Work samples

  • 'Sollers Point' Trailer
    Trailer for SOLLERS POINT, released in the US by Oscilloscope Laboratories.
  • Putty Hill // Theatrical Trailer
    My second feature, PUTTY HILL. Shot in Baltimore in 2009, released 2010. Music by Dustin Wong, used by permission.
  • I Used To Be Darker // US Theatrical Trailer
    My third feature, I USED TO BE DARKER. Shot in Baltimore in 2011, released 2013.
  • Coney Island Super 8mm
    A color Super 8mm sketch of a trip to Coney Island mid-summer, edited in-camera.

About Matthew

Baltimore City

Matt Porterfield has written and directed four feature films, Hamilton (2006), Putty Hill (2011), I Used to Be Darker (2013) and Sollers Point (2018). His work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Harvard Film Archive and has screened at the Walker Arts Center, Anthology Film Archives, Centre Pompidou, Cinematheque Française, and film festivals such as Sundance, the Berlinale, San Sebastien, Rotterdam,… more

SOLLERS POINT

SOLLERS POINT is a feature film about one man's return to society after a period of incarceration and six months' home detention. As Keith, 26, reenters a community scarred by joblessness, drugs and deeply entrenched segregation, he pushes back against limitations, some endemic to his socioeconomic reality, others self-imposed. This film was made possible, in part, with grants from the Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée (CNC) and Creative Capital. It was distributed in the US by Oscilloscope Laboratories in May, 2018.
  • Scrapyard
    Scrapyard
    McCaul Lombardi as Keith in Wong's scrapyard.
  • Breezay
    Breezay
    Breezay and McCaul talk shop.
  • Window
    Window
    Keith looks out his window.
  • Belushi
    Belushi
    Jim Belushi as Keith's father.
  • Zazie
    Zazie
    Zazie Beetz as Courtney.
  • Imani
    Imani
    Imani Hakim and McCaul Lombardi
  • Kate
    Kate
    Marin Ireland as Keith's sister, Kate.
  • Turners Station
    Turners Station
    Turners Station
  • Matt Porterfield's SOLLERS POINT - Excerpt 3
    In this excerpt, Keith (McCaul Lombardi) makes contact with ex-girlfriend Courtney (Zazie Beetz).
  • Matt Porterfield's SOLLERS POINT - Excerpt 1
    In this excerpt, Keith (McCaul Lombardi) confronts gangmembers trying to threaten his life.

HAMILTON

Porterfield's first film, HAMILTON, made over the course of six years and released in 2006, chronicles two summer days in the life of a young family living in a diverse suburban neighborhood in northeast Baltimore City. It was shot and exhibited on 16mm and features an ensemble cast of high school actors from Baltimore School for the Arts, Patapsco, Patterson, and Chesapeake. Called "one of the finest American independent films ever made" by New Yorker film editor Richard Brody, it continues to tour festivals, museums, and universities around the world and was included in John Water's 2006 Top Ten in Artforum International. The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and the Harvard Film Archive acquired it for their permanent collections in 2013.
  • Linda
    Linda
    Gina Mooers as "Linda".
  • Hamilton // Trailer
    HAMILTON (2006). Shot and printed on 16mm. Music by Animal Collective, used by permission.
  • Sarah
    Sarah
    Sarah Seipp-Williams as "Candace".
  • Joe
    Joe
    Chistopher Myers as 19 year-old "Joe".
  • Lena
    Lena
    Stephanie Vizzi as 16 year-old "Lena".
  • Jasmine
    Jasmine
    Jasmine Bazinet-Phillips as "Kelly".
  • Ellis
    Ellis
    Actor Ellis Kant, on location.
  • Camera
    Camera
    The crew, poolside.
  • On Location
    On Location
    Scott Martin (sound recordist) and Matt Porterfield shooting HAMILTON.
  • DeWayne
    DeWayne
    The Kant brothers in Harford Park.

PUTTY HILL

Porterfield's second film was made from a 5-page scenario rather than a screenplay. It combined techniques of documentary and fiction and allowed for more improvisation from the non-professional cast. According to the Maryland Film Festival program notes, "the film's central thread comes from a group of friends and family preparing for the wake of Cory, a Baltimore man whose life was taken by a heroin overdose. As characters reconnect and mourn, many are interviewed by an off-screen voice about who they are and how they live, bringing the narrative into points of intersection with documentary and experimental film. Skate parks, living-room tattoo parlors, paint-gun melees, and karaoke bars provide the visually stunning backdrop for a chorus of scarred but dignified voices calling out for better lives. As with HAMILTON, neighborhood is another integral thread, weaving us through uniquely Baltimorean rural spaces on the edges of our urban experience."

Made possible with a grant from IFP and Panasonic, shot for $18K, PUTTY HILL premiered at the 2010 International Forum of New Cinema in Berlin. It won "Best Picture" at the Santiago Festival Internacional de Cine, the Festival International du Film de La Roche-sur-Yon, the Festivala Autorskog Filma in Belgrade and the Atlanta Film Festival, as well as the Cinema Eye Honors Award for Nonfiction Filmmaking from The Museum of the Moving Image and Filmmaker Magazine. In 2012, PUTTY HILL was included in the Whitney Biennial. MoMA acquired the film for its permanent collection in 2013.
  • Zoe
    Zoe
    Zoe Vance at Hemlock Gorge.
  • Putty Hill // Theatrical Trailer
    My second feature, PUTTY HILL. Shot in Baltimore in 2009, released 2010. Music by Dustin Wong, used by permission.
  • Dustin
    Dustin
    Dustin Ray at Dimitri's Tavern.
  • Joe
    Joe
    Joe Mooney dancing at Dimitri's Tavern.
  • BMX
    BMX
    Mid-air at Carroll Park.
  • Tattoo
    Tattoo
    Spike tattoos Jeff.
  • Sky
    Sky
    Sky Ferreira in PUTTY HILL.
  • Hemlock Gorge
    Hemlock Gorge
    Andrew & Walker at Hemlock Gorge.

I USED TO BE DARKER

When Taryn, a Northern Irish runaway, loses her job in Ocean City, MD, she seeks refuge with American relatives in Baltimore. What follows is a lo-fi musical about people finding each other, letting each other go, looking for love where they've found it before, and figuring out where they might find it next. Co-written by Amy Belk, Porterfield's third film stars Kim Taylor, Ned Oldham, Deragh Campbell, Hannah Gross, Geoff Grace, Nick Petr, and Jack Carneal, and features original music by Dustin Wong, The Entrance Band, and Dope Body. It was shot in Baltimore and Ocean City in the summer of 2011 and premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. 
  • Taryn
    Taryn
    Deragh Campbell as "Taryn" / production photo by Andrew Laumann
  • I Used To Be Darker // US Theatrical Trailer
    My third feature, I USED TO BE DARKER. Shot in Baltimore in 2011, released 2013.
  • Ned & Jack
    Ned & Jack
    Ned Oldham and Jack Carneal / production photo by Josh Sisk
  • Adéle
    Adéle
    Adèle Exarchopoulos / production photo by Isaac Deibboll
  • Abby
    Abby
    Hannah Gross as "Abby" / production photo by Isaac Deibboll
  • Kim
    Kim
    Kim Taylor / production photo by Joyce Kim
  • Geoff
    Geoff
    Geoff Grace / production photo by Joyce Kim
  • Nick
    Nick
    Nick Petr / production photo by Joyce Kim
  • Dope Body
    Dope Body
    Dope Body at the Copycat / production photo by Isaac Deibboll
  • Deragh
    Deragh
    Deragh Campbell / production photo by Joyce Kim

TAKE WHAT YOU CAN CARRY

A character study as well as a meditation on communication, creativity, and physical space, TAKE WHAT YOU CAN CARRY is a picture of a young woman seen through the interiors she occupies and the company she keeps.  Porterfield's first film made outside of Baltimore, TAKE WHAT YOU CAN CARRY is his most personal and formally playful work yet. Inspired by George Perec’s text Species of Spaces, it imagines a character in transition, living in a foreign city for an indeterminate amount of time, trying to balance the various and distinct public and private manifestations of her personality. The film was funded through a grant from The Wexner Center for the Arts and a fellowship from the Harvard Film Study Center. It was written and produced in three months and premiered in the Shorts Competition at the 2015 Berlinale.
  • Lilly
    Lilly
    Hannah Gross as Lilly (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Family
    Family
    Louis Shanelec, Milena Gheorghiu, Ada Marie Schwitte and Angela Shanelec (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Morning
    Morning
    Hannah Gross as Lilly (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Gob Squad
    Gob Squad
    Hannah Gross performing with Gob Squad (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Reflection
    Reflection
    Hannah Gross as Lilly (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Berlin
    Berlin
    Hannah Gross as Lilly (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Hannah
    Hannah
    Hannah Gross as Lilly (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Britta
    Britta
    Britta Thie (photo: Iris Janke)
  • Bastian
    Bastian
    Art Director Anna-Sofie Hartmann and actor Jean-Christophe Folly.
  • Jenny Lou
    Jenny Lou
    DoP Jenny Lou Ziegel and AC Tom Akinleminu (photo: Iris Janke)

DAYS ARE GOLDEN AFTERPARTY

This video, a component of an installation at the Baltimore Museum of Art for the 2011 Janet & Walter Sondheim Award exhibition, is a study of the photographic image as a unit of montage. It is made up of cell phone pictures alternating at 24 frames-per-second. The rapidity of the edit exploits the phenomenon of persistence of vision, creating the impression of overlap and suggesting associations, relationships, between the images: graphic, emotional, rhythmic, and thematic.

SAVE THE PLANET

Developed as a thesis project at NYU, SAVE THE PLANET imagined a utopian group home in Bushwick, NY. Collaborating with homeless youth he met while living in Manhattan's Covenant House and inspired by the terrain of this Brooklyn neighborhood, Porterfield wrote a short screenplay about a diverse, makeshift family undergoing a change as they prepare for the departure of their surrogate father.
  • Storyboard
    Storyboard
    A storyboard for SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Dad
    Dad
    Gordon Porterfield in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Toussaint
    Toussaint
    Toussaint Lockett in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Beth
    Beth
    S. 4th btw Hooper and Hughes.
  • Jonas
    Jonas
    Jonas Jonnasson in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Eagle
    Eagle
    Gordon Porterfield, in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Self-portrait
    Self-portrait
    Matt Porterfield in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Tall Tales
    Tall Tales
    Gordon Porterfield in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Mirror
    Mirror
    Toussaint Lockett in SAVE THE PLANET (1998).
  • Storyboard
    Storyboard
    A storyboard for SAVE THE PLANET (1998).

Coney Island

A silent, color Super 8mm sketch of a trip to Coney Island mid-summer, edited in-camera. Part of a collection of short films included in the Baltimore Museum of Art's 2010 Janet & Walter Sondheim Finalists' exhibition. For this film, Porterfield traveled with a friend on the Q train to New York City's most-historic beach. Inspired by the personal diary films of Jonas Mekas, it was crafted chronologically and edited in the moment through careful shot selection and improvised montage.
  • Pier
    Pier
    Amy on the pier.
  • Coney Island Super 8mm
    A color Super 8mm sketch of a trip to Coney Island mid-summer, edited in-camera.
  • Ferris Wheel
    Ferris Wheel
    View from the Q train, entering the Stillwell Ave. station.
  • Sea
    Sea
    The Atlantic.
  • Crowds
    Crowds
    The beach.
  • Amy
    Amy
    Amy on the ferris wheel.
  • Jam
    Jam
    Mid-summer crowds.
  • Swim
    Swim
    In the water.
  • Sun
    Sun
    Amy on the beach.
  • Complex
    Complex
    On the Q train.

Dope Body video

A music video commissioned by Baltimore's most brutal band, Dope Body, for the song "Enemy Outta Me" off the album "Nupping". Shot on Super 8 and 16mm at the Current Gallery basement, the video's visceral, lo-fi style was an attempt to capture the energy and raw power of the band's live sound.
  • "Enemy Outta Me"
    Music video for "Enemy Outta Me", by Dope Body. Shot on Super 8mm and 16mm B&W film.
  • Zach
    Zach
    Zachary Utz, guitar.
  • Andrew
    Andrew
    Andrew Laumann, vocals.
  • Zach
    Zach
    Zachary Utz, guitar.
  • Group
    Group
    The whole band, killing it.
  • Guitar
    Guitar
    Zachary Utz, guitar.
  • Pedals
    Pedals
    Zachary Utz, guitar.
  • Andrew
    Andrew
    Andrew Laumann, vocals.
  • Dave
    Dave
    Dave Jacober, drums.
  • FX
    FX
    Zachary Utz, guitar.