“NY84” will have a gala opening and theatrical release this October 14 at the Arena Theater in Hollywood.
A unique venue for a unique film written and directed by Cyril Morin and starring Sam Quartin, Chris Schellenger and Davy J. Marr, “NY84” follows the adventures of three young artists in the downtown New York art scene in the early 1980s. Young and carefree, Kate, Anton, and Keith party, photograph, paint, sing, and play their way through the clubs and lofts of Alphabet City.
The party ends in 1984 when Anton and Keith contract a mysterious illness known as the “gay cancer.” We gain an intimate glimpse into their creative and emotional lives as the three lose their youth and innocence.
Cyril Morin
This is a lyrical poetic paen to those times some of us were lucky enough to have lived through. The sexual revolution and its sexual freedom in effect then for the newly liberated homosexual community, also opened the way for Kate to express herself. And it opened a door for transexuals, women and the whole diversity of humanity to assert itself today.
A unique venue for a unique film written and directed by Cyril Morin and starring Sam Quartin, Chris Schellenger and Davy J. Marr, “NY84” follows the adventures of three young artists in the downtown New York art scene in the early 1980s. Young and carefree, Kate, Anton, and Keith party, photograph, paint, sing, and play their way through the clubs and lofts of Alphabet City.
The party ends in 1984 when Anton and Keith contract a mysterious illness known as the “gay cancer.” We gain an intimate glimpse into their creative and emotional lives as the three lose their youth and innocence.
Cyril Morin
This is a lyrical poetic paen to those times some of us were lucky enough to have lived through. The sexual revolution and its sexual freedom in effect then for the newly liberated homosexual community, also opened the way for Kate to express herself. And it opened a door for transexuals, women and the whole diversity of humanity to assert itself today.
- 9/30/2016
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
The set of a scary movie becomes the site of real-life frights in the first trailer for Found Footage 3D, a self-aware horror movie that will make its world premiere at Bruce Campbell’s Horror Film Festival on August 20th in Chicago before enjoying its international premiere at London’s FrightFest on August 29th:
Press Release: Austin, Texas – Wednesday, August 10, 2016 – The terrifying trailer for the upcoming horror film Found Footage 3D was released today. Those with 3D TVs, Vr goggles, Google Cardboard, or red-blue 3D glasses can watch the 3D version of the trailer by signing up for the Found Footage 3D backstage area. The film will celebrate its World Premiere at Bruce Campbell’s Horror Film Festival in Chicago on August 20th, and will also have its International Premiere at FrightFest in London on August 29th. Directed by Steven DeGennaro, Found Footage 3D gives found footage a shot in...
Press Release: Austin, Texas – Wednesday, August 10, 2016 – The terrifying trailer for the upcoming horror film Found Footage 3D was released today. Those with 3D TVs, Vr goggles, Google Cardboard, or red-blue 3D glasses can watch the 3D version of the trailer by signing up for the Found Footage 3D backstage area. The film will celebrate its World Premiere at Bruce Campbell’s Horror Film Festival in Chicago on August 20th, and will also have its International Premiere at FrightFest in London on August 29th. Directed by Steven DeGennaro, Found Footage 3D gives found footage a shot in...
- 8/10/2016
- by Derek Anderson
- DailyDead
Directed by French composer turned filmmakers Cyril Morin, this unique romance had it's market debut in Berlin at the European Film Market. The film was produced by Paris-based company Media in Sync. Rights for all territories are still available.
Here is the official synopsis:
“Hacker’s Game” is a love story between two hackers, Soyan and Loise. Like many other hackers, Soyan works for a company he previously hacked. This “online security” firm runs covert activities for high-profile clients around the world.
Loise is a cyber-detective who investigates war crimes for a human rights organization. Obsessed with the truth, she also has spent years searching for an unknown person. The two hackers meet on a rooftop and bond together through a virtual chess game. But Soyan’s employer, Russell Belial, has asked him to protect the same arms-dealer that Loise is determined to help to capture.
Who will call the game now? What is Soyan’s real goal? The pair embarks upon an intense but dangerous romance, playing an elaborate game of deception. After being in a virtual world, will Soyan and Loise risk everything for true love?
Here is a recent interview with director Cyril Morin
How did you develop the story for "Hacker’s Game"?
After I shot my first feature film, The Activist, which took place in 1973, I wanted to direct a contemporary story with young people trying to connect emotionally in the wired world of Internet and smartphones. I wanted to do something with timely significance just a couple years in the future.
I also was following how the media depicts hackers. The most common news story revolves around whether they are heroes or traitors. However, I was more interested in their motivations. What drives an intelligent young person to spend all his time hacking into a top-secret database to reveal something to the public? Why have several young hackers died just before they planned to release information?
Is the film a techno-thriller or a love story?
The film is a love story at first. The “techno thriller” is more the background of the film. However, technology plays a big part in the love story. It is the only means for Loise and Soyan to come together. They have difficulty expressing their feelings directly because computers mediate everything they do.
So they use technology as a shield to hide behind, staying on the Internet to avoid the real world. Their relationship begins as a sort of game as they court each other through a virtual chess simulator. Real love is a new feeling for them. Soyan and Loise eventually break through into reality and discover themselves. But it might be too late…
How does your view of the Internet shape the film?
As with many people, the Internet has become a basic part of my life. However, I am not unaware of how it can distort reality. Online information can be faked and manipulated. How do we believe what we are reading? I am suspicious of anything I can’t confirm from multiple reliable sources.
Nowadays, there is a lot of controversy about how big companies like Google or Facebook spy on their users and this is quite an important theme in the movie.
I am scared about a future where facts can be changed for political gain or to manipulate people. We already know how leaders rewrite history quite willingly.
Tell us about the look of the movie.
I decided from the very beginning never to put a computer display on screen. By not providing that visual aid, the viewer is forced to focus on the characters and everything that is happening offline. Visually, I represent the Internet with sequences in the film in which terabytes of data flow through cables. We also have graphics that represent data clouds when text messages are sent. These elements show how technology has become more virtual than ever.
I experimented with black light during certain sequences where Loise and Soyan put on these virtual reality cyber-glasses. I wanted to set apart these scenes in a tangible way for the audience. We don’t know what they are seeing through the glasses. It could be a battlefield, an erotic game, or both.
The look is styled like a comic book with a more digital, futuristic edge. With Pitof, we experienced with a lot of innovative visual textures for the movie during post-production.
How did you work with the actors?
It was a very interesting process. Though I wanted to work again with actors I worked with before, the biggest challenge was finding the leads for Soyan and Loise. After completing the script, I found Soyan among 2500 headshots. With Chris Schellenger (from Paul Schrader’s "The Canyons"), we did a lot of workshopping to develop the character of Soyan.
For Loise’s character, I looked at some French actresses in Los Angeles but none of them quite worked for various reasons. It drove me crazy. Then, by chance, I met Pom Klementieff (Old Boy, Spike Lee) at a friend’s dinner party. It took only a few days for me to come back and cast her. Then I discovered her own biography was very close to that of Loise’s character. When I put Chris and Pom together to rehearse a scene, I knew I had my couple.
I spent three months on pre-production so we could do a lot of rehearsals. Then I rewrote a lot of the script based on it. Actually, that was a benefit for the crew on the shoot because we already figured out the scene through the rehearsal process.
Tell us about shooting "Hacker’s Game. "
I feel I didn’t shoot a movie as much as I hacked a movie. Movies usually involve a heavy footprint. But digital technology is changing everything. We had a small crew that took on an ambitious shooting schedule. Mobility was key because we had such a crazy schedule (we shot around seven scenes a day). Besides an efficient team, the Canon C300 camera helped a great deal. It works in low light so we didn’t need a lot of huge lighting gear.
How did you work with the crew?
Romain Wilhelm is a young talented Dp. Hacker’s Game was his first feature film. It was important to me to have a lot of young people in the crew so they could be on the same wavelength with the story. It was a bit of a “rock’n’roll” set and we had a lot of laughs as well as some tense moments.
The crew also was geographically diverse. Besides Americans, we had people from France, Japan, Romania, Belgium, Israel, Korea, etc... Just like the Internet, there were no borders. Amza Moglan, the second unit camera on the film, finished the edit after some difficulties with the first cut. Amza got all the emotional textures I wanted in the film and knew all the shots perfectly since he was on set for the entire shoot.
What about the music? You are also a film composer.
From the very beginning I planned to use music from a Los Angeles band “Seven Saturday.” I needed a fresh sound and real songs to go to with the love story. I remixed their songs to fit with the soundtrack and I did the rest of the score myself. It took me a long time to find the right feeling for the soundtrack. You know what an orchestra will sound like but you have to invent all the sounds with electronic music. I had a very precise idea how to mix those sounds with electric guitars. But there is no code and no rules. I had to reinvent my own music.
“I feel I didn’t shoot a movie as much as I hacked a movie”.
About the Director
Cyril Morin became a director on the side of a successful international career as a film composer with almost 100 soundtracks to his name. His music has won awards at numerous festivals and received acclaim from the international press. Among many honors, he was a nominee at the European Film Awards, the World Soundtrack Award and recently at the Jerry Goldsmith Awards.
He naturally became familiar with how films are produced and directed. He produced music videos before proceeding to direct his first short film Homere (1995) with footage from film archives. He also co-wrote and produced a documentary The Spirit of the Water (1995), a tribute to the Surfrider Foundation.
In 2011, he directed the short film The Application Cafe. Shot in the Californian desert, the sci-fi drama is a mythological interpretation of America.
In 2012, he wrote and directed The Activist, a thriller about political unrest by Native Americans at Wounded Knee. With nods to Brando, Nixon, and Vietnam, the film recreates the paranoid culture of the 1970s. This movie has already screened at festivals in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Stuttgart, Sedona and Byron Bay, Australia.
He recently completed his second feature film, "Hacker’s Game" (2013), a love story between two cyber-adventurers, starring Pom Klementieff (Spike Lee’s "Old Boy") , Chris Schellenger (Paul Schrader’s "The Canyons") and King Orba ("3:10 to Yuma").
Filmography:
"Hacker’s Game" / Feature Film, 2014, France/U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
"The Activist" / Feature Film, 2013, France/ U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
Festivals: American Indian Film Festival/ USA (Best feature film & Two Best Actor Nominations) - Valley Film Festival, North Hollywood/ USA - Das Nordamerika Film Festival - Stuttgart/ Germany (Best feature film nomination) - Sedona Film Festival, USA - Byron Bay Film Festival, Australia
"The Application Cafe" / Short Film, 2012, U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
Festivals: USA Film Awards, Dallas (Finalist) - Holly shorts Film Festival, Los Angeles - Short Film Corner, Cannes Film Festival -...
Here is the official synopsis:
“Hacker’s Game” is a love story between two hackers, Soyan and Loise. Like many other hackers, Soyan works for a company he previously hacked. This “online security” firm runs covert activities for high-profile clients around the world.
Loise is a cyber-detective who investigates war crimes for a human rights organization. Obsessed with the truth, she also has spent years searching for an unknown person. The two hackers meet on a rooftop and bond together through a virtual chess game. But Soyan’s employer, Russell Belial, has asked him to protect the same arms-dealer that Loise is determined to help to capture.
Who will call the game now? What is Soyan’s real goal? The pair embarks upon an intense but dangerous romance, playing an elaborate game of deception. After being in a virtual world, will Soyan and Loise risk everything for true love?
Here is a recent interview with director Cyril Morin
How did you develop the story for "Hacker’s Game"?
After I shot my first feature film, The Activist, which took place in 1973, I wanted to direct a contemporary story with young people trying to connect emotionally in the wired world of Internet and smartphones. I wanted to do something with timely significance just a couple years in the future.
I also was following how the media depicts hackers. The most common news story revolves around whether they are heroes or traitors. However, I was more interested in their motivations. What drives an intelligent young person to spend all his time hacking into a top-secret database to reveal something to the public? Why have several young hackers died just before they planned to release information?
Is the film a techno-thriller or a love story?
The film is a love story at first. The “techno thriller” is more the background of the film. However, technology plays a big part in the love story. It is the only means for Loise and Soyan to come together. They have difficulty expressing their feelings directly because computers mediate everything they do.
So they use technology as a shield to hide behind, staying on the Internet to avoid the real world. Their relationship begins as a sort of game as they court each other through a virtual chess simulator. Real love is a new feeling for them. Soyan and Loise eventually break through into reality and discover themselves. But it might be too late…
How does your view of the Internet shape the film?
As with many people, the Internet has become a basic part of my life. However, I am not unaware of how it can distort reality. Online information can be faked and manipulated. How do we believe what we are reading? I am suspicious of anything I can’t confirm from multiple reliable sources.
Nowadays, there is a lot of controversy about how big companies like Google or Facebook spy on their users and this is quite an important theme in the movie.
I am scared about a future where facts can be changed for political gain or to manipulate people. We already know how leaders rewrite history quite willingly.
Tell us about the look of the movie.
I decided from the very beginning never to put a computer display on screen. By not providing that visual aid, the viewer is forced to focus on the characters and everything that is happening offline. Visually, I represent the Internet with sequences in the film in which terabytes of data flow through cables. We also have graphics that represent data clouds when text messages are sent. These elements show how technology has become more virtual than ever.
I experimented with black light during certain sequences where Loise and Soyan put on these virtual reality cyber-glasses. I wanted to set apart these scenes in a tangible way for the audience. We don’t know what they are seeing through the glasses. It could be a battlefield, an erotic game, or both.
The look is styled like a comic book with a more digital, futuristic edge. With Pitof, we experienced with a lot of innovative visual textures for the movie during post-production.
How did you work with the actors?
It was a very interesting process. Though I wanted to work again with actors I worked with before, the biggest challenge was finding the leads for Soyan and Loise. After completing the script, I found Soyan among 2500 headshots. With Chris Schellenger (from Paul Schrader’s "The Canyons"), we did a lot of workshopping to develop the character of Soyan.
For Loise’s character, I looked at some French actresses in Los Angeles but none of them quite worked for various reasons. It drove me crazy. Then, by chance, I met Pom Klementieff (Old Boy, Spike Lee) at a friend’s dinner party. It took only a few days for me to come back and cast her. Then I discovered her own biography was very close to that of Loise’s character. When I put Chris and Pom together to rehearse a scene, I knew I had my couple.
I spent three months on pre-production so we could do a lot of rehearsals. Then I rewrote a lot of the script based on it. Actually, that was a benefit for the crew on the shoot because we already figured out the scene through the rehearsal process.
Tell us about shooting "Hacker’s Game. "
I feel I didn’t shoot a movie as much as I hacked a movie. Movies usually involve a heavy footprint. But digital technology is changing everything. We had a small crew that took on an ambitious shooting schedule. Mobility was key because we had such a crazy schedule (we shot around seven scenes a day). Besides an efficient team, the Canon C300 camera helped a great deal. It works in low light so we didn’t need a lot of huge lighting gear.
How did you work with the crew?
Romain Wilhelm is a young talented Dp. Hacker’s Game was his first feature film. It was important to me to have a lot of young people in the crew so they could be on the same wavelength with the story. It was a bit of a “rock’n’roll” set and we had a lot of laughs as well as some tense moments.
The crew also was geographically diverse. Besides Americans, we had people from France, Japan, Romania, Belgium, Israel, Korea, etc... Just like the Internet, there were no borders. Amza Moglan, the second unit camera on the film, finished the edit after some difficulties with the first cut. Amza got all the emotional textures I wanted in the film and knew all the shots perfectly since he was on set for the entire shoot.
What about the music? You are also a film composer.
From the very beginning I planned to use music from a Los Angeles band “Seven Saturday.” I needed a fresh sound and real songs to go to with the love story. I remixed their songs to fit with the soundtrack and I did the rest of the score myself. It took me a long time to find the right feeling for the soundtrack. You know what an orchestra will sound like but you have to invent all the sounds with electronic music. I had a very precise idea how to mix those sounds with electric guitars. But there is no code and no rules. I had to reinvent my own music.
“I feel I didn’t shoot a movie as much as I hacked a movie”.
About the Director
Cyril Morin became a director on the side of a successful international career as a film composer with almost 100 soundtracks to his name. His music has won awards at numerous festivals and received acclaim from the international press. Among many honors, he was a nominee at the European Film Awards, the World Soundtrack Award and recently at the Jerry Goldsmith Awards.
He naturally became familiar with how films are produced and directed. He produced music videos before proceeding to direct his first short film Homere (1995) with footage from film archives. He also co-wrote and produced a documentary The Spirit of the Water (1995), a tribute to the Surfrider Foundation.
In 2011, he directed the short film The Application Cafe. Shot in the Californian desert, the sci-fi drama is a mythological interpretation of America.
In 2012, he wrote and directed The Activist, a thriller about political unrest by Native Americans at Wounded Knee. With nods to Brando, Nixon, and Vietnam, the film recreates the paranoid culture of the 1970s. This movie has already screened at festivals in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Stuttgart, Sedona and Byron Bay, Australia.
He recently completed his second feature film, "Hacker’s Game" (2013), a love story between two cyber-adventurers, starring Pom Klementieff (Spike Lee’s "Old Boy") , Chris Schellenger (Paul Schrader’s "The Canyons") and King Orba ("3:10 to Yuma").
Filmography:
"Hacker’s Game" / Feature Film, 2014, France/U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
"The Activist" / Feature Film, 2013, France/ U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
Festivals: American Indian Film Festival/ USA (Best feature film & Two Best Actor Nominations) - Valley Film Festival, North Hollywood/ USA - Das Nordamerika Film Festival - Stuttgart/ Germany (Best feature film nomination) - Sedona Film Festival, USA - Byron Bay Film Festival, Australia
"The Application Cafe" / Short Film, 2012, U.S.A. (Director, Writer, Producer)
Festivals: USA Film Awards, Dallas (Finalist) - Holly shorts Film Festival, Los Angeles - Short Film Corner, Cannes Film Festival -...
- 3/5/2015
- by Peter Belsito
- Sydney's Buzz
Hollywood pro and longtime film score composer Cyril Morin has released his newly directed film The Activist in Los Angeles.
I have seen it and it is a serious sobering work about the Native American movement that gripped America in the '70's and is now practically forgotten. Thanks to Cyril this subject is before us again in his eloquent new work.
In 1973, members of the American Indian Movement began an armed rebellion at Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Wounded Knee, North Dakota that grabbed the attention of the world..
Elsewhere at the same time, two activists are arrested and held at an isolated sheriff’s sub-station. One is Marvin (Chadwick Brown), a lawyer whose Native American wife (Tonantzin Carmelo) died in a purported accident. The other is Bud (Michael Spears of “Dances With Wolves”), the dead woman’s brother. Both suspect that Anna was actually murdered. They’re assigned a conscientious lawyer, Claire (Alena von Stroheim, granddaughter of Erich von Stroheim) who begins to dig. Meanwhile, they’re visited by an associate of the Nixon Administration (Ron Rogge) , a Senator, and a Hollywood star (King Orba) who is also a political activist on behalf of Native Americans. Why are Marvin and Bud being held, and why are they the subject of so much interest?
When it becomes apparent that Anna had learned of a plot by corporate interests to ravage the land for profit, perpetrating an ecological disaster that would endanger thousands of lives, all one need do is follow the money. The cause of Anna’s demise is also apparent. Will the plots of evil men be revealed? Will Claire win freedom for the activists? What will happen now to Marvin and Bud? French / Us film-maker Cyril Morin is best known for composing scores for dozens of films and TV shows before branching into writing for the screen and directing.
His next feature, “Hacker’s Game” is currently in post-production. As he notes, Europeans are more interested in the recent history of Native Americans than is the general North American population. The struggle of Native Americans for justice continues, which means “The Activist” is timely in 2014, although set in a backdrop of events occurring several decades prior. Over-reaching government, corporate greed, and the rights of the oppressed are themes that are still with us.
I have seen it and it is a serious sobering work about the Native American movement that gripped America in the '70's and is now practically forgotten. Thanks to Cyril this subject is before us again in his eloquent new work.
In 1973, members of the American Indian Movement began an armed rebellion at Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Wounded Knee, North Dakota that grabbed the attention of the world..
Elsewhere at the same time, two activists are arrested and held at an isolated sheriff’s sub-station. One is Marvin (Chadwick Brown), a lawyer whose Native American wife (Tonantzin Carmelo) died in a purported accident. The other is Bud (Michael Spears of “Dances With Wolves”), the dead woman’s brother. Both suspect that Anna was actually murdered. They’re assigned a conscientious lawyer, Claire (Alena von Stroheim, granddaughter of Erich von Stroheim) who begins to dig. Meanwhile, they’re visited by an associate of the Nixon Administration (Ron Rogge) , a Senator, and a Hollywood star (King Orba) who is also a political activist on behalf of Native Americans. Why are Marvin and Bud being held, and why are they the subject of so much interest?
When it becomes apparent that Anna had learned of a plot by corporate interests to ravage the land for profit, perpetrating an ecological disaster that would endanger thousands of lives, all one need do is follow the money. The cause of Anna’s demise is also apparent. Will the plots of evil men be revealed? Will Claire win freedom for the activists? What will happen now to Marvin and Bud? French / Us film-maker Cyril Morin is best known for composing scores for dozens of films and TV shows before branching into writing for the screen and directing.
His next feature, “Hacker’s Game” is currently in post-production. As he notes, Europeans are more interested in the recent history of Native Americans than is the general North American population. The struggle of Native Americans for justice continues, which means “The Activist” is timely in 2014, although set in a backdrop of events occurring several decades prior. Over-reaching government, corporate greed, and the rights of the oppressed are themes that are still with us.
- 4/26/2014
- by Peter Belsito
- Sydney's Buzz
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