Miscellaneous Press Clippings

CONFESSIONS OF A SHORT-FILM PROGRAMMER
By Mike Plante
Filmmaker Magazine.com

(excerpt January 2004)
It’s All about the Art
So how can a filmmaker balance careerist dreams with artistic goals when making a short? Two filmmakers in particular have shown a knack for making personal art within the short-film format and have excited critics and the industry in the process.

Stefan Nadelman’s highly personal film Terminal Bar (2002) examines the New York City bar Nadelman’s grandfather owned for decades, through a series of photographs his father took while bartending. The family business is not a healthy one, yet the youngest Nadelman portrays it perfectly. His father’s photos are beautiful and telling, making up almost the entire film. As opposed to the popular but boring PBS style of telling a story through long takes of stills, Nadelman presents the images in a more animated and flowing style, with videotaped narration by his father telling the true stories behind the pictures. At 22 minutes the film actually feels like it could be longer, with more time spent on the photos and stories. It is essentially a small film but pushes what has been done before in traditional shorts.

Capsule Reviews - 12th Annual Aspen Shortsfest
By Walter Chaw
filmfreakcentral.net

(excerpt April 5, 2003)
Terminal Bar (USA, 22min., Stefan Nadelman, ****)--An extraordinary document of the patrons of New York's 8th side "Terminal Bar"--a squalid watering hole in the middle of the worst part of Gotham presided over by Sheldon Nadelman, barkeep and amateur portrait photographer. Ripping off snapshots of the Terminal's clientele form 1972 to 1982, Terminal Bar is son Stefan Nadelman's revisiting of his father's photograph collection--scored with heat and narrated now and again by papa Nadelman ("#405, he was crazy, man, nuts"). Asked why, Sheldon responds that people need to know the truth about his mean streets, his "New York Shitty"--if one man lies in the gutter, we all do. Terminal Bar is important and essential on its own, but more so in its discovery of a modern Weegee. Misery is the mother of inspiration, after all.

Finding the Shortest Route to Filmmaking Excellence
By Robert Denerstein
Rocky Mountain News

(excerpt April 5, 2003)
Outside the bounds of festivals - and even within them - shorts are easy to overlook. After I finished writing about January's Sundance Film Festival, I realized I'd neglected one of my favorite films: Terminal Bar, a 22-minute documentary directed by Stefan Nadelman.

The Terminal Bar was located in Manhattan across from the Port Authority Bus Terminal. The bar went through many incarnations, and Nadelman chronicles most of them in a film that revolves around photographs taken by his father, Sheldon. Nadelman's father worked as a bartender at the Terminal (since demolished) from 1972 to 1982 and took portraits of the bar's many regulars.

The Terminal Bar attracted an astonishing range of people, concluding its life as a gay bar, a development that was viewed by Nadelman with extreme pragmatism. ("You wanna stay in business? If it's gay, it's gay. You go with the flow.")

Give Nadelman 22 minutes and he'll give you an entire world, the kind inhabited by the sort of folks who can be found in bars at times when most of us are taking our first coffee breaks.

The Verdict at Sundance: Debuts on Difficult Subjects
By Elvis Mitchell
NYtimes.com

(excerpt)
Visual stylization Ñ and smoking Ñ was certainly evident in the evocative winner of the jury prize in short filmmaking, Stefan Nadelman's "Terminal Bar," in which a series of black-and-white photos spell out the history of that well-known Manhattan dive. The pictures created a Sundance staple Ñ an extended, dysfunctional family of loners Ñ which could also be detected in the majority of films and award winners. The dysfunctional family interaction was the pained heartbeat of Catherine Hardwicke's "Thirteen," the winner of the dramatic directing award.

A DELICATE BALANCING ACT IN PARK CITY
By Kenneth Turan, LA Times Staff Writer
LAtimes.com
http://www.calendarlive.com/cl-et-turan27jan27.story

(excerpt)
'You made my life'
Taking the jury prize in short filmmaking was "Terminal Bar," Stefan Nadelman's portrait of a venerable Manhattan drinking establishment. The director thanked his father for his decade of taking still photographs of the bar's clientele. "When he left Park City after the screening," Nadelman related, "my father said, 'Not only did you make my day, you made my life.' And my mother started crying."

TERMINAL BAR ON TOP: STEFAN NADELMAN'S SHORT
TAKES TOP PRIZE AT SUNDANCE!
http://www.res.com

(excerpt from RESalert, January 30th, 2003)
We couldn't send out a RES ALERT this week without a heartfelt digital high five to NYC's Stefan Nadelman, whose RESFEST-premiered "Terminal Bar" won the Jury Prize for Best Short Film at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this week. Nadelman, who took his film to France's Clermont-Ferrand Festival as well, was last spotted at the final Sundance party sporting a wide grin and a lovely female companion. Big ups!

SUNKISSED
Brooklynites return from Sundance with accolades
By Marian Masone
go-brooklyn.com
http://www.go-brooklyn.com/html/issues/_vol26/26_05/sundance.html

(excerpt from the Brooklyn Papers)
Raising the 'Bar' Stefan Nadelman, of Prospect Heights, has made a truly New York film. "The Terminal Bar" is a funky appraisal of the denizens of his grandfather's long-time bar, near the Port Authority Bus Terminal. (It closed its doors 20 years ago.) Using as text two articles about the joint (and it was a "joint") from the Daily News and New York magazine, Nadelman interviews his father, who, as he managed and tended the bar over 10 years, took photographs of the incredible faces that he saw there.

Nadelman the younger didn't go to film school, but he's wanted to make films since college. Without equipment or technology he's worked as an art director and animator, doing film on the side.

"This is my first film over two minutes," he admitted. But his father's photos were all over his home growing up, and he always thought that someone should document them.

"But not me - it was a daunting project," said Nadelman. "Finally, I said I'll do my own version to whet everyone's appetite and get the material out there." Now he's finally taken the big step and quit his day job to concentrate on filmmaking. As it turns out, others must agree with his decision. "The Terminal Bar" won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance for best short film.

"[Sundance] was perhaps the biggest highlight of my life to date," said Nadelman. "The celebrities, the live televising, the speech - it was a complete rush! I was a quasi-celebrity for a day."

Meaningless Sex, Male Bravado, and Thumping Docs
Punctuate the Sundance 2003 Shorts Program
by Tim LaTorre
Indiewire.com
http://www2.indiewire.com/onthescene/onthescene_030119punc.html

(excerpt from Indiewire)
Unusual in the documentary format, design and style are the principal factors for the success of two slick entries, "Terminal Bar," directed by Stefan Nadelman, and "Ocularist," directed by Vance Malone. With a thumping driving electronic beat, "Terminal Bar" tells the story a dingy, midtown New York bar that was frequented by various drunks and junkies. With narration and photography taken by Sheldon Nadelman, the director's father, the film relies on the filmmakers design skills by creating an animated collage of stills moving in rhythm with the ever-present beat.

Former Cyclone Diver Wins at Sundance
ISU Alum Captures Prestigious Film Award!

Cyclones.com Feb. 21, 2003 AMES, Iowa
Stefan Nadelman, a member of the men's diving teams at ISU and a 1994 graduate, earned one of the highest awards in cinema in January. Nadelman won the 2003 Sundance jury prize in short filmmaking with his independent film.

"Terminal Bar." "Terminal Bar" is a short film which depicts the patrons of a bar of the same name in New York City. Nadelman's father, Sheldon, was a bartender at the establishment who took and saved thousands of photographs of the patrons of the bar in the 1970's and early 80's. The film is a compilation of these photographs, made into a film with Nadelman's integration of text, stories told by Sheldon, and music. The film was hailed by critics as an accurate depiction of a tough neighborhood in New York, and his usage of multimedia concepts helped him garner the award at the prestigious Sundance festival.

"The Sundance experience can be best described as surreal," Nadelman said. "I cannot describe this honor bestowed upon me, for there were so many other amazing short films screened there.I feel extremely lucky."

Nadelman, a native of East Brunswick, N.J., competed as a diver at Iowa State from 1991-94. He won the 3-meter springboard at the Big 8 championships for the Cyclones in 1991 and 1992, in addition to six other finishes in the top-seven in both 1 and 3-meter springboard competition. His 3-meter score of 357.67 in a dual against Nebraska in 1994 still ranks second in ISU history.

"It was an amazing chapter of my life," Nadelman said. "I always considered the team as a fraternity because we spent all of our time together when out of the pool, and I am fond of the memories."

RES FEST CAME AND WENT WITHOUT MUCH ADVANCE PUBLICITY
written by Karl Cohen, Prescott J. Wright, Nancy Phelps and Paul Naas
ASIFA : International Film Association
http://www.awn.com/asifa-sf/2002/1002.html

(excerpt)
I was invited to a press screening and was impressed by the 5 short films shown. All used new technology in some manner and looked quite contemporary. The most impressive work show was Terminal Bar by Stefan Nadelman. It was an exceptional study of a truly seedy bar at 42nd Street and 8th Ave. in New York City. Be glad it closed in the mid-1980's. A computer motion graphics system was used to manipulate thousands of still photos used to make the film. The stills, which almost danced across the screen, were combined with old and recent film footage and a very lucid dialog by a former bartender who took the photos.

INTERVIEW with RESFEST'S JEREMY BOXER
Interview by Erin Britton
Epigram Online / Bristol University
http://www.bits.bris.ac.uk/epigram/epigram-index.php?article=219

(excerpt)
What exactly is your role at Resfest?
I'm the Director of European Operations, which effectively means planning the European leg of the festival tour. Planning the schedule and booking the venues etc...

We've just seen the 'True Stories' section of the festival: do you have a particular favourite in that category?
I'd say Terminal Bar by Stefan Nadelman because I'm a keen photographer and like the imaginative way that he has coupled the old photographs with the modern digital technology. Its an amazing way to capture the changes in lives and places that occur over a ten year period.

FESTIVAL: Dot Com Heyday May be Over, but RESFEST Still Shines
by Guy Cimbalo
Indiewire.com
http://www.indiewire.com/film/festivals/fes_02RESFEST_021029_wrap.html

(excerpt)
As if "The Osbournes" is not evidence enough to stop drinking, "Terminal Bar," from Stefan Nadelman, should convince you. In a series of photographs taken by his father from 1972-82 in Terminal Bar, one of New York's nastiest joints, Nadelman documents the steady decline of the bar's patrons and the bar itself. Visually, "Terminal Bar" is a kind of lo-fi, low-end "Kid Stays in the Picture," moving the camera around still photographs to create a sense of life, or, in this case, of slow death. Although the documentary doesn't explore everything you would like it to, the film works as both cautionary tale and extended bar lore.