The Interrupters

The Interrupters is a  multi-award winning feature-length documentary film by director Steve James and producer Alex Kotlowitz. It follows three Violence Interrupters from Chicago trying to stop the ever growing violence and death in their neighbourhood, they have all once come from a gang related background and this enables them get close and personal with the troubled youths of their community and try and help them change.

The filming does not show any violence and death except twice through out the two hours but with interviews and various establishing and detailed shots you get a clear look at just how bad the area has become for people of all ages. I feel the whole film was shot in a fantastic way and without the three main characters being able to go where many people are unable to we get a true insight in what is going on in Chicago and the rest of America with youth and gang culture within African-America and Latino communities.

This is a truly remarkable documentary that makes your feel for the communities caught up with in the crossfire as well as the people committing these violent acts and the Interrupters for doing what they can to try and prevent the violence.

Click on the picture below to watch the trailer and more information on The Interrupters website.

Old Boy - Screen Shots

Here are some work-in-progress screen shots from my latest university project, Old Boy. I am currently editing three clubs and societies I photographed looking at typology with in groups.

 

Poole Radio Yacht Club

 Battle Group South

 Netley Slot Car Club

Dissertation Note #2

Been doing some reading lately for my dissertation, I am still not 100% sure what I am going to be writing about, but I have a good feeling on what direction I want my essay to head towards. Here are few quotes and references that I am hoping to use in the final essay.

In an interview with Joerg Colberg, Benjamin Lowy states 

"what happens in NY and Iraq are separated by vast cultural, economic, and geographic differences, and getting people so disconnected to care about others is very hard." (Colberg, J. 2011)

Broomberg and Chanerin state on their website, 

"Crucially, for traditional photojournalism, is the fact that the three biggest news stories in recent years, September 11th, Abu Graib and the Tsunami, were all recorded by amateurs. Chris Boot made a joke during the Aperture discussion that these days if your photographs aren't good enough, you aren't far enough away. An inversion of Capa's famous quote. This strategy, of stepping back from the event and producing more reflective journalism, is a direct response to this new reality: that armed with a digital camera or mobile phone everyone is a photojournalist, in the traditional sense, reporting from the front line of life" (Lehan, J. 2006)

Colberg, J. (2011). A Conversation with Benjamin Lowy. [online] Available from: http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/extended/archives/a_conversation_with_benjamin_lowy/ [Accessed 17^th September 2011]

Lehan, J. (2006). Interview with Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin conducted by Joanna Lehan, assistant curator at the International Center of Photography, New York for the catalogue of ECOTOPIA, the second triennial of photography and video. 2006. [pdf] New York: International Center of Photography. Available from: http://choppedliver.info/pdf/lehan.pdf [Accessed 14th November 2011]

Restrepo

I finally got round to watching Restrepo by Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington. The documentary follows the men of Battle Company 2nd of the 503rd Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team of the U.S Army and their stay at Out Post Restrepo in the Korengal Valley, showing how the platoon cope with the day to day life in Afghanistan, and in one of the most dangerous areas for the U.S Military to be based. For me this feature-length was a great insight into military life on the front-line, the way the documentary is filmed immerses the audience into the combat, hard labour and chores of the solders, making the viewer feel as if they have been with the men from the start, seeing their blood, sweat and tears, which I think makes this an award winning documentary film. 

The image below has a link to the Restrepo website where there is more information on the film, the solders involved and an extensive selection of interviews to watch over, while you wait for your DVD to arrive in the post.

Dissertation Note #1

So now that I am into my final year I have to do my dissertation, it has been very difficult to think of a strong question that I want to ask, research and write about. I didn't want to go for something that was too easy for me to write about, as that would not teach me much about what I am interested in. I am still in the developing stage of my research but here are some photographers I have been looking at, they are not 100% going to be in my final piece but it shows the sort of work I am going to be looking at for the dissertation.


Each image is linked to the website I found them on, some of them have more of the photographers work or an article about the photographer.

Kevin Frayer

Balazs Gardi

Simon Norfolk

Luc Delahaye

Life In A Day

Last week I found out that Life In A Day was available to watch in full on its dedicated Youtube channel. The documentary was filmed all on one day on July 24th, 2010. People filmed their lives and uploaded them to Youtube, where the team behind this film had to filter through around 4500 hours of footage from 192 countries from around 80,000 submission. The historic film shows the beauty, horrors and day to day life of people from every corner of the world. A truly beautiful film that makes you laugh, cry and smile all with in ninety minutes, it opens your eyes to some great people and some beautiful scenes. The film shows our connection to one another even with so many things that make us different from everyone else. You see different cultures coming together, different places of the world, and see how people live their lives. 

Click on the poster to watch the full length feature film. 

Occupy London Stock Exchange

Occupy Wall Street is a demonstration, sit in and protest against the corporations, banks and governments that have been a major part in this economical crisis that has led to millions of people, world wide being jobless, homeless and feeling the strain of the financial meltdown. All the while the 1% have still managed to walk around with millions of pounds, dollars and euros in their own pockets, the 99% are struggling in this situation. The events that took place in New York City over a month ago, has spread across the world. Thousands of people have taken to the streets to show their support for Occupy Wall Street and to protest for their rights and to help make a change that many people feel the 99% deserve. 

The other week I went back to London for a few days and decided to pop along to the Occupy London Stock Exchange camp at St. Paul’s. I didn't take many photographs as I was just wanted to see this event for myself and take in the atmosphere. Here are two photographs that I shot on the day using a Bronica SQA. I plan on going back up to London when I get some free time and continue taking some more portraits of the protesters, and maybe creating a mini-project of this event in London.

Documentary Films

Lately I have been watching a fair few documentary films, these are partly the reason my political, economical and environmental views, opinions and interest has become stronger than ever before. As you can see from the DVD covers and posters below, they haven't been films that slightly prod the issue but they go head first into the issue, showing the true colours of some people, sometimes grim and horrible, sometimes destructive and greedy.

The images below each have link to the trailer for the film.

Welcome

After neglecting my other weblog for sometime now and wanting to re-invent my the old one, I introduce you to my new blog that is nicely titled Matthew Walden The Blog. 

To get things started I thought I would first introduce myself, I am a photographer in training, currently into political, economical and environmental documentary and portraiture photography.

This weblog is going to be a little bit different from the other weblog I produced, it will have less inspirational work, but will have more written work and my own work and projects.

Below are some of my work, just a teaser of what I shoot, which you can find the rest of clicking the first photograph below.