Formerly Of Mars Media.
By KATHY DeSALVO
Bicoastal Go Film has signed director Frank W. Ockenfels 3 for commercial and music video representation. Ockenfels comes over after five years at Mars Media, a satellite of HSI Productions. Both HSI and Mars are bicoastal.
Ockenfels, a well-known still shooter whose music and portrait photography has appeared on the covers of such magazines as Rolling Stone, Spin and Premiere, will maintain his longstanding affiliation with New York-based Art & Commerce, which reps him for print work.
Go Film principal/executive producer Jonathan Weinstein said he first came to know Ockenfels on a personal level this summer, after learning that they are neighbors in Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y. While he was quite familiar with Ockenfels’ still work, Weinstein said he was not aware the director had helmed a number of high-profile spots—for instance, the Converse ads featuring Dennis Rodman, through the then Houston Herstek Favat (which was subsequently sold to Boston-based Arnold Communications in ’97).
Unbeknownst to Weinstein, Ockenfels was also the director of "Teeth," a provocative anti-heroin PSA for Partnership For a Drug-Free America, created by copywriter Richard Yelland and art director Thomas Hayl. The ’96 spot, which sought to de-glamorize the "heroin chic" beauty myth, featured a female heroin addict who removes first her false eyelashes, her makeup and finally her teeth.
Describing Ockenfels as an "untapped talent," Weinstein said, "He uses a lot of his photographic influences in commercialmaking. He’s got a very raw, realistic approach to his photography as he does to his spotmaking. He takes the slickness out of it and maintains the reality of the environments and the people he films, so there’s a real strong sense of believability in his work. As a director, he doesn’t impose his style on the spot; in looking at a board, he considers what would be right for the project."
Relating that his departure from Mars Media was amicable, Ockenfels said, "I just think everyone there came to a standstill [in terms of] not really knowing what to do with me anymore." He added that since photography provides him a steady income, he hadn’t paid much attention to the slowdown in his directorial projects. "But in the last year, I thought this was silly: If I’m going to do this, I should really do it."
Ockenfels said that he was drawn to Go Film based on his newfound friendship with Weinstein and the prospect of being in a smaller-sized house. Said Ockenfels, "I thought it would be nice to go to a smaller company with less directors. Jonathan is a very hands-on guy, and I liked his whole personality. There was no pressure on his part; it was more [a matter of] me talking to him about it all the time. I just liked where he was going with his company."
Ockenfels launched his photography career 12 years ago when he started Purge, a New York-based print business that he still owns. In addition to his magazine credits, Ockenfels has shot several hundred album covers for artists such as David Bowie, R.E.M., Willie Nelson and Melissa Etheridge.
To date, Ockenfels has directed nearly 40 spots. His first assignment was the aforementioned "Teeth" for Partnership For a Drug-Free America. Among Ockenfels’ other credits are spots for Nike via Wieden & Kennedy, Portland; Champion via TBWA/Chiat/Day, New York; U.S. Robotics via The Leap Partnership, Chicago; USA Today via Gotham, New York; and Medic Alert via Merkley Newman Harty, New York. Most recently, he helmed an eight spot campaign for K-Swiss via Houston Helm and Company, Marina del Rey, Calif.; and a Boy Scouts of America spot for Bozell, New York.
Ockenfels said he began thinking of expanding into film six years ago, after he shot photos of the band Soundgarden which were used in their video "Spoonman," directed by Jeffery Plansker of bicoastal/international Propaganda Films. "I took all these pictures, and Jeffery understood my photography and basically glued them into the video," said Ockenfels. "It was a nice experience and I thought, ‘I could have done that part of it.’ It was kind of silly that I was handing my work off to somebody else to re-film."
After Ockenfels decided to explore his film options, his print agent set up meetings for him with assorted production companies, most of which told him to call after he’d done some spot work. But a meeting with HSI president Stavros Merjos proved more fruitful: Merjos invited Ockenfels to join the then fledgling Mars Media and funded a spec piece for him.
"At that time, they were looking for a lot of photographers to become directors because of the whole MTV thing," recalled Ockenfels. "[Music videos were] an easy in for younger directors because they had a place to play on MTV. The budgets weren’t huge; it was a lot easier to take a chance." Among the clips Ockenfels directed are Everclear’s "I Will Buy You a New Life," Alice In Chains’ "Heaven Beside You," Jonny Lang’s "Still Rainin,’" Better Than Ezra’s "In The Blood" and Blues Traveler’s "Hook."
Still photography currently comprises 75 percent of Ockenfels’ workload, and he related that he’d like to do a larger share of film projects. "I like the challenge of doing a lot of different things," he said.
Ockenfels joins a Go Film directorial roster also comprised of Michael Shapiro, Gary McKendry and Caitlin Felton. The company is repped by L.A.-based Lisa Giminez on the West Coast; Chicago-based Tim Harwood in the Midwest, and by New York-based Chris Messiter, Ann McKallagat and Barrie Isaacson on the East Coast.
Review: Writer-Director Adam Elliot’s “Memoir of a Snail”
It's not your typical stop-motion film when characters name pets after Sylvia Plath and read "The Diary of Anne Frank" — or when the story's inspired by a quote from existentialist thinker Søren Kierkegaard. And it's certainly not your typical stop-motion film when you find yourself crying as much as the characters do — in their case, with huge droplets leaking from bulging, egg-shaped eyes so authentic-looking, you expect the screen to get wet. But those are just a few of the unique things about Adam Elliot's "Memoir of a Snail," a film that's as heart-tugging as it is technically impressive, a work of both emotional resonance and great physical detail using only clay, wire, paper and paint. One thing Elliot's film is not, though, is for kids. So please take note before heading to the multiplex with family in tow: this film earns its R rating, as you'll discover as soon as young Grace, voiced by Sarah Snook, tells us she thought masturbation was about chewing your food properly. Sex, nudity, drunk driving, a fat fetish — like we said, it's R-rated for a reason. But let's start at the beginning. In this, his seventh "clayography" (for "clay" and "biography"), the Australian writer-director explores the process of collecting unnecessary objects. Otherwise known as hoarding, it's something that weighs us down in ways we can't see, for all the clutter. Elliot also argues that it helps us build constrictive shells around ourselves — like snail shells, perhaps. Our protagonist is Grace Pudel, voiced with a quirky warmth and plenty of empathy by the wonderfully agile Snook. We first encounter Grace as a grown woman, telling her long, lonely life story to her pet garden snail, Sylvia (named after Plath), at a moment of deep sadness. Then we flash... Read More