Associations & Organisations

• The Daily

  David Hudson’s invaluable diary of recent releases, publications, retrospectives, and other related news in the world of international cinema.

• Film Studies For Free

  Run by Catherine Grant, this is an invaluable resource which does exactly what its title would suggest: it brings together in one place links to scholarly and intelligent articles and essays on a wide range of subjects that are available for free. The site is dangerous. Why? Well because when you visit this site you will always spend more time perusing the many interesting links and connected tangents than you can afford!

• The Glorious and The Grotesque: Horror Cinema of the 70s and 80s

  The first of what we hope to be many websites sponsored by Offscreen. This one looks at the social, political, aesthetic and cultural aspects of one of the high points of American horror, the horror films of the 1970s and 1980s. Included are the many contemporary remakes of this by now classic horror films.

• FIPRESCI: The International Federation of Film Critics

  Website for the important film critics organization, FIPRESCI. Includes a link-up to their relatively new online film journal, “Undercurrents,” an interesting section where film critics write about film books that influenced their intellectual history, and much more.

  

• Ubuweb

  A wholly independent, wonderful resource on the avant-garde, poetry (in all its forms) and, to quote Ubuweb, “outsider arts.” Includes many sounds, music, books, essays, poems, interviews, radio spots, and critical works that have been salvaged from obscurity, or at least made readily available through their website.

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Blogs

• caboose

  Montreal-based independent publishing company that specializes in cinema publications. Owned and operated by Timothy Bernard. caboose also has initiated a fascinating project called “Planetary Projection,” an ongoing meta-commentary on the history and evolution of film projections as experienced by projectionists the world over.

• Shocks to the System

  Excellent blog by writer Jon Towlsen that specializes in horror films that can be considered subversive in their approach to genre norms of style, formal approach, theme or social consciousness. The blog is an extension of a book on the subject of ‘Subversive Cinema’ which is slated for publication from McFarland press in 2013. Chapter descriptions for the book are available on the blog.

• European Films.net

  Privately run website aimed at promoting European cinema. Covers films that are in-production and recently released across the world. Good source of production credit information with an extensive archive of film reviews.

• Electric Sheep Magazine

  Subtitled a “deviant view of cinema” Electric Sheep is an intelligent source of serious reflection on all sorts of cinema, but with a concentration on the esoteric. Varied in content too, with blogs, podcasts, interviews, etc.

• The Art(s) of Slow Cinema

  A wonderful online presence that functions as a one-spot venue for films that “take their time”, films that challenge spectators to contemplate the world around them. Created and run by Nadin Mai.

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By Way of Montreal

• Vertigo

  Vertigo is an international film magazine covering the best of independent and experimental film. This is the recently added online version of its hard copy magazine of the same name, which has been documenting global screen culture since 1993.

• Ubuweb

  A wholly independent, wonderful resource on the avant-garde, poetry (in all its forms) and, to quote Ubuweb, “outsider arts.” Includes many sounds, music, books, essays, poems, interviews, radio spots, and critical works that have been salvaged from obscurity, or at least made readily available through their website.

• Screening the Past

  One of the few refereed online film journals.

• Shocks to the System

  Excellent blog by writer Jon Towlsen that specializes in horror films that can be considered subversive in their approach to genre norms of style, formal approach, theme or social consciousness. The blog is an extension of a book on the subject of ‘Subversive Cinema’ which is slated for publication from McFarland press in 2013. Chapter descriptions for the book are available on the blog.

• Oddity Cinema

  As the title suggests, Oddity Cinema is a webzine which tackles the weird and the wonderful in bite-sized morsels of critical commentary, capsule reviews, interviews, trailers, plugs for upcoming releases, etc. What sets it apart from most online review sites is its interactivity, with readers able to add their own comments to reviews. The design is colorful and attractive, yet remains functional and easy to navigate.

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DVD Review Sites

• British Film Institute

  Excellent and in-depth site from the venerable British Film Institute. Highlights include the series “BFI Archive Interactive” which includes excellent interactive studies on British cinema. A recent one was Paul Merton on Early British Comedy.

  

• Stan Brakhage on the Web

  Filmmaker red Camper’s labour of love on the late Stan Brakhage. Extensive material covering the life of America’s seminal avant-garde filmmaker.

• Girish

  Blog written by Film and Cultural critic Girish Shambu which is simple and straightforward: perceptive thoughts on all things relating to cinema, with each blog entry capped off by a useful series of “recent readings” which links you to other film writing which has caught the bloggers mind for one reason or another.

• Reverse Shot

  Independent, quarterly film journal with intelligent and eclectic writing. Highlights include selected ‘director symposiums’ where the editorial board features who they feel are expressive voices in the contemporary cinematic landscape. Past symposiums include Jim Jarmusch, Tsai Ming-liang and Olivier Assayas.

• Filmmaker Magazine

  Online organ for the magazine dedicated to independent cinema. Includes additonal material not featured in the print version.

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Filmmakers

• Film Int.

  Online organ to the excellent, longstanding Swedish based film magazine, Film International (Filmint.).

• Cinémathèque Québécoise

  Montreal’s venerable cinema treasure which houses major retrospectives and selections from its own vast archive collection. Also includes an invaluable library of film books, periodicals, newspaper clippings, posters, etc., which is a mine of information for scholars and students.

• Poética do cinema

  New blog by Brazilian film scholar Marcelo Moreira Santos which is a voice for his research on film semiotics. Blog entries thus far include English translations of sections of his published PhD thesis, and includes helpful film links to relevant film making of and documentaries which support the entries. For example, the blog entry of May 7, 2013, “The Collaborative Authorship in Cinema,” includes brief excerpts of documentary clips from The Shining, Inception, The Dark Knight, etc.

• Senses of Cinema

  Huge, very well supported film journal that is perhaps the best of its kind. Each new issue has enough material to keep you reading for hours.

• Culture.ca

  This website is an initiative of the Department of Canadian Heritage, and functions as a one-stop gateway to all aspects of the Canadian cultural scene, including history, politics, sports, and art. Contains an impressive range of up-to-date links and cultural information, including streamed segments from the CBC Television Archives.

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Journalism and Criticism

• Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism

  What a wonderful surprise it was to learn of this new (2010) rekindling of the excellent British film magazine Movie, that ran from 1962 to 2000 and published some of the most engaged, constructive and intelligent film criticism of its time. The online version of Movie provides a nice lineage with the original by including a tribute to one of its founding fathers Ian Cameron (who died in January 2010) by V.F. Perkins, another important figurehead of the original magazine, as well as reprinted the essay by Cameron “Films, Directors, and Critics” from Movie #2. The online version (which is refereed and bi-annual) also emulates the style and layout of the original magazine, and includes some excellent frame grabs. Welcome back.

• Stan Brakhage on the Web

  Filmmaker red Camper’s labour of love on the late Stan Brakhage. Extensive material covering the life of America’s seminal avant-garde filmmaker.

• Screen Directors Guild of Ireland

  “Established in 2000, the Screen Directors Guild of Ireland (SDGI) is the representative body for directors involved in the Irish and international audiovisual industry. These include directors of feature films, fiction, animation documentary, television drama, short films, video art and commericals.”

• Oddity Cinema

  As the title suggests, Oddity Cinema is a webzine which tackles the weird and the wonderful in bite-sized morsels of critical commentary, capsule reviews, interviews, trailers, plugs for upcoming releases, etc. What sets it apart from most online review sites is its interactivity, with readers able to add their own comments to reviews. The design is colorful and attractive, yet remains functional and easy to navigate.

• Panorama-cinema

  A Quebec based French language webzine with impeccable taste and an astute critical sense. Their individual film reviews may not be exceptionally long but treat each word as a precious commodity in distilling the necessary elements of the film. The zine has spread out to include interviews, podcasts, and has recently emerged as a publisher, thus far with two books under its wing: their first L’Humanisme D’Après-Guerre Japonaise (Humanism in Post-War Japan) and the second Vies & Morts du Giallo (Lives and Deaths of the Giallo). I have looked at the latter and am impressed with its scope and scholarship. It is an important contribution to the critical literature on the giallo.

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Publishers, Labels, and Retailers

• Infliction Film

  Website where you can get information on films made or produced by Mitch Davis, who also programs for Fantasia, and the Cinema du Parc theatre. Great links page.

• Film Studies Association of Canada

  Organ for Canada’s long running Association that brings together film scholars, students, researchers, and teachers from all over the country.

  

• Learning Adobe Premiere

  If you are a young filmmaker or critic wanting to learn how to make audio-visual essays, this is a good primer.

• Octane Seating

  Resources for the independent filmmaker.

• Cinema of Malayalam

  Website dedicated to the cinema of Kerala, the southernmost costal state of India. This website contains an extensive database of national and international award winning films and directors of Malayalam (the language spoken in Kerala) cinema.

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Theory, History, and Analysis

• Paracinema

  Edited by Christine Makepeace, Paracinema is the online organ of the magazine that is made for, to paraphrase its tagline, “People who love genre movies.” Although many of the back issues (since 2007) are unfortunately sold out, the online presence fills in the space in-between new issues with exclusive editorials, links, festival reports, etc. Taking its name from the term coined by media theorist Jeffrey Sconce (which itself owes a debt to Michael J. Weldon’s ‘psychotronic cinema’), Paracinema prides itself in its writing, which is the right blend of serious, scholarly (without the leaden jargon), well-written, personal, and fun

• Octane Seating

  Resources for the independent filmmaker.

• Intute

  Intute is a free UK-based online resource which acts as a massive storage for the every increasing area on reputable online journals/essays in every conceivable area. Its main target are UK students, lecturers and researchers in higher academics, but obviously anyone seeking research in their particular area will benefit from Intute.

• Ingmar Bergman Face to Face

  English version of the award winning Swedish website on Ingmar Bergman, launched on May 22, 2006. An excellent reference site for works by and about Bergman.

• Cinema du Parc

  An important Montreal venue for alternative and independent cinemas. Not afraid to mix the popular with the esoteric.

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