Since being named one of Filmmaker magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2007, Portland-bred writer-director Calvin Lee Reeder has amassed a small body of impressively uncategorizable work—mostly no-budget shorts like Little Farm, The Rambler, and Snake Mountain Colada—that reveal a taste for the bizarre and beguiling, as well as the shockingly perverse. Prior to making films in earnest, Reeder played guitar with the Lars Finberg–led paranoid post-punk group Popular Shapes (a/k/a The Intelligence) and collaborated with Brady Hall on Jerkbeast, a feature comedy based on a demented, sophomoric public-access program they developed for fun. (Think Morton Downey Jr. meets Triumph the Insult Comic Dog.) That anarchic spirit certainly carried over into the short-form work, as did Reeder’s knack for creating eerie swatches of music and sound design to outfit his surreal stories, but the films became more ambitious, more cinematic, while remaining resolutely strange.
- 6/6/2012
- by Damon Smith
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Calvin Reeder’s trippy art-horror film The Oregonian lands in New York today for one screening at Brooklyn’s Nitehawk Cinema.
When we selected Reeder for our 25 New Faces series, Mike Plante wrote:
“I’m not really sure” how he arrived at his alt-horror style, Reeder says. “Just sorta roll the dice. I do love Sleepaway Camp. I just like to make movies all bent up, I guess.” Originally from Portland, Ore., and living in Seattle up until this year, Reeder played extensively with the great art-punk bands the Popular Shapes and the Intelligence. But he got notoriety, for better or worse, with the twisted public access show and later-feature film Jerkbeast, co-made with Brady Hall.
Perhaps stemming from his musical background, the sound designs in his films are complex in their layering of thick aural moods. They give the movies the feeling of old folk songs telling brutal tales.
When we selected Reeder for our 25 New Faces series, Mike Plante wrote:
“I’m not really sure” how he arrived at his alt-horror style, Reeder says. “Just sorta roll the dice. I do love Sleepaway Camp. I just like to make movies all bent up, I guess.” Originally from Portland, Ore., and living in Seattle up until this year, Reeder played extensively with the great art-punk bands the Popular Shapes and the Intelligence. But he got notoriety, for better or worse, with the twisted public access show and later-feature film Jerkbeast, co-made with Brady Hall.
Perhaps stemming from his musical background, the sound designs in his films are complex in their layering of thick aural moods. They give the movies the feeling of old folk songs telling brutal tales.
- 11/16/2011
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.