URL: http://www.postmodernjoan.com/wp02/
Site Name: Boiling Sand
Categories: Film history, Film theory, Hollywood, Queer cinema
Rating: PG-13 ( I use "ass" from time to time but seldom use "f*ck", if you get my drift...)
What is the main focus of your site?
99.9% of all criticism is grounded in mystification. The views of critics are like those who grade precious stones, examining the surface for flaws or the composition for irregularities, yet still fetishizing the object.
I work from demystification, asking marginally improper questions, especially about those issues some see as tangential or non-essential.
I defend that the backstory of a film is equally as hallucinatory as the cinema-viewing experience; truth is stranger than fiction as the saying goes. And backstory -- the hazards and happenstance of production -- is not just an extra quality, but a door of perception to seeing integral factors in how and why a film was formed and completed.
Part of this view comes from working on 500+ film and video productions in my career. For example, the high quality blow going around a movie set or the argument a director had with his/her spouse the night before definitely impacts the output and culture of a film's production.
Film production, like all professions, is a distinct work culture with deep anthropological dynamics.
What are your blogging goals, personally and/or professionally? In other words, what, if anything, are you trying to get out your blog?
My blog has a parent site, www.postmodernjoan.com , where I started placing more serious, 'academic' articles. [ I had just come back to the U.S. after working in China for a few years, and wanted to reclaim the English vocab I had lost and also market myself again as a film instructor.] But I wanted to do shorter, more down-to-earth pieces too. Creating BOILING SAND has filled that need. Actually, I haven't posted anything on the other site this whole year as the blog has been my main passion. As for what I'm trying to get out of it, right now the goal is to accumulate a substantial body of writings on movies.
Do you prefer an interactive community for your blog or are you the teacher and your readers are the students?
I have around 9,000 RSS subscribers but very few comment on my blog.
How long have you been movie blogging for, and how frequent do you post updates to your site?
Went live in October, 2008. I add posts once or twice a week. Heavily participate in blog-a-thons also.
Name up to three of your favorite movies (and no more).
THE ABRAHAM ZAPRUDER FILM
SANS SOLEIL / Chris Marker
VERTIGO
How did you hear about the LAMB?
Linked from another film blog.
Any additional comments, or give yourself an interview question that's not listed above.
I think my lengthy answer to the first question said it all.
