. "I did have some vague 'Oh, yeah' — I kind of got why people would approach it that way, even though I probably never would."

The film she created, "Me and You and Everyone We Know," screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival this week and arrives in theaters Friday bearing as fine a pedigree as any film of the season: After its January premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, "Me and You" was given a Special Jury Prize for "originality of vision," then received four prizes at the recent Cannes Film Festival and has picked up a handful of other festival awards.

July's previous work, which has twice been included in the prestigious Whitney Biennial, would likely fall into the category of "mixed media"; as the bio on her website puts it, "Miranda July makes movies, performances, recordings and combinations of these things."

For "Me and You," July, 31, served as writer, director and lead actress, playing an aspiring artist who falls for a single dad/shoe salesman played with uncanny charm by "Deadwood" actor John Hawkes.

Along the way, strange incidents and intersections draw a seemingly disconnected circle of neighbors and co-workers closer and closer. Some of the film's most provocative moments explore the emergent sexuality of a group of children, including a rather charming exchange in cyberspace between a 7-year-old boy and an unknowing prospective (and full-grown) paramour. In someone else's hands, these scenes might seem exploitative or off-color, but July manages to present them as gentle, tentative steps into a new world.

"I judged my own intentions," she says, in describing how she tried to discern when she might be crossing the line into the inappropriate. "I might need more room than exists in the culture to feel different things. I wanted to trust myself enough to not make it totally black and white."

And she didn't shy away from material that reflected her own past. Her character is an artist who can't get her work into a local show, and there is some humor at the expense of an art curator. While she admits she had second thoughts about some of the art world themes, she ultimately decided they were valid: "My thing isn't more weird than anyone else's thing."

In the end, July sees "Me and You" as occupying a space that pushes "the commercialization of more experimental stuff.….I really wanted it to be a very normal movie."

As she wrote the script, rather than relying on some preconceived notion of plot or what the movie might be "about," July let her feelings guide her, creating the heavily articulated mood and tone that are the film's biggest strengths — and presumably the factor that has set it apart from other quirky-on-purpose indie romantic comedies.

"When I sat down to write each day," she says, "I would think, 'What is the feeling of today? What's particular about my life right now?' And I would just trust that. It doesn't really look like it, but the film really is very much about me now, kind of laid over the characters.

"I would start from there, and sometimes that required a new character or a totally new direction. I would do this sort of detective work, looking at the scene and thinking, 'I wonder who this person knows.' It was almost as if the story had already been written, and I was this sleuth who had to uncover it."

[meatwad]

can anybody tell me what the first song in the trailer is? i think it is a spacemen 3/spiritualized song, but i can't figure out which one

EDIT: figured it out. it's "anyway that you want me" by spiritualized

[cowboykurtis]

has anyone seen this yet? i enjoyed it for the most part. i was willing to overlook some weaker elelments due to the fact that it seemed to come from such a sincere place.

i think sincerity is unique these days...

[Ghostboy]

A few of us saw it on the festival circuit and posted about it on the first page of this thread.

[cron]

anyone has the soundtrack on mp3 format?

[MacGuffin]

Indie filmmaker July wary as Hollywood beckons

Stay independent or go Hollywood? Filmmaker Miranda July, facing sudden success with her quirky movie "Me You and Everyone We Know," says she has already made up her mind.

July's low budget, independent movie, which was released in U.S. theaters earlier this month, has racked up awards at Sundance, Cannes and other festivals.

It has also won warm reviews, earned solid box office and brought first-time filmmaker July the distinction of being called a fresh cinematic voice.

But with Hollywood now beckoning, July, who wrote and stars in the offbeat romantic comedy, says she plans to go back to her work as a performance artist and writer.

And she refuses to pigeonhole the freewheeling "Me and You" into a slogan the way Hollywood's commercial movie marketing demands.

She calls her film "a conversation about loneliness and longing and sort of asking: 'Are you this way? Do we have to be this way? Are there things you've invented that let you out of your own world and allow you to connect?"'

When asked why her screenplay seemed to stray outside the basic three acts of a typical feature film, July admitted she never bothered to check the structure.

That convention-bending quality of the movie has made it a hit with many critics. The New York Times said that her film "introduces playful qualities of installation art to the conventions of narrative cinema."

'LEARNING TO LOVE'

In "Me and You," July plays a performance artist looking for her big break in the art world, and also for love.

But when she finds romance, it is with a reluctant partner, Richard, who is newly single and raising sons, Robby and Peter. Robby, 7, bluffs his way through Internet sex chats he barely understands, while Peter, 14, becomes the unwitting sex partner for a pair of adventurous neighborhood girls.

The 31-year-old filmmaker for years was best known as a performance artist. Her piece, "learningtoloveyoumore.com," for example, was part of the 2004 Whitney Biennial in New York.

That project, which includes a Web site, challenges participants to join by completing "assignments" and sending in the results including: "Draw a scene from a movie that made you cry" and "Make a paper replica of your bed."

Before "Me and You," she made a few short films with titles like "Haysha Royko" and "The Amateurist," which have been screened at venues such as the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Museum, also in New York.

But with "Me and You," July has what could be a crossover hit with mainstream movie audiences. Two weeks ago, "Me and You" took in $30,800 from only one screen in New York, and this past week after adding four more in Los Angeles and Chicago, it grossed $15,840 per theater.

By contrast, this past weekend's No. 1 movie, "Batman Begins," averaged just under $7,000 per screen, according to box office tracker boxofficemojo.com.

With that kind of success, a young filmmaker like July would expect Hollywood to come knocking at her door, but she said she wants a little distance from the movies for now. She is working on a new art piece and on a book of short stories.

"How little anyone cares about them, they suddenly seem like a nice respite," she said.

[noyes]

http://www.elginpark.com/meandyousite1.htm

[cron]

yeah, i was in that page all yesterday's evening listening but i want it on mp3 ,it's good

[noyes]

eventually it should be on soulseek. or some torrent site.
i'll keep you posted. vice versa.

[cron]

aight  

[Fernando]

Man! I can see why you want it so bad cron, it's amazing, everyone should check out that link given by noyes.

[md]

wow that trailer looks amazing! hopefully it will be screening somewhere close to me.

[Slick Shoes]

I really liked it. So many wonderful little moments.

[w/o horse]

Shit.  Did I miss this film's theatrical run or is it just now opening?  It's not playing in my parts.