Debbie Arnold Brown was invited to be a guest blogger on the blog Pledging for Change. Here is a link to her article:
2010: A Video Odyssey
Monday, July 19, 2010
2010: A Video Odyssey
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Michael on the Radio
I was invited to be a guest on a radio show in early May. The show is called The Marketing of Business, and it aired on WWDB AM 890 on May 8th and 9th. Being that those were Saturday and Sunday evening slots, not many of our friends were able to listen. So, I asked the show for permission to post it online. We have broken the show into 5 clips on YouTube.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Shakey Review by Pat Ganley
At nearly 800 pages Shakey, a biography about Neil Young, is bible thick and even biblically epic, covering love, wars, death, and betrayal. And much like the Bible, the task of reading it, cover to cover, might seem to be for true devotees. But even the casual fan will be rewarded by the exciting and knowledgeable account of events in the life of an artist who has sneezed out a 40-year catalogue of money-making hits one week and self-indulgent experiments the next. Devotees, however, will marvel at the tremendous access author Jimmy McDonough had to the reclusive singer-songwriter. After giving McDonough authorization to write the book, Young, in a schizophrenic fashion we learn to be true to the artist, tried to stop its release. McDonough delves deep into Young's internal conflict and Janus-headed persona. One side is the tequila-fueled, play-whatever-the-hell-you-want guy, who released Tonight’s the Night; it’s the Young who pursued that great moment of inspiration within a raw-sounding performance, and not in high fidelity and over-dubbing. While another side is the micro-managing control freak behind the bizarre synthesizer and vocoder-laden Trans.
What makes Shakey an especially fantastic read is the author's tone throughout –McDonough is clearly a fan. He relates the first time he heard the often-described Irish wake of an album, Tonight's the Night as a pivotal moment in his life, and vividly reminds us of those moments in our lives, when a piece of art, music, or film alters our perception of the world. For McDonough, the album was a "lifesaver." But his description of the album is not exhausted by his personal affection for it; he also puts its release into a historical context—a time when "the charts were full of pop confections." McDonough’s description of the album’s simultaneous personal and historical impact characterizes his approach to the book. "For me, the seventies can be summed up by just three things," he writes. "Those grotesque early shopping malls, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Tonight's the Night. Decay, but with a gleam in it’s eye." If the reader didn't already love that album, McDonough's observations about its impact, as well as his rich description of its songs and smoke-filled boozy production will at the very least provoke one to reconsider its place in rock history as one of the greatest albums of 70’s. Frankly, McDonough made me realize that a single book could have been written about this album alone, and I'm surprised no one has jumped at the chance to publish a 33 1/3 on the subject. (What gives Continuum?) Of course writing one in the face of McDonough’s moving and exhaustive prose will undoubtedly intimidate would-be authors.
Just because some of us think that Young’s best work was done in the 70's doesn't mean that McDonough ignores the rest. Shakey is the story of a man’s life, not just his career and not just his creative output—however inextricable those continue to be. We learn about Young's parents in Toronto: his mother, Rassie, a local TV celebrity, and his sports writer father Scott divorced when Young was quite, well, young. We also learn about a childhood spent with a transistor radio under his pillow, blasting the sounds of early rock and roll—thanks to Wolfman Jack—as well as lots of honky tonk and country music. In a way reminiscent of Tonight’s the Night’s later impact on the author, McDonough describes the radical impact that the Marty Robbins’ song, "Don't Worry" had on Young; of the song with "the first Fuzztone guitar," Young would proclaim, "See, that's country music—fu**in’ feedback came from country. Who woulda (sic) even thought. But there it was."
Such interviews comprise much of the content of this book. McDonough not only interviewed Young, but 300 other people, including those who work for Young, are fans of Young, who hate Young, who love or have loved Young. While this many-sided view of a man already thought to exhibit symptoms of a split personality could have resulted in a vertigo-like reading experience, Shakey’s structure is remarkably straightforward. McDonough tells the story more or less chronologically, allowing the varying perspectives to come and go, all the while maintaining the authority won by his well-researched text and meticulous interview transcripts. Most authorized biographies imagine themselves to be “the end all, be all,” the final word on the life of a person—the absolute truth. It’s clear, however, that McDonough doesn't feel that way about his project. The story of a life, perhaps especially the extraordinary life of Neil Young, will never be understood in so straightforward a manner; McDonough’s awareness of this is communicated in one fell swoop by the title alone. Shakey is derived from Neil Young’s film director pseudonym, Bernard Shakey, and this title exhibits our inability to pin Young down – even “Young” as a name is insufficient.
Indeed, this book isn’t a simple story, nor is McDonough’s authorial agenda a simple one. He isn’t out to praise Young unabashedly for his artistic achievements—quite the contrary. His compliments in one paragraph are answered by another paragraph that calls Young out for running away from problems or throwing money at them. He doesn’t use interviews with Young to assert “the way it was.” Young's perspective rarely clarifies things; often, he's downright contradictory. He'll change his mind as often as the wind shifts direction. Did you know that the anti-“W” Young was a supporter of Ronald Reagan? Or that he thought Woodstock—and peace and love, for that matter—was nonsense and that he refused to be on camera for the concert film? Did you know he's obsessed with trains and owned part of the Lionel Company in the 90's? Jimmy McDonough learned all of this after eight years of research and shared it with us in this immensely entertaining book, supplying footnotes to suggest he isn't lying, even when Neil Young might be.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Film Review by Meghan Giglio
Film Review
By Meghan Giglio
I remember years ago my mom telling me of the days she used to go to the chicken market with her mom to buy fresh chicken for dinner. She said the chickens would be in coups and you would pick out your chicken (I imagine similar to lobsters in a tank when dining at a fancy seafood restaurant). When the best looking chicken was picked, my mom said the butcher would grab it, chop the chicken’s head off, clean it, package it and off you went. Yet, my mom’s FAVORITE part was every so often, the chicken, now headless, would sometimes manage to wriggle from the butcher’s grasp and run around. She thought this was hysterical. I on the other hand, was a bit mortified.
After watching Food, Inc., a documentary dispelling where our food comes from, I have learned that presently our food travels on average of about 1,500 miles from place of origin to our table. That’s quite a change. So much in fact one of the first shocking statements Food, Inc., starts with is how the way our food is processed today has changed more in the last 50 years than in the past 10,000 years.
Food, Inc. states early on that even if you’ve made a conscious choice to avoid fast food, an industry debated for years, fast food hasn’t avoided you. The fast food we get in the little window at the drive thru is produced on the same mentality as the ever fresh tomatoes piled high in bins and the stacked meat and poultry lined on the back walls of our grocery stores. Food wasn’t always this similar. As the slogan on the front of the Food, Inc.’s DVD box exclaims, “You’ll never look at dinner the same way again.”
That said, I’m sure there are many people who have heard of Food Inc, but would rather keep his or her head buried in the sand, “So long as it doesn’t kill me, I don’t care.” But that’s the thing, food has killed—many. E. coli, salmonella, obesity and diabetes are all explained consequences within Food, Inc. However, the biggest part to remember when thinking of viewing this film is its intent is not to scare us away from our food, but to make us aware of our food; where it comes from, and how we can change the Food Industry.
Food, Inc. is directed and produced by Robert Kenner. He weaves this story with the help of two well known and knowledgeable subjects, Michael Pollen, author of Omnivores Dilemma and Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation. Each author helps narrate the unveiling of the Food Industry. They explain how the fast food mentality was revolutionized by the McDonald Brothers back in the 1930’s; assembly lines were brought back to the kitchen like a factory. Today, 4 meat distributors control 80% of our meat.
Food, Inc. is a visually stimulating documentary luring you right from the start with alluding image labels on our food, accompanied by sweet, chiming music. These images represent the happy façade the food industry has used to continue the idea that our food comes from a friendly farm in Iowa where pigs roll in mud with glee and cows munch grass until full. A camera winds sedately through our grocery store isles suggesting diversity, selection, and like the calm before the storm, these happy images dissolve. Dark, sinister conveyor belts now move our not so happy livestock toward a place looking more like the mouth of hell; the slaughter factories. Once farms, now factories.
I will warn, this film is not the best candidate for good ol’ fashioned family fun nor would I suggest it on a first date, however as Michael Pollen says early on, “The idea that you would need to write a book telling people where our food comes from is just a sign of how far removed we’ve become.” I first ask, why wouldn’t we want to know? But more importantly, why DON’T we know? Food, Inc. points out, because we’ve never asked, stating, “The industry doesn’t want you to know because if you did you may not want to eat it.”
Now from a film standpoint, of course all films, be it documentaries or narrative fictions are still subjective. One should always keep in mind to take a film’s contents with a grain of salt. Perspectives are held and what the filmmakers want us to know is told through shot selection and edit process.
That said, I don’t believe Food, Inc’s purpose is to just bash the food industry and hope the public doesn’t eat again. The film’s running theme is our right to know as consumers and demanding change. This is important to know because as Food, Inc.’s story unravels with beautiful interweaving shots of corn fields in Iowa to shocking footage of feces filled grow houses throughout the south, we should be demanding change.
As Food, Inc. delivers its questions, it layers its answers successfully. There are plenty of first account interviews given by science experts, grow house farmers and undocumented workers all juxtaposed with shot images and archival footage. For example, Food, Inc. reminds its viewers of past and not so past, food poison outbreaks by showing news anchors covering stories from 1993 to 2007. Remember E. coli outbreaks in our meat and spinach? The salmonella in our tomatoes and peanut butter? Food, Inc. helps to show how one has absolutely EVERYTHING to do with the other.
With all the shocking facts Food, Inc. states about the food industry, it’s always good to question the validity and sources. I did at times wonder where subjects have been getting certain stated facts and numbers, but that doesn’t mean I discredit it. They all make sense. However, an image of a chicken, belly up, panting for breath in an over stuffed, confined grow house is something I don’t have to question. The images are disturbing. The images are real. The images speak volumes of what I thought I knew.
Beyond that, what Food Inc really wants us to realize is that the food industry is powerful, but only as powerful as the consumer dollar makes them. Food, Inc gives more than enough support and reason to purchase organic, wholesome and sustainable foods, free of growth hormones, preservatives and pesticides. Why wouldn’t we want to eat this? Ever wonder why chips cost more than carrots? This film has the answers. Farmer Troy Roush, Vice President of American Corn Grower’s Association says, “People need to start demanding good wholesome food from us and we’ll deliver, we promise. We’re very ingenious people, we’ll deliver.”
Monday, November 9, 2009
Steadicam at PWP
Long time staffer and PWP Director of Photography Tom MaCoy is no longer just a certified Steadicam Operator, he is now a Steadicam Owner/Operator. This means that PWP and our clients will have even greater access to high quality dynamic video.
For those unfamiliar, Steadicam is a Academy Award Winning invention by Westchester, PA based Garret Brown. Early famous shots include the Rocky Steps sequence and multiple sequences in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining.
Never ones to be amazed only by the ability of technology, we are looking forward to deploying the Steadicam in future productions where the added storytelling value of moving camera will increase the visual and emotional impact of our shot choices.
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