Author, Ursula K. LeGuin once said, “There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.” In the modern world, technology has progressed far beyond the wheel, and aspects of storytelling have also evolved by making use of advanced technology. For writer, director, producer, and all-round filmmaker extraordinaire, Christopher Coppola, technology and storytelling complement each other like PB & J. A member of the famously talented Coppola family, Christopher has been using cutting edge technology to impart meaningful stories on film for years. I was thrilled to be able to chat with Coppola to discuss his current ventures.

DigiVangelist is more than just Coppola’s new show on the ReelzChannel. THE DigiVangelist is Christopher Coppola, himself. The name was given to him by journalist, Xeni Jardin. While directing a movie called The Creature of the Sunny Side Up Trailer Park, Coppola experimented with not only HD and different temperatures, but also every-day, consumer equipment. More important to the director than technology, however, was the actual story. Hence, he became the DigiVangelist—a digital, movie master with a message. Coppola’s message with his new show is simple: “Whatever Hollywood is doing, you can do.” But, in doing so, when utilizing advancements in technology to create indie movies, Christopher says not to lose sight of that ever important, age-old tradition of the story. “Communicate from the heart, to the heart… Say things honestly,” he reminds us. DigiVangelist is making strides in spreading these messages by seeking out lay people and giving them the technology to document their own stories. Christopher travels the world with technology tools in tow, meets various, everyday people, and teaches them how to use the equipment. In one episode, Coppola travels to Italy and gives a camcorder to an Italian man on a golf-cart-like vehicle. After learning how to use the camera, the man travels through the village and captures life as he knows it. In another episode, Christopher works with middle school kids, giving them two cameras to shoot a short film for a 3D film festival. The kids meet with specialists who teach them the techniques of shooting in 3D. Even though they’re young, Coppola treats the young filmmakers as equals, essentially giving them a great deal of responsibility. Yet, he jokes with them and brings a lighthearted, humorous quality to the show, making it entertaining, inspirational, and educational to watch. And I must not be the only one who thinks so—the ReelzChannel ordered another eight episodes after the original four aired.

Perhaps, DigiVangelist is proving successful because it documents a truly exciting time in history—Coppola calls it a technology “evolution,” because technology is constantly being reinvented and improved. Christopher explains to me that when Hollywood was first created around 1911, everything was experimental because film was never used before. There was no such thing as a close up shot until someone played around with a camera and invented it. The only people who were able to take part in the film world back then were those who were directly involved with the Industry. Today, anyone who has access to a cell phone with a camera can take part in movie making…at least in some fashion. The digital age makes Hollywood less inclusive, especially since outlets like YouTube and Facebook allow everyone to showcase their pieces to a worldwide audience. The DigiVangelist says he’s hopeful for a “Digital Renaissance” but also stresses the importance of not letting technology get the best of us by allowing it to rule our lives. Coppola reminds us that it’s important to remember and appreciate the old school of filmmaking as well. The new school and old school “have to work together,” he says. “One needs the other.” In this way, it’s possible to use the easily-accessible tools of modern technology in order tell age-old stories that celebrate humanity. Going into the holiday season, this seems a poignant lesson to keep in mind, whether we’re unwrapping the latest technology toy or sharing a tale or two around the dinner table.

And speaking of technology toys, I wonder how it is The DigiVangelist keeps up with the ever changing abundance of products on the market. Instead of a technology “geek,” the filmmaker considers himself a regular guy with a love of technologic gadgets and gizmos. He usually hears about the latest devices through word of mouth, or sometimes a specific company will approach Coppola and ask if he will use or show a particular product on television. What’s great about DigiVangelist is that for technologically deficient people like me, product functions and their instructions for use are described. After a couple of episodes, a technologically challenged person could easily learn the basics of how to operate various pieces of equipment.

I delve further to ask how Coppola goes about finding people and locations to film. The DigiVangelist says sometimes it’s spur of the moment, on the fly. Other times, he finds his subjects through PAH—Project Accessible Hollywood. PAH is a festival that Coppola started, which has similar aims as the show itself: “Through a variety of free contests, [PAH invites] local participants to create their own short digital films with cameras and video-enabled mobile phones that are provided by the Festival.” While DigiVangelist sometimes features people who already have an interest in filmmaking, most of the time, those who appear are completely uninvolved in the Industry. Coppola and his sidekick producer, Nicolas Paine, will often do research to find their next target. In one case, the duo wanted to find out where the largest HD screen in the world was located? Their search brought them to the Dallas Cowboys’ Stadium where they filmed a segment that included Coppola talking and joking with some of the players in the locker room. The show definitely has its humorous moments.

Funny AND inspirational, DigiVangelist is imparting both technological wisdom and storytelling insight to aspiring filmmakers and laypeople alike. Coppola’s advice to those wishing to be the next big filmmaker is to “constantly be shooting” and to “do it your way.” Essentially, don’t try to imitate what you’ve learned in a textbook; instead develop your own unique voice and eye. With sophisticated technology available to the masses, anyone can get in on the Hollywood action. After all, as Coppola says in the opening of DigiVangelist: “You’re a star.” Christopher Coppola is a true star for showing the world the wonders of technology, storytelling, and the relatively modern art form of filmmaking. His work as The DigiVangelist will be one of his legacies, as it serves to remind us all that passing stories from generation to generation holds together the very fabric of our society.

DigiVangelist airs on the ReelzChannel every Sat. at 12:30pm ET / 9:30am PT

http://www.reelzchannel.com/show/115/digivangelist

http://www.crcoppolaproductions.com/

http://www.facebook.com/ChristopherRCoppola

http://www.pahnation.org/

Famed for her pencils, Mercedes Helnwein colors her future in oil pastel. Her exhibition, Temptation to Be Good, is now on view at the Merry Karnowsky Gallery in Los Angeles until December 11.

“It’s a title that makes me think of a Midwestern girl being taken advantage of by Jesus and the Devil,” says Mercedes Helnwein of her series, Temptation to Be Good, which finally turns on the on-and-off romance with oil pastels.

Pencils play coconspirators, as they did in last year’s East of Eden, but Mercedes also appoints dominion to each instrument, allowing the pastels to govern the grace of their own pages, and the pencils to remain in office and draft that cryptic comedy of errors. All parties prevail — particularly the artist — who destroys disinterest by adapting.

“I had done one pencil drawing too many, and thankfully found a box of Sennelier oil pastels in a drawer,” the artist recalls. “It was a pretty dramatic day in the studio and thankfully nobody was around for me to physically attack. After I ripped up my drawing and found the box of oil pastels, I pulled out a huge roll of paper an artist friend of mine had given me a couple years ago. I taped it to the wall and started drawing the outlines to a huge face. I had to do something totally different in order for me to survive that day.”

Survival accomplished, the artist continues her overachievement — publishing her first novel, The Potential Hazards of Hester Day (2008) before the age of 30 and architecting art of increasing incredibility. Her shows sell internationally and famously as Damien Hirst purchased her collection, Whistling Past the Graveyard (2008), earlier this year.

Temptation to Be Good inherits qualities of East of Eden (2009) — criminal coteries (“Easy Company”), antipodal emotions (“Jim and Summer”) — but yet is an independent sibling, not erecting the full-bodied postures of East. It may floor the damsel (“Missouri II”), classic in Mercedes’ art, but it is all grown up in personality.

Know their gaze and know the women — not as many sidelong glances as before and not as much anxiety, but more dreaming and more meditation. In The Book of Disquiet (2005), Mercedes used color pencils for finely etched faces, hushed in dark tones of shadow and hair. Temptation tears apart tradition with oil pastels, the palette vibrant and the dimensions titanic at around 45” x 60.” Deem them deities — these women — and in their countenance, read their folklore and cosmic quest, for the grandeur makes this possible.

We here at Forth pride ourselves on digging deeper than the surface most other publications merely scratch. Without oppressive printing-costs to cut us off at the knees, we can indulge ourselves above and beyond the claustrophobic brevity that is generally imposed on standard Q & A’s. For those of you with a crippling case of A.D.D. your time is probably better spent watching the latest cute animal blunder on Youtube. For the rest of you: pour yourself a choice glass of wine, kick your feet up, and enjoy this one-of-a-kind conversation about failure, perseverance and how a writer boldly chose to follow-up his enormously popular novel-turned-Academy-Award-winning-movie.

Continuing the Dionysian exploits of Miles & Jack, Vertical – Pickett’s long-anticipated sequel to his now iconic Sideways — had me alternately laughing and crying through this hilarious, heartbreaking and ultimately moving meditation on Fame, Friendship and Family. I found it equally poignant and profound the way this epic road novel slowly but surely strips Miles down to his naked, sober soul — a bittersweet, existential deconstruction of everything this man is. Vertical managed to break my heart and then put it back together again, piece by piece, and should abolish any lingering doubts whether the author just got “lucky” with Sideways. This is a work to be both admired and savored like the great Willamette Valley Pinots Miles exults over (**Quoted on the back of Vertical’s hard-cover edition**). A story such as this, about real human beings experiencing real emotions, is unfortunately considered High Concept at a time when most “literary” adults are reading about vampires and wizards. Bravely dipping a pen in the ink of his own soul, Pickett’s novels chart a winding path from divorced, struggling writer in the throes of a mid-life crises, to celebrated author coming to grips with his success. A journey that should serve as inspiration for any underdog artists who feel that time — and hope — is running out for them.

I recently sat down with Rex at a coffee shop in Santa Monica to discuss Vertical and all the wine, sweat & tears that lead up to it. At 6’ 1” and with a full head of hair, the San Diego native is the complete antithesis to the nerdy portrayal of his alter-ego in the film.

MM: I admire what you’ve been through, Rex. You’ve fought the good fight.

RP: I’m blogging about it now (verticalthenovel.com), but you know, even after Sideways life wasn’t rosy. Success isn’t like one of those pianos that play themselves. No. There’s a blank page. People think they’re going to write that one thing and it’s going to be the be-all, end-all, well… think again.

MM: So for those who are unfamiliar with your background, describe the catalyst behind the writing of Sideways.

RP: My life was pretty much in the shit-can. My agent had died of AIDS; my mother had a massive stroke that rendered her left-side totally paralyzed; my younger brother took over her care out of ostensible altruism and then proceeded to gut all of her savings in a mere two years. I went through an amicable, albeit disorienting, divorce with my wife – who won an Oscar for a short-film I wrote in 2000 [My Mother Dreams the Satan’s Disciples in New York.] So I was pretty much nowhere when I wrote a novel called La Purisma – named after a golf course up in Santa Ynez – and it was a mystery novel. First novel I had written since some epigone avant-garde experiments in the ‘70s. It got me a publishing agent who took it on, but we couldn’t sell it. So that’s the other thing: if you have an agent and he likes your work, you can still have trouble getting published; it’s no guarantee just because you have representation. And in the novel world, things move slowly, unlike with screenplays. The rejection letters trickle in like a slow morphine drip.

MM: The frustration of Miles Raymond comes into focus.

RP: So thus we have Miles, the guy who can’t publish his novel. I started spending a lot of time up in Santa Ynez Valley. Initially I went up just for the golf – uncrowded and beautiful — then I started staying overnight at, where else? The Windmill Inn, just like Jack and Miles. Then I had to have a place to eat, so I ambled over to the nearby Hitching Post, now an iconic landmark because of Sideways. I would always go up mid-week when there was no one on the golf course, and practically no one dining at the Hitching Post. After a few glasses of their Pinot I’d strike up a conversation and suddenly I realized: “Oh my God, there’re wineries around here!” So, frustrated with my novel La Purisima, I took frequent sojourns up there. Then, because it was so beautiful and uncrowded I started taking friends. Once I went up with a buddy of mine, Roy, and we went from tasting room to tasting room, cracking each other up. He’s the inspiration behind Jack and he said, “Rex, you gotta write this as a screenplay”, and I thought, “Yeah!” So I wrote Sideways as a screenplay but it didn’t work. It so didn’t work, I didn’t give it to my agent.

Men suck. Well, not all men, but too many. All it takes is one look on the television or one listen to the radio to realize the accuracy of this statement. I’m not sure when exactly in the history of civilization men decided to become complete d-bags, or if they perhaps just “evolved” that way. All I know is, male behavior toward women has progressively become more and more derogatory. Long gone are the days of Ricky loving Lucy or The Beach Boys serenading sweethearts across America. No Ma’am, what we have on our hands now is one giant Petri dish brimming with bigoted, arrogant, chauvinistic specimens.

Recently, I worked for some time at a company that allowed employees to listen to the radio for eight hours a day. Needless to say, I too often got an earful of lyrics I really didn’t care to have. Sure, there was a time when I’d bop along to the beats and do the subtle-sit-down-dance in my swivel office chair, but that all came to an abrupt halt the day I realized what was actually being sung in these catchy songs that seemed so upbeat and positive. My first realization came with the ever so popular ballad “Toot it and Boot it.” For the longest time I thought the words in the title and chorus were complementing someone who had a cute booty. What I found out is that the singer, known as YG (Young Gangsta), is actually talking about a one night stand with a woman he met at “the club.” The singer seems to take great joy in calling his prey a “slut” and “stupid.” He refers to himself as a “pimp” and asks “who next?” His tone is pompous—he can’t believe the girl doesn’t know who he is, and when she thinks he’s cute, he plays hard to get, saying “knock it off you know you can’t have this.” The girl never says she wants to go home with him, but YG cockily believes that she does. When “she falls in love” YG laughs, kicks her out the door, and “makes her feel stupid.” Towards the end of the song we learn the singer may actually be married. Is NOTHING sacred now?

Unfortunately, the world of television has also sunk so low as to endorse “men” (if I dare even call them that), who think it’s okay to use women as objects. I fear we are all most likely familiar with the MTV show called “Jersey Shore.” I always knew NJ was nicknamed “The Armpit of America” for a reason. But for those of you living under a rock, here’s a brief synopsis of the show: Eight, twenty-something, Italian-Americans live in a house on the Jersey shore, party like it’s 1999 every night/morning, hook up with each other, as well as every other Guido within a five mile radius, then decide that they actually hate each other. Oh yeah, and how could I forget, the holy trinity of gym, tanning and laundry (GTL for short)? Pauly D. and Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino are two guys on the show who, besides GTL, spend the rest of their time attempting to get sex from any girl half way decent looking, i.e., someone who is not a “grenade.” So far, their endeavors don’t always seem to go according to plan, probably because girls are not idiots and can sense these guys are interested in one thing only. Plus, the fake bake tans, blow out haircuts, and steroid induced muscles are not every lady’s cup of tea. Honestly, I wonder if these guys plan on settling down one day and finding a girl they may actually want to marry rather than just “toot and boot.” If they can clean up their act, find someone who will marry them, and have kids with them, will they show episodes of “Jersey Shore” to their sons, or to their daughters??

Believe me, I realize it takes two to tango and that in some instances girls can be just as horrific as boys. But I wonder, do the boys initiate this kind of behavior? Have girls been so conditioned by the morons in their life that they have succumbed to this kind of degradation? Take, for example, “The Situation.” Although he has no class, no respect for his roommates, and seems dumber than a box of rocks, he is the leader of the “Jersey Shore” house, and what he says goes. And yet here he is making appearances all over the place and landing a spot on Dancing with the Stars, and The Tonight Show, sitting next to REAL stars like Jamie Lee Curtis. Why, America, is this meathead being rewarded for his behavior? I’d honestly love to know. I am appalled that he claims to be a descendant from the same country that my grandfather was born and grew up in. As far as I know, since my grandfather passed away, there hasn’t been a kinder, gentler soul to grace this planet, and he was the complete OPPOSITE of the parasitic males that slither and slide their greasy little selves through the television screen, infecting millions of homes across America. And there’s the really sad part of this kind of culture—it’s communicable. That is, not only are these guys at risk of contracting and/or spreading STD’s, they are also transmitting their behaviors to any young, impressionable males who might learn to treat girls as sex objects, and to any young girls who might think this is acceptable.

Growing up, I was always the kid whose parents listened to oldies and watched Nick @ Nite. I was raised on the classics (according to mom and dad, that is), from James Taylor, Johnny Mathis, and John Denver, to Get Smart, The Brady Bunch, and Bewitched. These artists and actors kept it clean and respectful, and were still entertaining, imagine that! I’m not sure why, now, in 2010, being mainstream and “cool” means degrading women. I think the only solution is to take an active stand and be that voice that says, hey, this isn’t cool. In doing so, we leave the despicable creatures that plague TV and radio to binary fision—the asexual reproduction of low life forms.

I traveled to Telluride, Colorado for the first time earlier this month for the town’s annual film festival. I journeyed there looking for inspiration, and my expectations were high. I was counting on cinematic artistry and natural wonder to come barreling toward me the moment my feet hit the dirt. I packed pads, pens, camera, digital video recorder- all in hopes of capturing something tangible- something that might ignite my own creative fire. Lucky for me, I found more than one something.

The Telluride Film Festival is one that stands apart from the others. Press was unnoticeable and the urgency around landing a distribution deal that exists elsewhere was nowhere to be found. By all appearances, it was merely (and impressively) a community of cinephiles assembling to celebrate and debate contemporary work. And by cinephiles, I don’t mean only those of us working in the industry. I met a librarian from San Francisco, local students, a Palo Alto tech-geek who has been a faithful attendee for a quarter century, an oil painter with a gallery on Colorado Avenue (Telluride’s Main Street), an extreme sports television producer, an advertising executive and her Wall Street fiancée both of whom began as volunteers years ago and now count themselves as paying festival goers. What struck me most was the sheer loyalty of so many of the attendees, who are a community in and of themselves. In fact, cinephile may be too broad a description for this group; a better one might be Telluridist. One local teacher presented me with a detailed account of a Brooklyn writer and three year veteran who gained a sort of fame by purchasing the least expensive pass yet finagled his way into some thirty screenings the year prior; a number most likely exaggerated as the festival only runs four days.

So what is it that keeps these Telluridists coming back? With two direct flights via prop plane from Denver daily, Telluride is no easy destination to reach. Yes, the Western style downtown nestled into the green mountainscape is idyllic beyond measure, but there’s something more…something dare I say magical about the place during this time year. Without a doubt, the beating heart of the festival lies in the artists themselves. I sat cross-legged on a grassy field a few feet from Colin Firth, Werner Herzog, Danny Boyle and Peter Weir listening intently as they discussed the value of a close up (a tool Mr. Herzog strongly believes to be overused), the rehearsal process (or lack thereof), and the neurological side effects of creating a character’s physical disability, such as a stammer, in the name of a great role. A question from the audience never went unanswered and most of the filmmakers loitered in lobbies following their screenings to speak directly with whomever wanted to pay them a compliment or present them with a late thought-up inquiry.

Following what turned out to be the unofficial US premiere of Black Swan, a petite young woman in her twenties shot her hand in the air to ask Darren Aronofsky the first question of the Q&A session. Her mouth opened, but instead of words a well of emotion burst forth shocking us all, her included. She just barely managed to get out, “thank you.” It was a surprising reaction to a psychological thriller, but Mr. Aronofsky, ever congenial with his easy Brooklyn manner (that may sound counterintuitive but I assure you it’s accurate) thanked her right back, acknowledging “this is why I do it” and added, “we’ll talk after.” He meant it too. Later, I discovered that she was a dancer and actress. Presumably, the film had struck a chord, perhaps gaining an emotional clarity that she hadn’t possessed before. Afterall, that is what the best art does, holds up a mirror and reveals a part of ourselves or our world that we have left unnoticed or worse ignored.

A Letter to Elia, a documentary by Martin Scorsese and co-director Kent Jones, was representative of the theme of artistic influence that ran throughout the weekend whether intentionally or not. The film serves as a message of thanks from one great filmmaker to another. It highlights the personal and artistic influence of controversial figure Elia Kazan and his films on a young Martin Scorsese, before the ambition to become a director was even a whisper in his great mind. Mr. Scorsese narrates the film with an uncharacteristically slow, effective pace and vulnerable demeanor. He talks about going to see Kazan’s films during the onset of adolescence, and how they articulated something about his own life that he could not yet name. He felt understood much in the same way, I would imagine, as the young lady in the Black Swan screening. East of Eden was a particularly important experience for Scorsese, who spends a great majority of A Letter to Elia discussing it. He admits, “I stalked it” and confesses to seeing it fourteen times in various theaters around New York City. The film is not a retrospective of Kazan but a grateful acknowledgement by Scorsese of the influence those films had on the direction of his life. It brought viewer, panelist, and filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier, who witnessed the tragic effects of Kazan’s testimony to the House Un-American Activities Committee first-hand, to tears. A Letter to Elia addresses the blacklisting that Kazan took part in, but only to examine the influence the events had on his body of work. Scorsese believes that Kazan’s best films came after this period of time. The issue of betrayal becomes paramount in his pictures following the testimony. Clearly influenced by the events of his own life, the director increasingly looks inward to tell stories with heavy personal meaning to him. It was then, Scorsese argues and most would agree, that Kazan transformed from director to artist.

The concept of artistic influence was touched on by directors responsible for two of the highest profile films in Telluride, Black Swan and The King’s Speech. After the sneak peak of Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky repeated the oft-mentioned notion that “nothing is original.” He went on to say that he, like most other artists, is influenced by various sources, in this case the most obvious being Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake, but also Dostoevsky’s The Double and Roman Polanski’s Repulsion. He explained how he “puts them into a blender and makes (his) own smoothie.” What comes out is unique- he’s made the story his own- but the underlying ideas at play have been contemplated by countless artists and thinkers before him, since the beginning of storytelling itself. In the case of Black Swan, because the original work Swan Lake plays such a prominent part in the story, the influence may work in reverse as well. Of course, Tchaikovsky is not alive to rewrite Swan Lake nor would we want him to, but Black Swan influences the audience’s experience of the ballet in two obvious ways. First, it informs the original by presenting a literal re-telling of the story at the center of both works. The audience witnesses a modern day translation of the symbolic ballet complete with evidence to support how and why the fragile yet driven woman at the center of both tales unravels before our eyes. One woman commented, “It made Swan Lake make more sense.” Second, while leaving the theater, I overheard a group of enthusiastic filmgoers discussing that they’d “love to see Swan Lake again.” It’s possible that the ballet will see increased interest quantified by either more productions being staged or more tickets, DVDs, and/or books being sold.

During the introduction for the final screening of The King’s Speech at Telluride and with a similar sentiment to that articulated by Mr. Scorsese, the first thing out of director Tom Hooper’s mouth was an expression of gratitude for iconic filmmaker Peter Weir’s attendance. Hooper went on to site Weir as the preeminent influence on all of his period pieces. Hooper specifically recounted how he used Weir’s Master and Commander as a “touchstone” for the John Adams miniseries he directed that aired in 2008 to much acclaim on HBO. He admitted that he was thrilled to meet Weir for the first time in Telluride because his films were viewed and discussed often in his home while growing up. Although raised in London, Hooper, like Weir, is of Australian descent. His mother, an Australian expat who moved to London before her son was born, encouraged Tom to watch Australian films and specifically Weir’s work. Hooper recalled her saying, “If you like film, you’ve gotta watch Australian cinema.” From a spectator’s point of view, there is nothing as influential and inspiring as watching an artist you admire come face to face with one of his or her own creative idols for the first time. But that’s par for the course at Telluride.

For me, it’s obvious why people come from across the world to the far-flung town of Telluride year after year. Not for the mountains or the rolling waterfall, although both of those help, they come for the promise of inspiration- or influence- even for those of us who don’t normally think of ourselves as artists. The creative force lies within each of us. But only some have the ability and curiosity needed to access it. In places like this, when we stumble upon inspiration, whether accidentally or after a long, sought out pilgrimage, we change- our perspective shifts and we understand something about ourselves that we didn’t before. We come one step closer to becoming artists ourselves.