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Mark L. Feinsod (born March 7, 1972) is an American film and music video director, based in New York City, whose work straddles a line between the experimental and narrative modes. His movies often feature characters, but tend to dispense with the notion of "plot" altogether and other fictional tropes such as character motivation or development, instead choosing to pinpoint (usually by way of having the climax and the end of a movie be one and the same) the exact moment when a life-altering, character-changing decision must be made. The endings of his work are often ambiguous and tend to leave much of what came beforehand either unresolved or more mysterious. Indeed, a frequent theme of his work is the disavowal of easy analyses of or answers to events both personal and public. This is often shown by having events within a movie become more and more disjointed and fragmented as the action unfolds.
While living in London in 1997 and 1998, he made his first short film, Love And Lung Cancer, which starred popular Scottish actress Neve McIntosh. He also made a short called Brno Train Death Friend.
His third short film, A Sense of Entitlement, was made in 2000. It was shot in Super 16 mm, blown up to 35 mm, and has a length of 28 minutes. It is notable for its carefully framed compositions and long takes which often feature elaborate dolly and tracking movements. Upon release, it was compared to Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons by Dave Kehr in the New York Times. Like most of Feinsod's work, it has shown around the world and been critically acclaimed, although despite this he has not achieved any sort of mainstream renown. The movie is also notable for the performance of its lead, Rike Scholle, who appears to have retired after making this film.
His next project, The Boy from New York City, a music video for a German poptronica band called Riviera similarly manages to achieve a high level of creativity while skirting the mainstream altogether. Shot on Super 8 mm and featuring handheld camerawork by Feinsod himself, it is a strange clip about a grown woman who appears to live in isolation with her stuffed animals. She invites a boy to a tea party, and although there is some suspense as to whether or not he will actually come, it is downplayed in favor of lighthearted humor showing the girl getting ready for the party. The ending sequence, shot on a Manhattan rooftop, carries through on the sensibility of the clip. This music video is most notable for marking Feinsod's first collaboration with Roland Wolff, half of Riviera. His music is also used in Feinsod's next two movies, and he appears to be composing the score for Feinsod's first feature, Matutinal Reverie (according to Feinsod's Internet site). The corresponding album Mood Bazaar was in the Japanese Top 40 and the video shown in heavy rotation on Japanese music video channels.
After An Autumn Day That Felt Like Summer, a 15-minute digital video movie that Feinsod made in 2003, is notable for being his first full-fledged movie in which he took on the bulk of the duties, writing, directing, producing, handling the camera work, and editing both audio and picture. Set in post-9/11 New York, it concerns a young man (played by Timur Kocak) who cheats on his girlfriend with a burlesque dancer (portrayed by Anna Curtis of the Bombshell! Girls). It seems to be primarily a semi-narrative movie about the mind-set of New York after 9/11, and refutes the idea of easy answers or slogans as solutions to a complex problem.
In 2004, Feinsod directed Virginal Young Blondes, and in 2005 had a retrospective at The Pioneer Theater. Heavily covered by the press, it received favorable notice universally. The Deafening Silence of a Very Bright Light, Feinsod's first feature, was shot during autumn 2005 and was completed in the fall of 2010. He currently hosts How to Do Nothing without Really Trying, a weekly comedic podcast about New York City that is hosted on SelfAbsorbed.me and available for streaming via iTunes.
[[Category:American screenwriters]] [[Category:American film directors]] [[Category:Bard College alumni]] [[Category:1972 births]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:American music video directors]]