Category Archives: Documentary

Coming to Showtime this Saturday, March 31:
OPERATION ODESSA

Director:
Tiller Russell

Premiere:
SXSW 2018

Select Festivals:
Miami

About:
An outrageous caper in the Miami drug underworld.

Named for the federal task force investigating Russian gangsters in the Miami drug trade, Tiller Russell’s entertaining film takes viewers back to the heyday of that scene in the 1980s and ’90s, and introduces them to some of its major players as they relate a stranger than fiction story of the excesses of the time. At the core is a Russian gangster known as Tarzan, a Floridian luxury car dealer, and a self-made millionaire Cuban drug trafficker. Together, they weave an outrageous story of chutzpah and hubris that culminates in a plan to buy a post-Cold War Soviet nuclear submarine for a Colombian drug cartel. While the film could be criticized for glorifying criminality to some extent, it fits the nature of the colorful characters it explores and the milieu in which they operated until their activities caught up with them.

New to DVD this week:
RAISING BERTIE

Director:
Margaret Byrne

Premiere:
Full Frame 2016

Select Festivals:
Sarasota, Bentonville, AFI Docs, Atlanta Docufest, Chicago, Citizen Jane, Cucalorus, Big Sky Doc

About:
An observational coming-of-age portrait of three African-American teenagers in rural North Carolina.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

New to DVD this week:
STRAD STYLE

Director:
Stefan Avalos

Premiere:
Slamdance 2017

Select Festivals:
Hot Docs, AFI Docs, Hamptons, Denver, Antenna Doc, Biografilm, Dallas, Sonoma, Martha’s Vineyard, Salem

About:
An amateur attempts to reproduce a world-class violin.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

Coming to NYC’s Stranger Than Fiction series tomorrow, Tuesday, March 27 and to theatres and VOD this Friday, March 30:
THE CHINA HUSTLE

Director:
Jed Rothstein

Premiere:
Toronto 2017

Select Festivals:
Hamptons, Palm Springs, CPH:DOX

About:
An exposé of a multibillion-dollar stock market fraud centered around China’s economic boom.

As detailed in Rothstein’s investigative doc, in the wake of the 2008 devastating financial crisis, which should sensibly have led to greater caution about the idea of ever-growing markets, some investors sought to recoup their losses by speculating in China. Using reverse mergers to gain access, since foreigners aren’t allowed to invest directly, registered but defunct American companies were taken over by a Chinese company, becoming shell companies for the Beijing economic miracle and open to US investors to seek profit. The problem: many of the Chinese companies involved have been grossly overvalued, creating a house of cards that will eventually tumble. The film follows the efforts of those who would expose this fraud – and, explicitly noted here, profit off of the reckoning by shorting the companies’ stocks – and those who are only to happy to perpetuate the falsehood so long as they can continue to make money, even if others will lose their shirts in the process. While prone to talking heads and occasional overdramatic flourishes, Rothstein’s film succeeds in clearly and concisely explaining market details that otherwise might be sleep-inducing, and benefits from some memorable subjects.

Coming to National Geographic beginning tonight, Monday, March 26:
ONE STRANGE ROCK

Producers:
Nutopia and Protozoa Pictures

Premiere:
National Geographic (March 26)

About:
A ten-part series exploring the unique wonders of the planet Earth through the eyes of astronauts.

An ambitious production that eschews the typically placid style of many science and nature programming with a more cinematic approach – occasionally veering too much towards over-the-top blockbuster territory – this informative and engaging series seeks to explain how our fragile planet enables and maintains life against all odds. Among the noteworthy aspects to this NatGeo series is its star wattage – it is executive produced by Darren Aronofsky and narrated by Will Smith – and the singular perspective brought to each episode by astronauts. These men and women, having left the planet and viewed it, and the celestial bodies around it, from a decidedly different vantage point – lend the proceedings an awareness of and appreciation for a universal perspective.