John Cassavetes, Shadows, 1959

With the proliferation of the Internet and low-cost means to produce movies, independent film has fully entered the mainstream. Sundance has become more of a photo-op for Hollywood's 'Who's Who' to wear their latest skicaps, than it is a venue to introduce innovative new filmmakers such as when Steven Soderberg made his debut with Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989).

Today's independent filmmakers can all thank John Cassavetes for becoming the grandfather of the independent movement. Cassavetes' directorial debut, Shadows, is remarkable on multiple fronts. First, Shadows is simply the coolest American film you will ever see made prior to 1960. Its uncompromisingly different than anything that was made up to that point, anywhere in the world. If Shadows had been a French language film it would have been known as the founding film of the French New Wave (Godard's Breathless wasn't issued until a year later).

However, because this film also deals with very American topics such as inter-racial dating and the Beat movement, it is solidly an American classic; you expect Neil Cassidy and Kerouac's "On the Road" crowd to show up and hang out with the Shadows protagonists as they roamed the streets of New York City. You'd be hard pressed to find a black protagonist in almost any other film of the era; keep in mind, this film was made almost a decade before Sidney Poitier played his infamous role in Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (1967)!

Finally, there's a real feeling that the characters are not acting but are actually living the life portrayed on the screen. Jazz music underscores the film and gives it its pace, at one moment slow and reserved, the next moment bursting with energetic passion, sometimes even with violence. The sound quality and scratchy-ness of the film is sub-par but just having the opportunity to watch Shadows in any format is a treat.