After the iNternets Celebrities returned from the Sundance Film Festival we were inspired to cover other events with our lens and our perspective. The first major summer event of 2007 was the Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival. In a newly gentrified neighborhood underlooking the Brooklyn Bridge we gathered to watch a few artists from borough of Kings and some artists from other places spit their hot shit.
Unlike the film series that was created by our weeklong experience in the Utah mountains, the film set for the Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival is the product of a single day of shooting. I give a lot of credit to Terrence Elenteny for finding the material in several hours of tape to create these films…
But I also need to shout out Cas and Rafi for being hardbody filmmakers who braved the oppressive 175 degree heat sunshine to remain at the festival until the very last minute.
My favorite video in the series was titled ‘The Lost Tapes’. Terrence and Cas describe the serious aspect of Hip-Hop in this video as they show the business people as well as the artists that encompass rap music. Inside of this video is a line from Rafi that has fully described my feelings for appreciating rap music - discerning. The other truly classic moment in this video is Rafi’s interchange with QB emcee Killer Shah.
What I always find to be sort of remarkable is the fact that I only see Rafi and Cas on days that we film, yet we never have too much of a problem finding our rhythm and speed after we give each other pounds [ll]. I’m still not sure what the future holds for the i.C. movement, but I will always enjoy watching the exploits of discerning Hip-Hop fans.