Author Archives: basiltsiokos

Now on DVD: BEETLE QUEEN CONQUERS TOKYO

Jessica Oreck’s unusual investigation into Japanese culture’s special affinity with insects had its World Premiere at SXSW 2009, with screenings at a number of fests including Full Frame, Cinevegas (Special Jury Award for Artistic Vision), and Jihlava. It had theatrical runs in NYC, LA, SF, Chicago, Seattle, and Denver among others. The doc also picked up a Spotlight Award at the 2010 Cinema Eye Honors.

Oreck looks to Japan’s past and present to explain the country’s entomomania in this lyrical detective story – from its first emperor who named the island Akitsushima (“Isle of the Dragonfly”) to professional insect hunters who can command huge prices. At the same time, one of the most intriguing aspects of the film is the parallel consideration that the rest of the world instead learned to respond to bugs with repulsion and fear. While the film arguably might tell audiences more about the Western fascination with Eastern culture than about Eastern culture itself, its crisscrossing through various aspects of Japanese history and society is intriguing and illuminating, offering viewers the opportunity to pay attention to how we see and interact with nature and its smallest details.

Coming to HBO2 this Wednesday, May 18: BURMA SOLDIER

Director Nic Dunlop, with co-directors Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg, premiered this portrait of a now repentant Burmese military oppressor turned democracy activist at Sheffield last fall. I included the film in my coverage of IDFA for indieWIRE a few weeks later, saying:

Focused on Myo Myint, a former Burmese soldier, the film offers powerful first-hand testimony about the abusive totalitarian system seen in films like BURMA VJ, but from the unique perspective of a man who was one of the abusers. After he turned against the oppressive regime he once supported, Myint spent 15 years in prison, enduring torture, before finally seeking asylum in Thailand. As perhaps suggested by having three directors, the film isn’t as focused as it could be – despite this, it’s worthwhile for its remarkable access to its courageous subject. At IDFA, producer Julie leBrocguy noted that, through the help of underground activists, the film is being smuggled into Burma so that it can be shown to the Burmese people and perhaps help motivate them to fight back against their oppression.

Screening on PBS’ American Experience tonight, Monday, May 16 and coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, May 17: FREEDOM RIDERS

Stanley Nelson’s retelling of a key chapter in the story of the Civil Rights movement had its world premiere at Sundance last year and is now making its broadcast premiere on PBS’ American history focused program, American Experience, which is also making the DVD available.

Seeking to generate awareness of segregation in the American South, more than 400 black and white college students intentionally broke racist laws by traveling together on integrated interstate buses from Washington DC to an intended terminus in New Orleans LA, going through Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi along the way. Nelson, speaking to surviving riders, recounts their courageous journey, which captured national headlines when they encountered mob violence in Alabama, necessitating National Guard protection to continue their journey. Ultimately, their struggle managed to get the attention of the President and helped to open the nation’s eyes to prejudice and racism, paving the way for Civil Rights legislation that followed. Nelson’s documentary is compelling and well-constructed, bringing the Freedom Riders’ story back into public consciousness.

Now screening at Brooklyn’s IndieScreen through Sunday, May 15: SONS OF PERDITION

Jennilyn Merten and Tyler Measom’s absorbing exploration of the lives of teen exiles from the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints had its world premiere at Tribeca last year, and in the past year has screened at more than thirty other festivals and series, including Silverdocs, Austin, Sheffield, IDFA, Traverse City, and the Independent Film Festival Boston. As part of its theatrical run, it’s back in NYC, with other engagements lined up through the summer. It will have its broadcast premiere as part of OWN’s Documentary Club in mid-June.

The film follows a group of boys (the primary subjects of the film, though there are girls along the periphery as well) who all grew up in “The Crick,” an FLDS stronghold in Colorado City, AZ. They have been banished from that community, becoming cast offs from their Heavenly Father’s salvation, and not allowed to see family members. While the revel in newfound freedoms – including self-expression through clothing, hairstyles, and music – their sheltered upbringing means they know little about secular society, and it’s only through the charity of people like wealthy patron Jeremy Johnson and his wife that they have a place to stay, at least until their self-destructiveness causes trouble there too. They try to rescue family members, but the control exerted by their society almost always means that such attempts are doomed to failure. By narrowing their focus on a small group of boys’ stories, Merten and Measom construct more of a character study than a full-fledged examination of the FLDS – they’re not making a definitive exposé, but instead following these boys as they try to make sense of their new lives and deal with the traumas of their pasts, without the support of the families who have until now been the center pillars of their strange, segregated world.

Brooklyn-based Merten is scheduled to be in attendance for Q&As.

Now available on DVD: EAT THE SUN

Peter Sorcher’s feature documentary debut about sungazers has had a handful of screenings at select festivals, including Mill Valley, SF Doc Fest and Big Sky. It’s just been released on DVD and will have its cable broadcast premiere on the Documentary Channel on the Summer Solstice, June 21, with iTunes and other VOD to follow later this summer.

The film follows Mason, a SF man who initially subscribes to the practice of sungazing, a pseudo-meditative/spiritual practice whose users claim energizes the body and makes eating unnecessary, as he seeks out other sungazers to see how they deal with living in society while engaging in something so far on the fringe. Among these are Gene Savoy, the real-life inspiration for Indiana Jones, now the leader of a Church based around the belief that Jesus was a sungazer; and, most interestingly HRM, an Indian guru who claims to have gone years without eating. While Mason goes on his quest, the filmmaker does his own investigation of HRM, with surprising results. EAT THE SUN offers a fascinating look at an unorthodox (and potentially dangerous) practice without indulging in mocking its practicioners, and raises provocative questions about the power of and need for beliefs.

Coming to theatres in NYC, LA, and New Orleans this Friday, May 13: HEY, BOO: HARPER LEE AND TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

Almost exactly 50 years to the date that Harper Lee’s seminal American novel received the Pulitzer Prize comes Mary McDonagh Murphy’s documentary detailing its history and continued impact. The film has only screened at a handful of festivals, and will expand from these initial playdates through next month.

The film explores the origins and legacy of Lee’s novel, her first and only, through personal correspondence, interviews with Lee’s close friends and 99-year-old sister, and a host of noted authors, journalists, and celebrities influenced by the book, including James Patterson, Anna Quindlen, Tom Brokaw, and Oprah Winfrey. Murphy delves into Lee’s life, and the speculation around her long-ago retreat from publicity and a public life, but maintains a respectful distance – there are no Michael Moore-like attempts to secure an interview with her on camera. While the conventional, talking heads approach taken seems much more suited to the small screen, the film does provide fascinating insight into the novel, especially in the context of the status of the civil rights movement when it was being written and released, and how African-Americans responded at the time. Perhaps most importantly, the film triggers an impulse to revisit the book, which many of us haven’t read since middle school, or to see the Academy Award winning film adaptation starring Gregory Peck.

Premiering tonight as the first film in the Oprah Winfrey Network’s Documentary Club: BECOMING CHAZ

I profiled this World of Wonder production before its world premiere at Sundance here.

Available on VOD (including Amazon, Roxionow, iTunes, Vudu, Playstation, and Xbox) today, Tuesday, May 10: THE INVENTION OF DR NAKAMATS

Kaspar Astrup Schröder’s remarkably appealing film premiered at CPH:DOX in 2009, and went on to festival screenings at IDFA, True/False, Thessaloniki, Full Frame, Hot Docs, Planete, and elsewhere.

One of the most entertaining documentaries of the past few years, Schröder’s film reveals to the world one of Japan’s greatest resources: Dr Yoshiro NakaMats, the unlikely man behind 3,357 inventions, including the floppy disk. The eccentric octogenarian is a natural showman (you’ll be mimicking his catchphrase and hand signal before the end of the film, mark my words), making a perfect subject for this wonderfully absurdist doc. Viewers may wonder if the inventor takes himself completely seriously – he shows off both practical and outlandish inventions with equal gravitas – but there’s no denying his intelligence and think-way-outside-the-box problem solving. if the pleasure in watching NakaMats and his wacky inventions isn’t enough, the backdrop of the Japanese setting adds another important layer. My favorite sequence remains the preparations for the good doctor’s birthday celebration, an episode that captures the quirks of Japanese politeness and customs perfectly. THE INVENTION OF DR NAKAMATS is equally accessible to both documentary diehards and to those who wouldn’t normally gravitate to non-fiction.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, May 10: CROPSEY

Barbara Brancaccio and Joshua Zeman’s often creepy revisiting of an urban legend from their Staten Island youth had its world premiere at Tribeca in 2009. It went on to a scrappy DIY theatrical and festival run for the past two years, and is now coming out on DVD.

The Cropsey legend involved a child-snatching escaped mental patient who had taken up residence in State Island’s dilapidated Willowbrook Mental Institution. Though dismissed by most as a Boogeyman tale, Cropsey seemed to become all-too-real when a pre-teen with Down syndrome went missing in 1987, a disappearance that soon became linked with four other cases of missing children. The filmmakers return to Staten Island (and, in a BLAIR WITCH-like sequence, to Willowbrook) seeking the truth behind the urban legend. While I’ve often taken issue with directors inserting themselves into their films, Brancaccio and Zeman are among the rare filmmakers who have a strong enough argument for why they should be onscreen, and, a few indulgences aside, generally make it work. The production as a whole is atmospheric, well-shot, and wonderfully paced, with disturbing revelations that keep the audience just on the right side of unsettled. Other documentarians could learn from CROPSEY how to entertain audiences while still offering them illumination.