Hip Hop Documentaries at Sundance
The recent Sundance Film Festival had its share of hip hop movie action, though certainly not as heated as last year's feeding frenzy over Hustle & Flow that may have helped spawn wh at some consider to be this year's focus on potential box office hits by the major distr ibutors.
So far I haven't heard of any deals for Beyond Beats & Rhymes: A Hip-Hop Head Weighs in on Manhood in Hip-Hop Culture whose director Byron Hurt said, "I want this film to be the talk of Sundance . . . But what I really want is for somebody with a lot of money to fall in love with this film."
Beyond Beats & Rhymes is set to appear on PBS's Independent Lens documentary seri es this spring.
The Beastie Boys also appeared at Sundance in support of their concert film Awesome; I f*ckin' Shot That which premiered at this year's fe stival. The documentary was edited by MCA from footage of a concert at Madison Square Garden taken by fans wielding Hi-8 and digital video cameras.
The Beastie Boys played an hour-long live set at one party as part of their promotional efforts but I haven't heard of any deals for them either.
Chris Lee takes a nice look at hip hop's presence at the Sundance Film Festival including another hip hop documentary shown at Sundance called The Hip Hop Project that "chronicles a social outreach program em powering inner-city teens — the project teaches self-realization through helping kids learn MC and DJ skills."
thanx 4 the info! my hip-hop doc, GRIND2SHINE, is almost ready 2 explore options like sundance...nice 2 know there are others already getting put on:) thanx again, chad hendricks
Posted by: chad hendricks | July 23, 2006 at 01:48 PM
Make sure you send a press release to me at Hip Hop Press (rather than to ProHipHop).
You'll find the guidelines here:
http://www.hiphoppress.com/info
Peace
Posted by: Clyde Smith | July 23, 2006 at 01:55 PM