A new round of my curated selections for Hulu’s Documentaries page for indieWIRE is now up. This week, it gets a little political, with a double bill sadly inspired by the recent spate of LGBT youth suicides (and by yesterday’s National Coming Out Day), and by the technical anniversary of the US’ declaration of war against Iraq.
For more information about the selections, take a look at my iW article.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Indiewire @ Hulu Docs, Recommendations
Coming to DVD next Tuesday, October 19: SMASH HIS CAMERA
Oscar Award-winning documentary director Leon Gast (WHEN WE WERE KINGS) scored the US Directing Award for his latest film, which premiered at Sundance at the beginning of the year. Magnolia gave the film a limited theatrical release this summer.
SMASH HIS CAMERA is a portrait of Ron Galella, the master paparazzo made infamous when he was sued for harassment by Jackie Kennedy Onassis. While showcasing and celebrating Galella’s decades of celebrity photography, Gast also tackles the criticism the 79-year-old still-working photographer has amassed due to his notorious invasion of privacy. Despite the ethical quandaries that come with his profession, Galella, and the film, ultimately emerge as likeable and entertaining.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases, Sundance
Filmmakers: The regular deadline for the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival is coming up next week! The postmark deadline is Friday, October 15, and the 2011 fest will take place April 14-17, so mark your calendars now.
I had the honor of serving on Full Frame’s jury in 2009 and had a wonderful time. The event, set in Durham, NC, is uniquely programmed and draws a diverse and non-fiction savvy crowd from the area’s Research Triangle, made up of NC State University, Duke, and UNC-Chapel Hill. It’s one of the premiere documentary specific festivals in the world, and well-worth submitting your work for consideration. My thoughts on the festival can be found here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Submission Deadlines
Dear Documentary Filmmakers: Submit artwork-free DVDs – don’t pre-dispose programmers to form opinions- it could hurt you.
Although I’m immediately thinking of film festival submissions, this DDF could easily apply to sending your film in for consideration by sales agents and distributors, at least to some extent. At the core, this advice is about the first impression your film (and you) make to those individuals who potentially may select your film to gain wider exposure.
Filed under Dear Documentary Filmmakers, Documentary, Film, Film Festivals
Opening in NYC’s Quad Cinema this Friday, October 8: GOING BLIND
After a long stint producing at ABC News 20/20, Joe Lovett set out on his own, producing and directing award-winning specials on AIDS education and cancer. He may be best known in recent years for GAY SEX IN THE ’70s, which premiered at Tribeca and revisited the growing political and sexual visibility of the gay community between Stonewall and the first reports of AIDS.
Lovett’s newest film, like one of his first independent documentaries, is a very personal film, detailing his own struggles with vision loss as he profiles a number of others who are blind or have limited vision. Serving as both a series of portraits of individuals who have not let their limited sight limit them and an awareness-building tool to educate audiences about the issues facing people like them (and Lovett himself) and about the new technologies that offer hope, GOING BLIND provides inspiration and information in equal measure. If there’s one standout in the doc, it’s Jessica Jones, a photographer whose vision loss led her to become an art teacher for impaired children – she’s a natural for the camera and could easily be the standalone subject of a follow up film.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
Coming to DVD next Tuesday, October 12: KIMJONGILIA
NC Heikin’s debut documentary had its world premiere in competition at last year’s Sundance – the project was also supported by the Sundance Institute’s Documentary Film Program and participated in the Sundance Story & Edit Labs in 2008. After the festival, Lorber Films gave the film a limited theatrical release.
KIMJONGILIA takes an in-depth look at North Korea through the testimony of survivors of the dictatorship’s legendary prison camps who managed to escape, as well as through a stunning amount of propaganda films and other rarely-seen official footage extolling the magnificence and beneficence of Kim Il-sung and his son Kim Jong-il. The former prisoners’ stories of injustice, abuse, and famine serve as a powerful counterpoint to the lush images of a happy, prosperous country.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases, Sundance
Dear Documentary Filmmakers: You’re enamored w your artist/musician subject – don’t assume that the uninitiated will be too.
This is a common problem I’ve found with docs focused on art or music. To speak specifically about music docs, by far the more abused subgenre of the two, many filmmakers make the mistake of assuming that just because they like a musician or band, it’s self-evident that everyone else does too. They get permission to follow some band on tour and/or in the recording studio, and the result is a generic behind the scenes “band on tour” doc. Unfortunately, more often than not, it doesn’t go much further than this – minimal or no effort is made to convey why the filmmaker thinks they’re worth following as subjects, or why the audience should care if they aren’t already fans.
Filed under Dear Documentary Filmmakers, Documentary, Film
Opening at the IFC Center this Friday, October 8: MARWENCOL
I’ve already written about Jeff Malmberg’s exceptional documentary debut here.
Check out the official theatrical trailer and list of theatre engagements at the film’s website. Mark your calendar to see this doc when it opens in your area. No false hype here – this film is like nothing you’ve seen before. You won’t regret it.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
Coming to HBO this Monday, October 4: SINS OF MY FATHER
Nicolas Entel’s portrait of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar and his son has been on the festival circuit for the past year, making stops at Mar del Plata and IDFA before coming stateside at this year’s Sundance and winning both the Audience and Jury Award at the Miami Film Festival.
After the death of his father in 1993, Juan Escobar and his mother, Pablo’s widow, went into exile in Argentina, changing their names to avoid being connected to his notoriety. Entel convinces Juan, now known as Sebastián Marroquín, to discuss his father and his legacy for the first time publicly, having experienced a surprisingly different side to the man Colombia viewed as its most wanted criminal. The film effectively shows the personal conflict that the younger Escobar has gone through, paying for his father’s crimes, but seeking reconciliation with his past and expiation of his inherited guilt, culminating in a poignant meeting arranged between the sons of two of his father’s most prominent victims and himself.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Sundance
For my curation of Hulu’s Documentaries page for indieWIRE this week, I was (loosely) inspired by the currently in-progress New York Film Festival. Rather than highlighting that fest’s alumni, I went broader and selected docs about or featuring NYC. For more information about the selections, take a look at my iW article.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Indiewire @ Hulu Docs, Recommendations
