Horror Hipsters VS Spoken Word Poets

So near the end of last year I got an email requesting that I review the dvd, "Graffiti Verite 7." The latest in documentary filmmaker, Bob Bryan's series which began with looking at the world of graffiti and then on "Graffiti Verite 6," switched over to the world of spoken word poetry. Personally, I'm more interested in graffiti than spoken word, but as the filmmaker comes from Bed-Stuy I agreed to give it a look. Only I tried to watch it with my four year old son who quickly lost interest as there were no cartoon characters, superheroes or action, and then never got a chance to finish watching it. And quite truthfully I wasn't all that motivated to stick it back into my dvd drive. And not having completed watching the film, nor being all that excited about it, I felt it was wrong to even attempt to review it. But I admired the sentiment behind the filmmaking - despite my feelings about the quality of the filmmaking. And besides, as his PR person pointed out, my not so positive view of the film was in the minority, as several people had given it glowing reviews.

And then this past week I got a request to review a very different sort of film, "The Eaters," made partly in Bed-Stuy by Katie Carman, who also lives in the hood. It was sold to me as "Shaun of the Dead meets Dazed and Confused" However, while I laughed hysterically over Shaun of the Dead, I have such a deep aversion to Richard Linklater's films that I cringed just watching the trailer of Dazed and Confused. While the trailer for "The Eaters" makes it look more like Shaun of the Dead does Williamsburg. Only not as funny.

But hey, that's just my opinion. In the end that's what any review comes down to, one person's opinion. And remember, until a month ago I hadn't gone to the movie theater in four years (since my kid was born). Let's just look at what I currently like: Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Man on a Wire, anything by Spike Jonze, the Spider-man films, anything by Michel Gondry, or Alfred Hitchcock, or Stephen Chow. Perhaps my tastes aren't too far off although I have an aversion to both horror films and films about hipsters, and think spoken word is great but would never go to see someone perform it. So really, who am I to judge either of those films?

When I was sending out the unpublished manuscripts of my novels to literary agents, I got both wonderful and cuttingly nasty feedback . And since they are memoirs thinly disguised as fiction, those mean comments cut to the bone.

The thing that I think is important, is that both films were made on a shoestring budget by Bed-Stuy residents - one an oldtimer and one newbie. One black and one white. And that they were labours of love. And for that - for both filmmakers to follow their dreams through to the end, I can't commend them highly enough. So the best thing to do is ignore my completely narrow and subjective opinion, check out their websites: GV7 and The Eaters and decide for yourselves.