Mike Ott’s latest feature “California Dreams” — receiving its World Premiere as part of the fledgling Critics’ Week program that runs concurrently with the main Berlin Film Festival — is one of those barely-there, micro American indies that is a little more SXSW than Sundance. The film — Ott’s sixth — places the audience in medias res of its hybrid fiction/non-fiction narrative, offering minimal orientation and ultimately resolution to the travails of a handful of marginal figures.

Continue reading Superficial ‘California Dreams’ Struggles To Find A Purpose [Berlin Review] at The Playlist.

Prolific indie filmmakers Mike Ott and Nathan Silver team up for the experimental and meta “Actor Martinez,” an exploration into the oftentimes difficult process of unearthing the honesty in acting. They take an interesting route to the truth, deliberately obfuscating the line between fiction and nonfiction in a film within a film, lulling the audience into one reality and then abruptly jarring you out of one scenario and into another. 

Continue reading Tribeca Review: Mike Ott & Nathan Silver’s ‘Actor Martinez’ Is A Fascinating And Experimental Meta-Movie at The Playlist.

Continue reading Rotterdam Exclusive: Clip From Nathan Silver And Mike Ott’s ‘Actor Martinez’ Casts A Girlfriend at The Playlist.