SXSW 2025: Tapping Into Texas’s Vast Potential to Become the Next Cinematic Frontier
This year’s SXSW film festival in Austin blew into town with a considerable tailwind of enthusiasm for the Lone Star state’s film and TV future. Every state in the union can claim unique cultures, geographies, and mythologies, but there’s no disputing that Texas looms very large in our collective cultural imagination. It’s a state that takes very seriously the notion that it’s really a country.
Texas’s hold on our imagination is evident in how many great films and TV series are set there (whether they’re actually filmed there or not—we’ll get to that in a second),
From Mumbai to Batam: The Unexpected Journey of Dev Patel’s “Monkey Man”
Actor-turned-director Dev Patel, best known for his breakthrough role in Slumdog Millionaire, received a well-earned standing ovation for his directorial feature debut, Monkey Man, at the SXSW Film & TV Festival in Austin Texas this past March. His thrilling, kinetic debut went on to win the Headliners Audience Award.
The fight-filled action epic produced by Get Out and Us director Jordan Peele was inspired by the story of the half-monkey,
The Streaming Innovation Alliance’s Mission Continues
The Streaming Innovation Alliance turns a year old today. If you haven’t heard of SIA, you’ve certainly been impacted by its commitment to giving streamers a unified voice so they can keep creating the films and television series you love – and delivering them to audiences when, where, and how they choose to watch. Once viewed as an upstart to traditional entertainment, streamers have become a beloved part of the visual storytelling landscape. As the advent and deployment of digital film capabilities upended but did not replace the use of film on film and TV sets,
Pioneering Producer Auchara Kijkanjanas on Animating Thailand’s Entertainment Industry
A pioneer of animation in Thailand, producer Auchara Kijkanjanas is no stranger to copyright infringement. The founder and head of Big Brain Studio produced the nation’s first big animation hit, which was pirated shortly after it was released. Hence, Kijkanjanas takes both personal and professional satisfaction from witnessing the changes in attitude and behavior toward intellectual property that have occurred in subsequent years. She also holds out hope that something like Thailand’s generous and successful production incentives for live-action projects from overseas might one day be introduced for the animation sector.
Taiwan Based Producer Sam Yuan on His Netflix Series “Shards of Her” & More
In a career that spans over two decades, Taiwan-based producer Sam Yuan has been involved in a variety of productions, from critically acclaimed GF*BF and box office megahit Our Times in his early days to the more recent, Golden Horse-winning My Missing Valentine and Netflix hit series Shards of Her.
He is currently the secretary general of the Taiwanese industry organization, New Media Entertainment Association (NMEA),
Trusted Partner Network President Terri Davies on Cyber Security in 2022 & Beyond
Terri Davies became the president of the Trusted Partner Network (TPN) this past February, and her role really couldn’t be more crucial. She was tapped to lead the Motion Picture Association (MPA)’s evolving TPN program into a flexible, multi-tiered model to better serve the vendor and content owner communities and align with the rapid changes in the film and television industry. This includes the introduction of cloud security assessments, overseeing the creation, publication, and ongoing management of MPA’s content security site and cloud best practices,
Celebrating World IP Day’s Focus on Young Creators With Teenage Artist Patrick Jackson
Today is World Intellectual Property Day, and this year’s focus is on the ways in which young creators are making a big impact on safeguarding IP and making the world a more creatively vibrant place. As the World IP Day’s official site explains, “Across the globe, young people are stepping up to innovation challenges, using their energy and ingenuity, their curiosity and creativity to steer a course towards a better future.”
We thought one excellent way of celebrating World IP Day this year would be to shine a light on some of those young people who are going to help us create a better,
Leading Lawmakers Celebrate the Motion Picture Association’s Centennial
“We are a nation of visionaries,” Vice President Kamala Harris says at the top of her remarks about the Motion Picture Association’s centennial. The Vice President was one of nine leading lawmakers to speak about the centennial and the importance of the MPA’s work advocating on behalf of the film and television industry. “Members of the Motion Picture Association, for a century you have written the lines we will never stop quoting. You have created the images we will never forget.
The Motion Picture Association’s Film Workshop Suggests Vietnam’s Industry is Now Open for Business
As part of its mission to facilitate the development of a sustainable and internationally competitive screen industry in Vietnam, the Motion Picture Association (MPA) hosted an in-person film workshop with the Vietnam Film Development Association (VFDA) at the University of Economics in Ho Chi Minh City on April 28.
The event was over-subscribed, with approximately 130 filmmakers, government officials, celebrities, and media in attendance. It was also screened online on May 12, attracting a further 240 attendees.
Burkinabé Star Issaka Sawadogo on the Importance of Fighting Piracy
Telling stories has always been a way to connect with people around the world, through common narratives and shared feelings. Whether the story being told is set in Mali, Miami, or Malaysia, they reveal how much more alike we are—in our hopes and dreams, our fears and failures—than we are different. But stories are not told by themselves: they are the work of millions of people who create the films and television series we love.
Oscar-Nominee Emile Mosseri on Scoring for Family Dynamics in “Minari”
This interview is part of our ongoing Oscar series. It was originally published on January 19. Emile Mosseri is nominated for Original Score.
Dream-like piano notes accompany the Yee family as they gaze out the windows of their beat-up station wagon, on their way to a new home in rural Arkansas. Hoping to make it as a farmer, patriarch Jacob (Steven Yeun) is in the process of uprooting his wife, Monica (Yeri Han),
Art Director Daniel Lopez Muñoz on Finding Pixar’s Oscar-Nominated “Soul”
This interview with Daniel Lopez Muñoz is part of our ongoing Oscar series. It was originally published on December 24, before the film was nominated for Best Animated Feature Film.
Once again Pixar tackles the subjects of the meaning of life, fearlessness in the face of change, synchronicity, and inspiration in their new film Soul. It’s the first time, however, that they have centered the story on a Black man,
Oscar-Nominated Costume Designer Trish Summerville on Diving Into Hollywood’s Past in “Mank”
This interview is part of our ongoing Oscar series. It was originally published on January 25, since then, Summerville has been nominated for Best Costume Design.
David Fincher’s black and white epic, Mank, revisits the storied Hollywood era of the late 1930s when Orson Welles was writing what would go down in history as one of the best films of all time, Citizen Kane. But did he write it alone or with the help of Herman Mankiewicz,
Costume Designer Trish Summerville on Diving Into Hollywood’s Past in “Mank”
David Fincher’s black and white epic, Mank, revisits the storied Hollywood era of the late 1930s when Orson Welles was writing what would go down in history as one of the best films of all time, Citizen Kane. But did he write it alone or with the help of Herman Mankiewicz, a once sought after screenwriter fallen prey to twin drinking and gambling problems? In Fincher’s version of events,
Composer Emile Mosseri on Scoring for Family Dynamics in “Minari”
Dream-like piano notes accompany the Yee family as they gaze out the windows of their beat-up station wagon, on their way to a new home in rural Arkansas. Hoping to make it as a farmer, patriarch Jacob (Steven Yeun) is in the process of uprooting his wife, Monica (Yeri Han), and American-born children, Anne (Noel Cho) and David (Alan S. Kim), from California to this sparsely populated corner of the rural South.
Oscar-Winning Costume Designer Mark Bridges on His First Western “News of the World”
Over his long and varied career, costume designer Mark Bridges has tackled just about every wardrobe challenge imaginable. His efforts have led to Oscar wins for The Artist (2011) and Phantom Thread (2017), as well as nominations for Inherent Vice (2013) and Joker (2019). But surprisingly, he has never taken on a Western. That changed with News of the World.
Vanessa Kirby & Ellen Burstyn on Their Poignant New Film “Pieces of a Woman”
It is rare that a film as difficult to watch as Pieces of a Woman compels you to watch it multiple times. That’s the case with Netflix’s new aching drama, in which the acting and story are presented in such an authentic way that it offers new layers with each successive viewing.
The first English language film by director Kornél Mundruczó and his partner and screenwriter Kata Wéber,
Screenwriter Kata Wéber on Grief and Healing in “Pieces of a Woman”
Screenwriter and playwright Kata Wéber wrote Pieces of a Woman as a play before adapting it for the screen in partnership with director Kornél Mundruczó for their first English language film (premiering on January 7 on Netflix). Their last film was the award-winning White God, and the two have had both a long creative and personal history together. This story of Martha (Vanessa Kirby), a mother grieving the loss of her newborn child,
Translating the Untranslatable: The Impossible Art of Subtitling “Taco Chronicles”
Subtitle translation is a fascinating, complicated, and often overlooked part of the filmmaking process. It’s a delicate dance of literal translation and cultural interpretation, all the while practicing a serious economy of words. Most subtitles are capped at only forty-four characters (less than this sentence). Plus, the eye reads much slower than the ear hears.
My own up-close experience with the art form came with Netflix’s Taco Chronicles (Las Crónicas del Taco),
Producer Monica Levinson on “Borat 2” & “The Trial of the Chicago 7”
Producer Monica Levinson might have been able to call 2020 a banner year were not for the fact such a sentiment would be in poor taste considering how atrocious 2020 was. Yet two of her films factored into the larger conversations we were having in ways that would have been unthinkable at the start of the year.
One of those films was Aaron Sorkin’s The Trial of the Chicago 7,
