Carney-vàle!

[Michael Kerpan]

I wish the woman would please just go away.

A little rash, considering that you've heard only one side of the story.

[domino harvey]

He meant Carney

[Foam]

I wish the woman would please just go away.

A little rash, considering that you've heard only one side of the story.

This would hold more water with me if Rowlands or her lawyers were willing to provide another side of the story, or even so much as curtly confirm or deny Carney's. I care about Cassavetes films, I care about the truth more than I do about any one person's point of view, and I personally have tried to get in contact with Rowlands and her publicist about these and related matters to no avail. Now, I recognize that Carney is considered by most on this forum to be a worthless joke of a scholar, and I agree that much of what he says is Looney Tunes indefensible, but I'm a Cassavetes fan, Carney is clearly dedicated to promoting his work, and here I am seeing that there's no longer a preorder button for a book about one of my favorite filmmakers. What can I say? It's consistent with things we know Rowlands has done before, and what good does a backlash against Rowlands do for Carney if she is not in fact suppressing his work? Is he just amusing himself? I happen to believe him. I'd rather defend someone on record as being wrong and abrasive than someone who is tight-lipped and anti-discourse.

Edit: I do not wish death upon Gena Rowlands.

[Grand Illusion]

The truth is that some pastor from friggin' Gainesville, Florida, accidentally burned all the Cassevetes books on accident on 9/11. There's none left.

[Michael Kerpan]

Edit: I do not wish death upon Gena Rowlands.

Glad to see this clarification.

[Oedipax]

I wasn't sure where to post this, but I figured I would pass this along as it makes the rounds today:

AN OPEN LETTER FROM MARK RAPPAPORT TO THE INTERNATIONAL FILM COMMUNITY

September 2012

To all filmmakers, film critics, film archivists, film academics, curators, festival directors, and film enthusiasts everywhere—

I am writing to you because something very unforeseen, very unexpected, and most unpleasant recently happened in my life,

When I moved to Paris seven years ago, I had to decide whether or not to take with me copies of my films, video masters, early drafts of scripts, duplicates of reviews and announcements, etc. When I mentioned this to Ray Carney, tenured professor at Boston University and author of several books on John Cassavetes and who also claims he is “generally recognized to be the leading scholarly authority on American narrative art film,” he eagerly offered to hold all of my materials. I accepted his offer, with the understanding that he would return them to me upon request and that they remain at BU. Five years later, in 2010, I requested the return of some of my video masters to make copies of them for various film archives in Europe. Carney duly returned those video masters to me. They were in excellent condition.

Since that time, various companies have expressed interest in streaming my films, and UCLA, in conjunction with The Sundance Institute, have volunteered to archive video masters of Sundance alumni films. In early April, I made several requests to Carney for the return of my materials. I sent Carney several e-mails (to various e-mail addresses), and I called his home and office and left numerous messages. Carney ignored all of my attempts to reach him. As a result, I hired a lawyer and filed a lawsuit in Massachusetts, where a judge issued a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction against Carney. The court entered a default against Carney (who had not responded to my complaint) and ordered Carney to return the materials to me, or else be held in contempt of court. After that, Carney hired a lawyer who stated Carney intends to defend his conduct by arguing that I “gave” him the materials outright as “a gift.”

There is much at stake here for me. Without the digital video masters, my films, everything prior to 1990, Casual Relations, Local Color, The Scenic Route, Impostors, Mark Rappaport—The TV Spin-Off, Chain Letters, plus the High-Definition version of Exterior Night, cannot be made available for streaming, commercial DVDs, video-on-demand, or any electronic delivery system down the road. My life as a filmmaker, my past, and even my future reputation as a filmmaker are at stake. I gave Carney no rights to my materials except the right to hold them and return them to me on request. His lawyer has refused to disclose the current location of my materials.

Carney tried to cast doubt on the truthfulness of the inventory I presented. Furthermore, under oath, he stated “some of the items I received I no longer have because I gave them away to third parties. I discarded other items due to the degraded and unusable condition they were in when I received them. Finally, I discarded other items at later dates after they were worn-out by the normal wear and tear of being used.” This is sworn statement from Carney who, earlier, on his website bragged, “Mark is a great friend and gave me almost everything he owned when he left New York for France… So I am now the ‘Mark Rappaport Archive.’ I have the largest collection of material by him in the world: file cabinets and storage bins full of amazing things: production notebooks, film prints, rough drafts, revisions, scripts, film stock, DVDs, tapes, notes, jottings, journals, etc. etc. etc. It’s a dream come true for me and one of the major film collections by one of the world’s greatest artists. All being preserved for posterity at any cost.” http://people.bu.edu/rcarney/aboutrc/letters57.shtml" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (PLEASE NOTE: If this interests you, go to the website before this entry is removed.)

Elsewhere, he describes me as “a genuine national treasure.”

The judge, at a pre-trial hearing, demanded that Carney supply the court with a full inventory of what he still had, what he gave away, and what he destroyed. Carney subsequently delivered a full inventory—which included absolutely everything I gave him. None of it had been given away or destroyed. Although he clearly had perjured himself, I was ecstatic to learn my materials were intact. After four and a half months of this, Carney got in touch with me to propose a deal, saying, “I sincerely wish you well and I am sorry this issue has come between us.” “I am willing,” he writes, to “ship everything back for a modest consideration, simply to cover my costs and the time and trouble of having stored the material for the past seven-and-a-half years.” In return for my own films, I was to pay him $27,000! Some may call this extortion, I call it merely outrageous. Just to put it in perspective, that would equal 3 years of the monies I get from Social Security. To continue the suit to trial would have cost me about the same amount, in addition to the thousands I had already spent. I couldn’t afford to continue.

Just when I filed for a dismissal of the suit, Carney demanded back, because he claims they were part of “the gift” I gave him, the video masters that he returned to me in 2010—namely From the Journals of Jean Seberg, Postcards, Exterior Night, and John Garfield.

I’ve heard somewhat similar stories from other filmmakers, although none quite as breathtaking as this.

For a variety of reasons, I think this is a cautionary tale you might consider emailing to colleagues, friends, and acquaintances who are interested in the conservation and protection of works by non-mainstream filmmakers, film preservation in general, and archiving not just films but film-related artifacts of the recent past by independent filmmakers. Please feel free email this letter, post this on Facebook pages, and submit it to various blogs.

If you want to write about this situation, I have much more information.

Sincerely,

Mark Rappaport
marrap@noos.fr

[Gregory]

Interesting. I have to link to this interview from Carney's site before it gets pulled, where he sings Rappaport's praises at length. One of the two best photos of Carney I've seen (the other one is on the dustjacket of his Capra book).
Also, Dear everyone who writes about Ray Carney: Please stop likening him to Noam Chomsky (I know I've seen this a few other times). This analogy is asinine. Thanks. Sincerely, Gregory [last name withheld to avoid inviting frivolous lawsuits from Carney]

[domino harvey]

As if we needed more reasons to hate Ray Carney! Jesus, what a mess and a cautionary tale indeed. I would have thought Carney could at least be entrusted with the materials of an artist he admired, but apparently not

[zedz]

This sort of puts the Shadows kerfuffle in a whole new light (not that Carney didn't already seem like an asshole in that regard).

[domino harvey]

For those wondering where the dissenting voices are, we have another thread for Ray Carney as well

[Mr Sausage]

Would anybody object if I renamed this thread Criterionforum's Crazy Carney Carnival? Because I was looking at this and now I kind of want to.

[knives]

I think just Crazy Carney Carnival would work fine.

[AlexHansen]

Crazy con Carney.

[Mr Sausage]

Alright, new deal:

Person to come up with the best name gets to name this thread and the other one.

And yes, I am very, very bored right now.

[matrixschmatrix]

The Carney Code

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

Carney con carne (extra spicy)

[knives]

Split the difference and say Ray con Carney.

[Mathew2468]

Carneygie Hall

Carneyac Arrest

[tarpilot]

In absolute seriousness, someone with Rappaport's deets should nudge him toward Judge Judy -- even if you lose, the loss is completely covered by the show

That and it would probably be the most amazing thing in the history of the universe

[wigwam]

tarpilot, put that shit together: MR emailed me right back from that email address at the end of that letter, and he wasn't giving me the hard-sell on his digital works like the Willy Loman-esque Jon Jost

let's call this thread Carney-vàle!

[Professor Wagstaff]

The He-man Gena Rowlands Haters Club

[Mr Sausage]

let's call this thread Carney-vàle!

I like it. Up it goes.

[onedimension]

That scold of Hollywood pretension, Ray Carney, really submits to some hard-hitting interrogation in those interviews!

[Foam]

Shocking news. I correspond with Carney fairly regularly so I'll try to get his side of the story.

[onedimension]

It is possible, just speculating, that a person might become suddenly possessive of his old film materials on discovering there was money to be made..