Branching Paths
News

New documentary hopes the “indie” game invasion of Japan is a good thing

One of the first things that Anne Ferrero says to me is that her new documentary isn’t “Indie Game: The Movie [2012] in Japan.” She tells me this as she’s aware that many people will assume that to be the case. But it’s not just a matter of a director looking to ensure that her potential audience isn’t misled: there’s a lot more to it. Much of it is summed up by one of Ferrero’s interview subjects in the documentary, Alexander De Giorgio, the chief organizer of Tokyo Indie Fest. “I think it’s dangerous to try and compare the Japanese indie…

News

That Dragon, Cancer dev to document story in upcoming film

There’s a heartbreaking documentary in the works on the equally heartbreaking game That Dragon, Cancer. The film is called Thank You For Playing and judging from the newly-released teaser trailer, it looks like it’ll be powerful stuff.  Two independent filmmakers have captured the personal tragedy of Ryan Green, who is developing a nonfictional game based on his family’s struggles to cope with their infant son being stricken with terminal cancer. Green admits in the video that it was a tough call to allow strangers to haul in film equipment and point cameras at his son as he lay on a…

News

Martin Scorcese’s predictions for film seem awful relevant to the world of videogames

Martin Scorsese recently wrote an open letter to the film industry, explaining how the world of cinema is changing for the better, because things like the Internet and the decreasing cost of quality camera equipment are empowering small creators to get their art out there without the bankrolling of big studios. Sound familiar?  He writes: Audio-visual entertainment and what we know as cinema – moving pictures conceived by individuals – appear to be headed in different directions. In the future, you’ll probably see less and less of what we recognize as cinema on multiplex screens and more and more of…