Mark Pellington’s ‘This Is Buzz’ Tells the Story of an MTV Revolution — Trailer

Last October, IndieWire championed “This Is Buzz,” a new documentary by Mark Pellington (“Going All the Way,” “Arlington Road”) that takes a deep dive into a unique cultural moment: the brief but glorious run of MTV‘s highly influential and prescient current affairs collage show “Buzz.”

Now, that movie has a new trailer and a distributor planning to give “This Is Buzz” the kind of roadshow release that is becoming more and more prevalent for independent films.

In keeping with the radical multimedia nature of “Buzz” itself, Antenna Releasing will take “This Is Buzz” on a nationwide tour with screenings that go beyond straightforward theatrical engagements. The plan is for musicians and pop culture icons who are featured in the documentary, or were a part of “Buzz” during its heyday, to participate in live Q&As with Pellington.

Pellington will also stage “This Is Buzz: Analog & Ecstasy” in major U.S. cities, presenting the “lost transmissions of ‘Buzz,’” an immersive experience of image, music, and analog culture that takes audiences beyond the single screen. The exhibition will provide a rare chance to revisit the lost episodes of the series for the first time, 36 years after they initially aired. A digital release will follow later on in the fall.

Although “Buzz” only lasted 13 episodes before drifting into near-obscurity, in its moment the series was seen alongside David Lynch and Mark Frost’s “Twin Peaks” as one of the shows redefining the parameters of television as an art form. Ostensibly a news show but much more experimental and adventurous, its form foretold aspects of visual grammar now in common use on YouTube and TikTok.

“Buzz” covered stories and perspectives the established media ignored — and covered them in a fast-paced, almost avant-garde style that couldn’t have been more different from the format that had been in place since the days of Edward R. Murrow. Pellington co-created the series with ABC News Jon Klein, and in “This iIs Buzz” they look back at their experiment’s rise and fall — and consider what it has to tell us about our present reality.

“I had noticed over the years that everything had become more like ‘Buzz,’” Pellington told IndieWire. “Like, there are attacks in Syria and everybody knows what’s going on instantly with this global news compression and internet culture. The world kind of caught up to what we were doing in terms of technology and globalism. ‘This is Buzz’ “connects the analog landscape of the early ‘90s with where we are today.”

Antenna Releasing will roll “This Is Buzz” out on a roadshow theatrical release this September. For more information on the release, visit www.antennareleasing.com. And check out the film‘s newest trailer, an IndieWire exclusive, below.