Scr(i)nk: Indie Filmmaking: Now & Then

Indie Filmmaking & How It’s Changed, From 1959 to 2013

Film and TV director Allen Baron’s recollection of making his first indie, the cult film Blast of Silence, starting in 1959 when less than six indies were being made in any given year, to the digital revolution now. Included a checklist of filmmaking essentials then and now. (FM)

Festival Buzz: With $29M Revenue Growth Since 2002, The Toronto International Film Festival Sets 5-Year Strategic Plan

Screen International on the ambitious five-year plan, through 2017, that TIFF is embarking on, including strategic priorities for artistic excellence and sustainability. The entire plan is included in the report. (SCR)

Myspace Losing 5% of Workforce Despite Music-Focused Revamp

Business Insider has the news of the 5% staff reduction at the site after a January relaunch, $20M ad spend this summer, and 36M users. (BI)

Lars Von Trier, In A First, Surrenders Final Cut On ‘Nymphomaniac’

THR on producer Peter Aalbaek Jensen’s revelation that, for time’s sake as opposed to content, the five-and-a-half-hour cut of Nymphomaniac will premiere at 4 hours in Copenhagen and be split into two two-hour features. (THR)

Review: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

Screen International writes: There’s a grim fascination throughout Catching Fire due to the emotionally charged storyline, but because the plot very much echoes the first film’s, weary familiarity blunts the life-or-death urgency…Jennifer Lawrence provides an intensity and openness that make the character’s inner struggles somewhat poignant.” (SCR)

Controversial Big Screen Sex Scenes: Realistic Enough To Merit Debate Or Just Ridiculous?

Film School Rejects takes on the debate of controversial sex scenes and ‘whether they’re even realistic enough to be worthy of discussion” – from Blue Is The Warmest Color to Shame, Twilight, and Showgirls. (FSR)

Publishers Weekly’s Best Graphic Novels of 2013

The best graphic novels of the year range from a teen’s true country-hopping hitchhiking tale Today Is the Last Day of the Rest of Your Life and World War II reclamation story The Property, to civil rights memoir March Book One. (PW)

Creatives: 7 Ways To Beat The Time Crunch

Fast Company presents Chris Hardwick’s 7 real ways to manage your time, ranging from unsqueaking the wheel, conserving your momentum as you switch gears, measuring lost time from online and smart phone stimuli, and thinking of the future: “the projects you have today might not still be going in a few years, the things you pitch today pick up where those things leave off.” (FC)

Writers: Romantic Comedy Outline For Book or Film

A basic plot outline model for romantic comedy that details the structure of the three acts in the story, from first date to sunset sails. (EJ)

Authors: How To Beat The 96% Rejection Rate By Publishers

The key issues that send author submissions to the round file and how to beat the odds with smart solutions, including: failure to follow submission guidelines, genre confusion, a wretched query letter, and proposal insights for the nonfiction writer as 70% of nonfiction titles are ghostwritten. (HUFF)