Okay, I’m starting to obsess over this. Helvetica is already the #1 documentary on iTunes, but it’s now reached #19 on the total movie sales chart. That’s for all 2,500+ movies on there, not just documentaries. We just passed 10,000 B.C. and In Bruges. Next up, 27 Dresses. You’re going down, Katherine Heigl!

Download Helvetica from iTunes and help prove that an indie font documentary can trounce the Hollywood megapix!

Update 7/18, 9:15pm EST: We moved up to #17 and bumped Heigl down. But then she came back, and we dropped to #21. And now it looks like Juno is makin’ a move on us!

Update 7/19, 11:00am EST: We’ve moved back up to #19 and vanquished Heigl to #25. Must. Stop. Looking. At. These. Charts…

Guess which font film is available as a digital download from iTunes, as of yesterday? You guessed it. And guess which font film is already the the #1 documentary on iTunes? Right again. Eminem, Shmeminem. iTunes users, download Helvetica to your computer or your tiny mobile device. Or watch the trailer on iTunes (which looks surprisingly good) and get more info.

Apparently Mr. Moore has selected Helvetica to screen at his Traverse City Film Festival in beautiful Traverse City, Michigan, later this month! The film will be shown there Wednesday, July 30, at the Milliken Auditorium. Get more info.

Damn, that was quick. Michael Baker found both bloopers, and two more that even I hadn’t noticed! So Michael wins a copy of the Blu-ray limited edition. Here are the two I was talking about:

My reflection during the Crate & Barrel scene, as the door is closing.

Luke’s head in the automatic doors of Sainsbury’s in Shoreditch, London.

Congrats Michael!

In narrative films and on television, they call them bloopers. I’m not sure what it’s called when documentary filmmakers accidentally film themselves when they’re trying to film something else. But if you look closely in Helvetica, you’ll see several of them, like in this shot from the street footage in Amsterdam:

That’s Experimental Jetset’s Danny van den Dungen and I in the reflection on the left.

There are two times in the film when reflections blatantly get into the shot… one time you’ll see me standing behind the camera and tripod, and the other time our DP Luke Geissbuhler’s head is prominently featured. Can you find us? The first person to spot the two shots we appear in wins a copy of the Blu-ray limited edition package. Good luck!

Helvetica film soundtrack favorites El Ten Eleven hit the road this week for a US tour. Be sure to catch them live if you can:

05.29.08 | Las Vegas, NV | Beatles Revolution Lounge
05.30.08 | Pasadena, CA | No Future Cafe
06.01.08 | Hollywood, CA | Hotel Cafe
06.03.08 | San Francisco, CA | Thee Parkside
06.04.08 | Eugene, OR | Luckey’s Cigar Store
06.05.08 | Seattle, WA | Sunset Tavern
06.06.08 | Portland, OR | Towne Lounge
06.07.08 | Boise, ID | Neurolux
06.08.08 | Salt Lake City, UT | Urban Lounge
06.09.08 | Denver, CO | Hi-Dive
06.11.08 | Kansas City, MO | Record Bar
06.12.08 | St. Paul, MN | Turf Club
06.13.08 | Madison, WI | The Annex
06.14.08 | Grand Rapids, MI | Founders Brewing Co.
06.15.08 | Chicago, IL | Schubas
06.17.08 | Cleveland, OH | Beachland Tavern
06.18.08 | Buffalo, NY | Mohawk Place
06.19.08 | New York, NY | Knitting Factory
06.20.08 | Brooklyn, NY | Union Hall
06.21.08 | Pittsburgh, PA | Brillobox
06.23.08 | Chapel Hill, NC | Local 506
06.24.08 | Charleston, SC | The Village Tavern
06.25.08 | Tampa, FL | The Orpheum
06.27.08 | Jacksonville, FL | Club TSI
06.28.08 | Atlanta, GA | AFTERLIFE @ MASQUERADE
06.30.08 | Austin, TX | Beauty Bar
07.03.08 | Prescott, AZ | the Raven Cafe
07.04.08 | Phoenix, AZ | Ruby Room
07.05.08 | Tucson, AZ | Plush
07.31.08 | Costa Mesa, CA | Orange County Performing Arts Center

You got it. Actually, if it were truly minimalist, this bag wouldn’t have any printing on it at all. But I digress. The “Film” bag is available now in the shop. No mention of my name, or that it’s a documentary, nothing. Just the word Film, in Neue Helvetica 75 Bold. ‘Nuff said.

Last week, this blog suffered from what’s known as a “denial of service” attack. That’s when spamming software floods a server with hundreds of thousands of bogus requests, effectively blocking all legitimate web traffic and slowing the entire server down to a standstill. After some tech maneuvering, we had to relocate the blog to a new directory on the server, which effectively changes the URL to all our past blog posts. So if you’re bookmarking this blog, or getting an RSS feed of it, you need to change the URL from helveticafilm.com/blog to helveticafilm.com/newblog

Death to spammers.

I’m honored (or should I say honoured) that the film is being shown at London’s historic Barbican Centre this weekend. So I’ve decided to break my self-imposed moratorium on attending screenings of the film, and I’ll be there to present it. This Saturday, April 26th, at 2pm. Tickets are limited, book here. Cheers!

We just got a box of the Blu-ray discs in… cool. Popped one into the Playstation 3 (which I purchased strictly for research purposes, really) and guess what, they work! I like the way the Blu-ray menu system works. While you’re watching a film, you can navigate the menus and sub-menus (like chapters, extras, etc.) in a transparent layer on-screen, while the film is still playing, so you never have to stop or go back to the main menu. The picture is awesome, and all the type on the menus and in the film is razor sharp.

I have to admit that I’m a sucker for shiny new technology. Keep our Capitalist/Consumerist economic system strong and buy a Blu-ray player on your way home from work today. It’ll make you sexier than you already are. And you *are* sexy.