​"How many famous women drummers do you know?" Hit So Hard: The Life and Near-Death of Patty Schemel is a no-punches-pulled portrait of the life and times of hard-hitting drummer Patty Schemel. The film tells a raw, intimate story about openly gay Schemel, and provides an up-close look at her struggles with being different, addiction, the deaths of her close friends, her near-devastating descent into drugs after a major betrayal, and ultimately her journey back to a clean, new life.  More >>

Lydia Lunch in a scene from Blank City

​"If you could be anybody, who would you be?"

"An outlaw, a film director, a rebel, a rock star!" yells a '70s gangster shooting a gun at the Super 8 camera, cutting to a rapid-fire Mars punk song over a killer montage of '70s film clips of punk and no wave musicians and actors.

Such is the beginning of riveting, no-holds barred documentary Blank City. It was New York City, 1970s, and a crew of artists, newly armed with hot Super 8 cameras, began shooting their lives and the punk and no wave musicians around them with no permits, no restrictions.

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​Rare indeed is the music documentary which flaunts the fact that not a single note of its subject's work is heard throughout the duration - but considering the subject in question is the infamously fractured 'Mats, maybe not all that surprising either?More >>

​Unlike his heroes Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald and Abba, who "wrote incredibly simple songs with extremely well worked arrangements giving every song an iconic quality you couldn't believe it hadn't been done before," Stephin Merritt has remained an enigma and somewhat still obscure genius of contemporary music who never really fit in with the 90's slacker bravado or the modern day indie-band beardo personas that are so popularized today.

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For his first serious lead role, Sacha Baron Cohen, who has made a name for himself playing caricatured roles like Borat, Bruno, and Ali G, will star in an upcoming Queen biopic as lead singer Freddie Mercury.

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​The Sound Unseen festival, which celebrates independent films about music, will celebrate its 11th season with a dozen films at three separate locations October 6-10. This season, the festival will show a selection of films at the Southern Theater on the West Bank in addition to hosting events at its longstanding partner the Trylon Microcinema and one at the Red Stag Supper Club.

Highlights include a documentary about troubled and iconic producer Phil Spector, live concert footage of David Byrne, a documentary about the life of Lil' Wayne, and a film inspired and partly created by members of Broken Social Scene.

See below for the full schedule of films, as well as a few accompanying performances by local musicians.


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Local filmmaker Brady Kiernan's debut film, Stuck Between Stations, has been selected for IFP's 6th Annual Independent Filmmaker Labs. First profiled here, Stuck Between Stations' story of two young people searching for meaning over the course of a single random night in the Minneapolis underground has drawn the attention of major actors Josh Hartnett and Michael Imperioli, who both play supporting roles. Now, with the film being selected for an Independent Film Lab, Kiernan and his collaborators have a plethora of resources and opportunities in the independent film community at their fingertips, starting with a series of workshops this week in New York City.

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​Such a good idea: Radio K's female-centered program Girl Germs and local music site Reviler are teaming up to present a "Girls on Film" series this summer at the 501 Club, and things kick off tonight with a screening of the MTV classic series Daria. For those of us who came of age in the '90s, Daria was the quintessential show about awkwardness and angst, and it will be interesting to see how the episodes have held up over the years.

Check the flyer below for all the films that they have planned at the 501 this summer.

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The fifth annual Cinema and Civics film and music series returns to Stevens Square Park next month, starting off what seems a promising summer with The Neverending Story and MC/VL on June 16th. Trying to find a common thread in the movies this year, the only free-association that came to mind was animals: the make-me-ups (Neverending Story), the prim and coddled (Best In Show), monstrous morons (Dr. Strangelove), the peckish and flighty (The Birds), or the escape artists (Pee Wee's Big Adventure). I don't really think there's a theme. There is however a pretty much consistently great lineup of bands playing, including Buildings, Phantom Tails, and Gay Witch Abortion.

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​It would take a telenovela at least two weeks to tell a story as epic as R. Kelly's "Trapped in the Closet," a 22-chapter song that weaves through lives filled with sordid affairs, bisexual husbands, and midgets hiding in cabinetry.

Tonight at the Turf Club they will be screening Chapters 1-12 of this complex, sweeping tale set to three chords.
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