If I had to spend the rest of my life in a dark room watching films, I'd go crazy, but only if I was forced to watch a steady diet of Michael Bay movies. Present me with a buffet of poetic, stylized, challenging, experimental cinematic experiences, or the underseen American and foreign classics of the past, and I will happily gorge myself. I will watch anything with a distinct point-of-view, a sense of style, a new take on an old subject, or an old subject crafted with the perfection of a master, but I can smell a pop culture contrivance just by sniffing the online ad. As The Restless Critic, I'm not only searching for films that keep me glued to my seat in that dark room, but I want to encourage you to see those films as well. With so many ways to see movies these days, there is no excuse, if you are a lover–or even a "liker"–of film, to avoid the lesser known films that need your attention in favor of surrendering to the multiplex blockbusters that only want your dollars.
My love of writing about films came before my love of making films, but now they are twin passions. As a filmmaker, I own– along with my wife and partner Ann Hedreen–Seattle-based White Noise Productions, and we are dedicated to making documentaries and short films for non-profit organizations. I also host Roadsongs on the independent radio station KBCS, 91.3FM and I've been reviewing films for the station since 1998. The KBCS Movie Review airs every Thursday at 7:30am and 3:20pm and now during the Thom Hartmann program.
A documentary I made on the 1999 WTO protests in Seattle, 30 Frames A Second, won the best documentary award at several film festivals, was named one of the Best Undistributed Films of the Year by the Village Voice and was selected as a Notable Film of 2001 by the American Library Association. It is distributed by Cinetic Media. My cerebral sci-fi film, The Ends of the Earth, screened at several festivals and is available for online watching at Indieflix.
Our other documentaries include Quick Brown Fox: An Alzheimer's Story and The Church on Dauphine Street, set in post-Katrina New Orleans. Since 2000 we have produced more than 100 short films, all of them noted for their cinematic content and sensitive treatment of subject matter. From 1982 through 1999, I worked as a television news cameraman, editor and producer for local and national news programs. I won several Emmy awards that are now stored in a box.
It seems that since I graduated from college I have always had a camera in my hand.
