Exclusive free BB event in Los Angeles: screening of Catfish documentary

Hey Los Angeles Boing Boing readers! You are invited to a free and exclusive screening for the documentary Catfish, which was a sensation at Sundance. I saw it last month and was enthralled. It also has generated plenty of controversy, so the audience Q&A with the producer, director after the screening ought to be interesting!

In late 2007, filmmakers Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost sensed a story unfolding as they began to film the life of Ariel's brother, Nev. They had no idea that their project would lead to the most exhilarating and unsettling months of their lives. A reality thriller that is a shocking product of our times, Catfish is a riveting story of love, deception and grace within a labyrinth of online intrigue.

It's screening at the Landmark Theatre on Pico (link below has details) After the screening, I will moderate a Q&A panel with the Catfish filmmakers Ariel Schulman, Henry Joost and Nev Schulman, who will share their experience of making the film and will answer questions about the events that transpired within the movie.

I recommend that you don't watch the trailer if you can help it. It's better to watch Catfish with no idea of what it's about.

Reserve tickets to CATFISH screening here.

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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Anonymous

I think the whole thing is fake. have you seen http://www.iscatfishfake.com The internet loves a conspiracy
deckard68

“The issue is that it is alleged that the filmmakers deliberately baited and provoked a mentally unstable woman for the purposes of making their film.”

You’re sayin’ that like it’s worse than deliberately baiting and provoking a mentally unstable woman for the purposes of getting a date on Friday night!
- Anonymous
  
  @Deckerd, the allegations are that there was never a legitimate “relationship” they were in on the game early on and deliberately drew the scenario out to “make” a film. So yeah that’s a lot worse than your analogy, it’s predating on a person who is already in a weakened position and that they knew was vulnerable. It’s reprehensible.
  - tsm_sf
    
    We’re all, at one point or another, intensely weak and vulnerable.
    
    Saying that someone with emotional problems cannot be the subject just marginalizes them, which I’m assuming isn’t your intention. It’s either all ok, or none of it is.
    
    and…
    
    “Y’know, if all the people with life-style crises were laid end to end… Well, I mean, who’d be left to actually lay them?”
SAMO1415

I want the spoilers sooo badly.
Talia

RE: “Angles” – heheh. I see what you did there. :)
unit_1421

This pretentious bullshit must be spoiled!!!

Rosebud’s the sled!

Jaye Davidson plays a transwoman!
Anonymous

I’m there! You’re getting a peck on the cheek, Mark!
SAMO1415

Found them!

WARNING: SPOILERS IN LINK!

http://www.ifc.com/blogs/indie-eye/2010/01/catfish.php
awerich

I did see the trailer already weeks ago but I am still intrigued by this story…, Thank B.B.,I’ll be seeing you their.
ultranoia

The “controversy” revolves around allegations that the film is a fakeumentary. Spoilers here:

http://www.movieline.com/2010/01/does-sundance-sensation-catfish-have-a-truth-problem.php
Anonymous

There’s been more than a few accusations that Catfish isn’t a documentary (i.e. it’s fiction), and the filmmakers seem to be incredibly careful to avoid ever using the word.

So feel free to go and enjoy it by all means, just keep in mind that there’s a good chance that it’s this year’s Blair Witch Project.
Wassermelone

I recommend not watching the trailer because it really gives you the wrong idea of what it is.
Saxtor

First a Facebook movie. Now a 4Chan movie. When are we going to get a Happy Mutants movie?
Shane

Mark, since you’re moderating perhaps you can ask them to clarify the issue of just how true a documentary this is.
technosean

THIS FILM IS GREAT! BUT YOU CAN’T SEE IT BECAUSE IT’S SOLD OUT! AND DON’T READ ABOUT IT EITHER!

Er, what’s your point, exactly, in posting this to the world? Showing enthusiasm for something that can’t be shared?
deckard68

Even that one still image shows that it is fake. No one looks that well groomed in an effort to look shaggy, unless they’re acting.
- grimc
  
  No one looks that well groomed in an effort to look shaggy, unless they’re acting.
  
  Or they live in certain areas of Brooklyn or LA.
  
  ‘Course, that raises the question: Can being a hipster be considered a form of acting?
  - Spoon
    
    That comment is adorable.
blinkers

You’re going to moderate the Q&A panel? Uh oh Mark, you’d better make sure that no one says anything at all about the movie being fake or else the filmmakers might get their panties in a bunch again.
Trotsky

I watched the trailer.

You can’t stop me.

Don’t even try.
Trotsky

She lives in Michigan, people. What else did those dudes expect except a doomsday religious cult farm compound where Bulgarian child-slaves are being harvested for their organs?

It does look like a fun flick though. I’m too lazy to drive over to Pico, so I will wait for the Netflix birdy to regurgitate it into my eyes about six months from now.
Trotsky

This movie is basically Tales from the Crypt: Hipsters’ Horror.
turn_self_off

what is the chance that the base story is true, but the movie is using reenactments to cover various “holes” in the filming?
- Anonymous
  
  “what is the chance that the base story is true, but the movie is using reenactments to cover various “holes” in the filming?”
  
  No, you’re missing the point. Read the Movieline story linked above. The accusation is *not* that the filmmakers reenacted true events after the fact. The allegation against them is that they may have willfully fabricated the scenario they present onscreen–by pretending not to know they were dealing with a mentally unstable woman who was sock-puppeting various fake characters.
  
  In other words, the accusation is that the filmmakers exploited not just the mentally ill woman by playing along with her clearly fraudulent claims, but also moviegoers who think they are seeing an earnest, honest portrayal of filmmaker hipsters taken in by a shocking internet hoax. In fact, the filmmakers may have been active, knowing participants in the hoax.
Anonymous

Is Jesse Jubilee James involved? Seems like it’s all a little bit of history repeating.

http://tinyurl.com/29antxd
blueelm

From the looks and sound of it this film seems like something I won’t miss not watching.

I’ll pass.
Trotsky

But there’s also a weird echo here of News Corp Murdochian terror memes breathlessly warning of Craigslist serial murder and MySpace molestation. It’s alarmist, but in a trendy way. Reefer Madness except with Facebook. Jack Webb and Reader’s Digest, but brought up to date. “What if a hot chick on Facebook… was a crazy hillbilly from Michigan?!” Also, Deliverance.

The funny thing is, you can almost see how the conversations went when they were writing this:

“What about Alabama?”

“Hell no. No reasonably savvy audience would believe an attractive and up-and-coming dancer would willingly live in Alabama. And the first time the protagonists are like… ‘Let’s go to the backwoods of Alabama to meet this hot girl,’ the audience would immediately suspect some serious shit was about to go down.”

“What about Michigan? Michigan is kind of neutral, but also scary in a rural, dystopian kind of way.”

“Yeah, Michigan. That’s much better.”

Reminds me of Juno. A movie that is deeply conservative in its message, but works very hard to affect a veneer of progressivism.

In a way, even though this film purports to be a member in good standing of the cyber tribe, its message seems to be completely at odds with same. Of course, I got all of this from the trailer, so what the fuck do I know?

Having said all of that, I’d watch this film anyway. Why not? It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a “real” documentary, or even if it has a hidden agenda. I don’t need to believe that corpses actually return to life to enjoy a George Romero film. A movie can be shallow, even inept, and still be entertaining.

Suspension of disbelief and all that.
- yupgiboy
  
  “I don’t need to believe that corpses actually return to life to enjoy a George Romero film.”
  
  Well, if it were touted as an actual documentary, you would almost have to.
  - Trotsky
    
    My point is if I sitting in theater and moving thing of pictures on screen and noise go in my ear good, then me no care of nothing.
blueelm

“We’re all, at one point or another, intensely weak and vulnerable.”

Yeah but we don’t all get publicized and have a bunch of hipster scum make $$$ off of us, do we?

Film sounds like a steaming pile to me FWIW.
Anonymous

I don’t think the “fakeumentary” angle has been properly represented here.

The issue is that it is alleged that the filmmakers deliberately baited and provoked a mentally unstable woman for the purposes of making their film.
Anonymous

Sounds as if the real significance of this film — if it’s as fake as the Movieline critique above argues — is that it trades in multiple levels of meta-fakery: The girl turns out to be sock puppeteer who ostensibly fools the filmmakers into believing her fictitious backstory; but the filmmakers, probably wise to the fraud, play along anyway in an attempt to trump up a shocking narrative/provoke an audience reaction, which would make them the cinema equivalent of trolls.

I hope Mark addresses these various levels of meta-exploitation in the panel after the screening.
archanoid

Fakey documentary is fakey.
ThomDowting

“SOLD OUT”

in 42 minutes? How many tickets did you guys get? 5?

LAME invite without actual invites is obviously LAME.
Coherent

I read the synopsis, and I think I just saved myself two hours. The thing is, this kind of thing has actually happened, and continues to happen every day, and it’s sad and it’s a real problem with the internet. The moral of the story; don’t get emotionally involved if the relationship is purely online.

Or, Always look a gift horse in the mouth. Lol.
Anonymous

what about NYC??
Anonymous

The trailer looks kinda lame.
But I’m calling it now, the girl is either:
A. Fat
B. Married
C. A guy
D. All of the above (Actually that’d be amazing.)
Antinous / Moderator

That gentleman is quite easy on the eyes.
- Trotsky
  
  I’m het and even I’d do him.
Trotsky

Also, who just “happens” to film their brother shirtless “all the time” because he seems “cinematic?”

McPoyles?

http://www.philebrity.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/mcpoyles.jpg