If I had any question as to whether or not I was in the right theater to see the energy doc Houston We Have a Problem, that question was answered when a guy sat down two rows in front of me wearing a 10 gallon hat. Not a modern Stetson, mind you, but a Old West 10 gallon hat. He seemed to fit the part of the Texas oilman.

As director Nicole Torre said following the screening, the film is a call to action, urging both oilmen and clean-energy pioneers to work together to solve the country’s energy problems. In Torre’s interviews, a consensus emerges: wildcatters got us here, and wildcatters are going to lead us out.

Put another way: The wildcatters who discovered all that Texas oil (like those profiled in the recent book The Big Rich) had a common thread among them: a willingness to take risks in the hopes that they would hit it big. Houston argues that that same spirit is needed in the search for renewable energy.

Late in the film, we start to meet some of those modern day wildcatters, and it was about this point that the same 10 gallon hat sitting two rows in front of me also appeared on the big screen. In both instances, it was sitting on the head of Steve Munson, the head of Vulcan Power Company, a developer of clean, renewable power.

I suppose it’s good to know that the pop culture image of the cowboy oilman is staying the same, even as the thing he’s looking for has changed.

The title of one of the panels Saturday afternoon at the Nasher Sculpture Center was “Documentary or VLog: What’s a Documentary Really?” And that proved to be the subject of the panel. For about five minutes. The rest of the time, though, was an education for anyone who has ever thought about making a doc from three guys who know their way around one. Here are the best pointers that emerged:

YOUTUBE HAS MADE THE JOB HARDER: People being interviewed have always tended to clam up when the cameras start to roll. But the ubiquity of YouTube, with all its videos passed around of people looking less than their best, has caused doc subjects to pause before offering their true self.

“The cameras are doing two things. We either get a measured approach when we talked to them or they sort of shutdown,” Haze director Pete Schuermann said of the college students he interviewed about his binge-drinking film.

So how do you get people to open up more? Rock Prophecies director John Chester has a strategy.

“I take a camera right away, because I want to immediately start the process of wearing them down,” he said. Most people will eventually start to get more comfortable.

GET THEM BUSY: Still having trouble getting people relaxed? Have them do something they would be doing anyway.

“I think you set up situations where they are preoccupied with the task at hand,” Chester said. If you are interviewing chefs, talk to them while they’re cooking.

SHOOT IN MINI DVD AT THE MINIMUM: If you have any hopes that your film will make it onto television, you’ve got to be in HD.

GIVE ‘EM A TASTE: Once you’ve got your film made, consider offering more than just a trailer. Eric Mofford, a producer on the forward-thinking Houston We Have a Problem, suggested putting a long enough clip of the film online so that people really get a sense of the film (as opposed to some quick-cutting, pack-in-the-info trailer).

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS: And speaking of those trailers – be sure you know your fair use rules backwards and forwards (or at least know a lawyer who does). The example was made of Super Size Me, the 2004 film about America’s fast-food addiction. In the movie, you see the McDonald’s logo throughout as director Morgan Spurlock eats there everyday for a month. But in the trailer, you won’t find it. The difference is that it can be argued that shooting in McDonalds, and consequently showing their logos, was vital to telling the story. The law doesn’t care about your ability to sell your film, though.

Want to read up on fair use now? A good start is the Center for Social Media’s Documentary Filmmakers Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use. It’s not beach reading, but it might save you some heartache down the line.

How do female rappers find the balance between embodying traditional hip-hop qualities while also maintaining their identities as women?

That’s the question at the heart of the documentary Say My Name.

Director Nirit Peled says that initially she wanted to find out, “what role do women have in hip hop?”

“And when I ended the film, it was more about the role that hip-hop has in their lives,” she said after the film played earlier this month at South by Southwest.

The degree to which hip-hop drives their lives varies from person to person. For those like Detroit rapper Miz Korona, it’s all-encompassing. Every word, piece of clothing and story seem to be grounded in a hip-hop identity. For others, like New York’s Chocolate Thai, it leads to what feels like a split personality. At the start of the film, she’s a tough talker, swilling a Heineken while throwing out as much bravado as any gangsta hustler. But later we watch as she cheers no her young son on the playground, doting on him as only a mother can.

One point that nearly everyone agreed on is that they wanted to be known for their talent, not their looks. Foxy Brown, they’re not.

“We want to be known as LYRICISTS,” says Monie Love, who was featured on Queen Latifah’s 1989 breakout “Ladies First”

The focus on these personal perspectives leads to a distinction that should be made about Say My Name: this is not “the history of women in hip-hop.” Many of the most recognizable female rappers are not interviewed, including Salt and Pepa, Missy Elliott and Queen Latifah. But those who are featured represent the spectrum of women in hip-hop. There are teenage amateurs spitting lyrics on the playground. There are rising stars, including Britain’s Estelle. And there are those of have left their mark on the field (MC Lyte, Remy Ma, Roxanne Shante, Monie Love). Dallas’ Erykah Badu even makes a brief appearance, raising some questions as to where hip-hop ends and soul and R&B begin. It’s an ever-blurring distinction, and some artists – Badu included – move fluidly between the styles. Had the filmmakers attempted to nail down a definition of what they consider hip-hop, it might have lead to a more finely focused document.

Still, the strength of the film is in the stories these women tell about determination and heartbreak. About trying to make it in a man’s world. And about how they’ve fought to make sure that terms “female” and “rapper” aren’t mutually exclusive.

Art&Seek will sponsor two screenings of the film: Sunday at 10:30 p.m. at the Magnolia and Monday at 5:30 p.m. at NorthPark.

Chocolate Thai

Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray star in Double Indemnity.

At 3 o’clock on Friday afternoon, Terry Walstrom and his 18-year-old son, Nicholas, were settling into a movie at AFI Dallas. The fact that a father and son would be catching a movie together wasn’t unusual, but the movie they had picked was. The 1944 Billy Wilder classic Double Indemnity, starring Fred MacMurray, Edward G. Robinson and Barbara Stanwyck, was on the bill. Terry says he has seen the movie several times, but Nicholas had never watched. So why were they bothering to drive all the way from their home in Fort Worth to watch something they could play any time at home on DVD?

“I used to live in L.A. when they had a bunch of revival theaters where you could see films with an audience of fans of that film,” Terry said. “To see it with an audience of real movie buffs is worth the trip. There’s an electricity to an audience that has a real appreciation of the film.”

Since the adoption of the VCR in the eary 1980s, the revival theater has pretty much gone the way of the dodo. But judging by the 60 or so people who attended a show on  a weekday afternoon, there is still some appetite for repertory film in North Texas. The Inwood Theatre keeps the repertory flame burning most consistently with its midnight shows on Friday and Saturday (Pee Wee’s Big Adventure is on this weekend). And the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth as well as the Dallas Public Library work in older movies now and then. But it’s rare to see something as old and truly classic as Double Indemnity on the big screen in Dallas.

Film festivals like AFI Dallas primarily exist to show movies that local audiences might not ever see otherwise. But one of the side benefits is the repertory films that are sometimes added to the schedule. AFI Dallas will also show Chinatown tonight, as well as Gentleman Prefer Blondes on Wednesday and The Last Picture Show on Thursday.

Rick Worland, a professor of cinema and television at SMU, lead a question-and-answer session with MacMurray’s daughter Kate after the screening. When asked about repertory film’s place in Dallas, he conceded that it was all but dead as people become more attached to their home theaters. But he did tip his cap to the crowd in the theater.

“When you do put these films on the big screen, people do come out to see them, which is interesting because most of the people here have seen this before,” he said. “But it just goes to show that movies were made to be seen on the big screen.”

Experts will tell you that that is because of the larger picture, better sound and the communal experience. But Terry had another explanation.

“At home, you’re too much the master. In the theater, the film is the master.”

Sleet/Snow is part of the North Texas College Showcase on Saturday.

What sounds good for this weekend at the AFI? Here’s what I recommend:

Saturday

Rock Prophecies – If you’re a fan of rock ‘n’ roll and photography, this doc is for you. It follows the career of concert photographer Robert Knight as he captures some of the lasting images of rock, including some of the last photos of Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan. 4 p.m., Magnolia

The Hurt Locker – Kathryn Bigelow’s narrative film about an elite bomb squad in Iraq has intensity to burn. Bigelow will be on hand to receive the AFI Dallas Star Award. 7:30 p.m., Magnolia

North Texas College Showcase – More than a dozen films made by local college directors will play. Sleet/Snow out of UT-Arlington is one of my favorite films of the festival. 9:45 p.m., NorthPark

Sunday

Booker T. Washington Shorts – What are the student filmmakers at Dallas’ arts magnate school up to? Here’s your chance to find out. 12:15 p.m., Magnolia

R.I.P.: A Remix Manifesto – Where do you draw the line between copyright protection and artists’ creativity? This doc from Canada attempts to answer that question as it follows mash-up artist Girl Talk. 9 p.m., NorthPark

Bollywood Beats – India comes to town in this locally-produced story of a dancer who takes on an unruly class of recruits. It screens as part of the Texas Competition, and you can read Jerome Weeks’ review here. 3:30 p.m., NorthPark

One morning a few years ago, Keith Maitland found himself following a blind man as he used his white stick to navigate the busy streets of New York City. At the time, Maitland was working in the city on the set of Law and Order. He had recently attended a wedding in Austin and happened to get into a discussion with a man at his table who worked for the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired. It got him toying with the idea of making a documentary about the school. In the time it took him to watch the man navigate a busy intersection on 23^rd Street, Maitland made a decision.

Maitland

“That was a light bulb moment for me,” Maitland, a Plano native, said in a recent interview. “In this one instance of seeing this guy and paying close attention, it occurred to me that he’s just like me. He’s got to get to work, he’s on his way somewhere and he’s not going to let the intersection stop him. He can’t live within one city block for the rest of his life. And that was when I said, ‘OK, I have to make this movie.’”

The result is The Eyes of Me, which screens at AFI Dallas on Saturday and Sunday. The portrait of four students at Austin’s Texas School for the Blind is alternately touching, heartbreaking, insightful and inspiring.

Maitland headed to Austin in the summer of 2005 to research his film. Within 24 hours, he found Chas, a 6 foot 9 aspiring rapper with personality to burn. The Fort Worth native would be a senior in the fall, so it was important to move quickly.

The other three stars of the film were selected from a pool of about 20 students after the school year started. They are Meagan, a fellow senior who would go on to be valedictorian; Isaac, a newcomer to the school who had been blind less than a year; and Denise, a Dallas native trying to find her way as a freshman.

Chas

The four students Maitland selected are opposites in nearly every way except for their blindness. Chas is larger than life; Denise is tiny. Meagan is driven in school; Isaac is a little more driven by girls. Their varied perspectives underscore a point important to Maitland.

“Adults in the situation of going through sight loss or major sensory loss have a tendency to shut down, and all other elements of their life go on hold while they focus on that and that alone,” he said. “But these teenagers didn’t put everything else on hold. Yes, they’re dealing with their sight loss, but they’re also dealing with everything else that a teenager deals with: dating, romance, the quest for independence.”

A documentary about teenagers is bound to be dramatic (see last year’s excellent American Teen, for starters). But documentaries based mostly on interviews can be visually boring.  To protect against that and to explore a key question, Maitland decided to animate parts of the film.

“People always ask blind people how they dream. I assumed that if you had sight and lost it, and you’d only lost it a couple of years ago, you’re likely to dream in very much the same way you used to,” Maitland says. “So I wanted to create a dreamlike sequence.”

He hired Austin-based animators Jason Archer and Paul Beck to provide a few segments of rotoscopic animation. (You can see some it in the beginning of the trailer, above.) The duo had previously worked on Richard Linklater’s A Scanner Darkly. The charge for The Eyes of Me was to imagine what blind people see in their own minds.

Maitland sought creative input from his subjects, interviewing them about how they pictured the world. What he found when he talked to Meagan was that his assumptions about how they dream weren’t exactly right.

“We talked about it, and it was like, ‘When you talk about sunset, what do you imagine?’ And she said it was, ‘that postcard moment. When I think of a sunset, I don’t think of any one specific sunset I saw, I think of the best sunset’.”

As Meagan ticks off the colors of that sunset, they flow onto the screen, swirling around her and bringing the audience inside her mind.

If you don’t catch The Eyes of Me at either of its AFI screenings, there’s a good chance you will see it on Independent Lens one day – Maitland has already cut a 56 minute version suitable for television. And there’s also a chance your kids might catch it, too. The Meadows Foundation provided finishing funds for the film. And once they saw it, they liked it so much that they provided additional funding to develop a curriculum around the film for high school students.

The Eyes of Me screens at the Magnolia on Saturday at 12:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Director Keith Maitland and subjects from the film will be in attendance.

Nate Fowler

From AFI Dallas to Spring Gallery Night in Fort Worth, it’s a busy weekend for North Texas arts. Adding to the what-to-do logjam are a pair of worthy local-music shows within walking distance of each other in eastern Deep Ellum.

First, the no-brainer: the CD-release show and party for Salim Nourallah’s new release, Constellation, at the Sons of Hermann Hall. Serial nice guy Nourallah, 40, is one of Dallas’ indie treasures, and not just as a musician; he, Stuart Sikes and the pAper chAse‘s John Congleton are the area’s most sought-after record producers. (Nourallah’s recent credits include and the Old 97′s‘ nationally lauded comeback disc, Blame It On Gravity). According to this interview, Constellation is not only Nourallah’s crowning achievement as a recording artist, but it may also be his last album. Blame both gravity (i.e., age) and his knob-twiddling talent for that.

Meanwhile, at the Amsterdam Bar near Fair Park, a benefit for Dallas hard-rock mainstay Nate Fowler (American Fuse, Nate Fowler’s Elixir) will commence. Like many dedicated musicians (much less artists), he can’t afford health insurance – which would have come in handy when his left forearm and wrist were severely fractured in a car wreck early last year. Not only will Fowler perform (and, we hear, play guitar) for the first time since the wreck, but a bunch of local rock notables will play beforehand, including the BAcksliders, KERA/Art&Seek’s own Paul Slavens and the rarely spied punk poet Spyche. So many wanted to perform, in fact, that a second show on Sunday will feature the Happy Bullets, Rahim Quazi and - guess who? – Salim Nourallah. Don’t be surprised; he’s that kind of guy.

When I first picked up the Bollywood Beats screener and saw what the film was about, it caused me to wonder: North Texas’ South Asian community could cast, crew, create and produce a professional Bollywood musical? There was that much talent and resources, in-front-of- and behind-the-camera? Impressive.

Turns out I had to shift my expectations somewhat. Bollywood Beats was indeed shot in Plano (standing in for LA), and writer-director Mehul Shah is an SMU grad. But post-production was all done in Delhi, and the principal actors are out-of-town pros (actress-co-producer Mansi Patel, Lilette Dubey of Monsoon Wedding, former Miss India USA Pooja Kumar).

So the back story of the film actually goes like this: SMU grad Shah continues his climb in the industry from his Desi base (Desi refers to the children of the South Asian diaspora, in this case, Indian-Americans). Shah’s first film was the 2005 drama, Diwali, so kudos to him for continuing his trans-oceanic efforts.

Right. So how’s the movie? It’s a low-budget-but-n0t-that-cheap-looking musical set in America with all of the silly-happy Bollywood conventions intact, sub-category: the struggling young dancer with a dream. Raj ( Sachin Bhatt) wants to dance professionally, but he can’t get a gig, his dad doesn’t understand why he doesn’t find a real job and his girlfriend dumps him. An older Indian woman (Dubey) has a suggestion: Why not start a dance class for Indian women? Typically, Jyoti, this fairy-godmother plot-device, has no real motivation or relationship. She’s just a good-hearted, independent, unmarried woman (from somewhere) with all the money she needs (from somewhere) to help out other people, and not just Raj (there’s an adulterous husband who needs to be exposed). And no, Jyoti is not a cougar out to seduce Raj. That’s another kind of Bollywood film.

Needless to say, the class is a success, there’s a possible gig with a music video, a disastrous one at an Indian wedding and before I could set down my roti and ghee and shout, “climactic dance competition coming up,” one of them pops out of nowhere.

Sachin Bhatt in Bollywood Beats

If all of these aren’t well-worn Bollywood cliches, they’re certainly well-worn Hollywood cliches. But that’s not the point with such a film. Because of Shah’s Indian-American setting and (apparently) intended audience, Bollywood Beats features an American pop-culture and immigrant overlay to the very familiar generational/sexual/professional tensions. Raj, for instance, is developing a personal dance style that mixes hip-hop moves with more traditional Indian dance steps. There’s also an extended sequence involving a young gay male (Mehul Shah himself) and the acceptance (or lack of same) he encounters. Traditional family and sex roles (gay or housewife) don’t accommodate the transplant process as easily as music and dancing do, but then all the tensions get channeled into music and dancing, anyway.

Right. So how are the dance productions? Those are pretty much the entire purpose of a Bollywood musical. It’s revealing that although Keith Clark is credited with the choreography, four other names are listed below his, without official title — suggesting the varying styles on display. Bhatt is attractive and charming, though his hip-hop moves are more mainstream breaks and glides than hard-core aggressive krump. As the put-upon housewife who (surprise!) suddenly flowers on the floor, Kumar is a commanding presence. Bollywood musicals are all about directing (possibly dangerous) sexual energies into safe, smiling, lightly smoldering dance numbers, and Kumar excels at conveying the smolder, especially in the final sequence.

For no real reason except to spin off the sampler offered in the climactic competition, Shah tags on an ending medley that’s a wry history of Bollywood dance, and you can see how, over the years, Indians have very knowingly melded their own conventions with American movies, music and fashions — including ’60s mini-skirts and Beatles-era psychedelia, Saturday Night Fever disco and Purple Rain-era Prince. It’s the chief reason to see Bollywood Beats. Unfettered by plot or character or earnest social issues, it’s just fun.

At the AFI Film Festival, Bollywood Beats screens Sunday at 3:30 at NorthPark and Wednesday at 10 pm at Magnolia.

Trailer for Tattooed Under Fire

• Art & Seek is sponsoring the AFI Film Festival screenings of Tattooed Under Fire at 4 p.m. today and 4:30 next Thursday, both at the Magnolia.
  

• KERA radio story:

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• Expanded online story:

Roxanne Wheelis owns the River City Tattoo Parlors in Killeen and in Austin. Five years ago over a beer, Wheelis told documentary filmmaker Nancy Schiesari about the young men and women from Fort Hood — and the tattoo that some were getting before they deployed to Iraq.

It’s called a “meat tag.” It’s a soldier’s dog tag information tattooed on his or her torso.

SCHIESARI: “They do this in the event that they get blown up, the torso is most likely to remain intact and they can be identified.”

Wheelis also told Schiesari that she should hear the stories these soldiers were telling. They talk because getting a tattoo can be like what happens with a hair stylist or a massage therapist. A friendly stranger puts her hands on you and, over time, you relax and tell her your life story.

River City Tattoo Parlor in Killeen, Texas, near Fort Hood

WHEELIS: “You just have to let down your defenses, and the tattooist has to make you comfortable. It’s akin to counseling, plus you get a fabulous piece of artwork for the rest of your life.”

In 2005, Schiesari started visiting the Killeen tattoo parlor with a crew of her filmmaking students from the University of Texas at Austin. While making the documentary Tattooed Under Fire, they found that, even in front of a camera, the soldiers would open up – about themselves and the war.

SCHIESARI : “I saw how easy it was, while someone’s being tattooed, if they talk. It sort of helps people cope with the fact of the needle digging in. So as the person talked more and more, it was easier to ask, What’s your worst fear? And then all this stuff comes out.”

For many soldiers, getting a tattoo remains a macho ritual – a form of warrior paint. Other soldiers use their bodies as canvases to express themselves. One displays a tattoo that declares Rats Get Fat – a comment on war profits. Others want to remember the best in their lives.

Anthony, combat medic

James Collette, a lead gunner, has had favorite animals inked on him as well as reminders of the music he plays.

COLLETTE: “Mostly, they’re kind of a storyboard to remind me of where I’ve been and what I’ve gone through in my life.”

But as the soldiers return from deployment, the second half of Tattooed Under Fire becomes more about the aftermath of war than body art. While driving to Dallas, Collette had to swerve off the freeway. He’d had a flashback to a roadside bomb explosion in Iraq. In this scene from the film, he shakes while describing it.

COLLETE: “It’s like 150 lbs of explosives from 10 feet away. That’s a lot of concussion from the explosion. And it just slammed me into the turret of the truck. And just engulfed the whole truck in flames.”

Jonathan Evans, a combat mechanic, has a memento of his mother on one arm. On the other, he has a Grim Reaper – a reminder of an event that’s plagued him with nightmares. Evans saw an Iraqi point a rocket launcher. Evans shot him with his machine gun. The Iraqi turned out to be a child.

EVANS: “Last tour, after I had to gun down a child with a .50 cal, I just couldn’t do anything for the rest of the day, I was shutting down. One of my buddies made the crack that only the Reaper could have done that and still done his job. So when we got home, went out and got real drunk, my buddy talked me into getting a Reaper put on my arm.”

Both Collette and Evans are being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder. Evans calls himself a walking time bomb of aggression.

EVANS: “It’s being dealt with through various treatments and various means of calming down. Lately, I get pissed off, I go outside and work on my car.”

Schiesari hadn’t planned on her documentary turning out this way.

SCHIESARI: “I really didn’t know what was going to happen in part two. These soldiers came back with those experiences. It’s lucky in that sense, it’s good to have a day job because I could do this film over three years and go back and forth, oh God knows how many times.”

The soldiers are marking their torsos the way the war has marked their lives. And they’re using their skin to cope — and to celebrate. Those sounds in the background while Evans spoke were from his infant son. Evans has had another tattoo put on his arm. It’s a baby reaper and its name is David.

Filmmaker Nancy Schiesari

Want tickets to AFI? We’re happy to be giving them away. Go here for details.

Update: Tix are gone. But we may have more on Monday, so check back.