Category Archives: Documentary

Coming to NYC’s Rooftop Films tomorrow, Tuesday, June 7 and to theatres this Friday, June 10: THE MUSIC OF STRANGERS: YO YO MA & THE SILK ROAD ENSEMBLE

Morgan Neville’s look at a diverse collective of world musicians made its bow at Toronto last Fall. Further fest play included Berlin, True/False, San Francisco, Montclair, DocAviv, Los Angeles, and the upcoming Sydney, Provincetown, and Biografilm.

The Oscar-winning Neville finds more unsung musicians to profile in his latest project, although his subjects here had already established themselves in their home countries before the renowned Yo Yo Ma gathered them together to explore the cross-cultural potential of music. While Ma is the instigating force here, and offers viewers a surprising candor about the perpetual restlessness – and perhaps boredom – he’s felt around his default career in music since his days as a child prodigy, his story is but one shared in Neville’s engaging portrait of Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble. While the film traces this eclectic group’s origins in a 2000 experiment, it’s grounded more in the recent past, with profiles of a few other members of the band. Wisely foregrounding personalities over performances so that those who are not necessarily enamored with world music have a way in, Neville still manages to showcase enough music to demonstrate the fruits of Ma’s collaborative vision as well as its impact on the participants and audiences.

Coming to DVD and VOD this coming Tuesday, June 7: THE FEAR OF 13

David Sington’s tale of a death row experience made its premiere at BFI London last year. Screenings followed at DOC NYC, True/False, CPH:DOX, and Wisconsin.

I previously wrote about the film for DOC NYC’s program, saying:
In 1982, Nick was sentenced to death for a brutal crime. After more than two decades behind bars, he petitions the court to carry out his sentence and put him to death. Compellingly presented as his confessional, David Sington’s film melds psychological thriller and true crime drama to reveal the shocking truth behind not only Nick’s case, but of the American justice system as a whole.

New to VOD this week: T-REX

Drea Cooper and Zackary Canepari’s profile of a boxer made its bow at SXSW last year. Its extensive fest run has also included Hot Docs, New Orleans, San Francisco, Traverse City, Camden, Hot Springs Doc, DOK Leipzig, Cucalorus, Athena, and Atlantic, among others. The doc was released earlier this week on Vimeo on Demand.

Cooper and Canepari trace a young fighter’s Olympic dreams as women’s boxing becomes an official part of the Games in 2012. Their subject, Claressa Shields, better known by the titular nickname, has been training since she was eleven, convincing her gruff coach Jason to change his mind about women in the sport. Sixteen when this portrait begins, T-Rex is determined to qualify for the London Games, channeling a difficult upbringing and a seemingly still-rocky current home life in economically-depressed Flint MI into boxing with the hopes of bettering not only her situation, but that of her family. Success and its impact on Shields’ ego brings strain to her relationship with her coach – also an interesting figure – while also unveiling the double standards that are often faced by female athletes. While an often somewhat reserved subject, Shields is likeable – particularly when she lets her guard down with a love interest who also rankles coach Jason – further helping to distinguish this project from the standard Olympic athlete portrait sub-genre.

Coming to NYC’s Anthology Film Archives tomorrow, Thursday, June 2 through Saturday, June 4: PAUL SHARITS

François Miron’s appreciation of the avant-garde filmmaker made its bow at Rotterdam last year. Since then, it has screened at Jeonju, Japan’s Image Forum, San Francisco Doc Fest, Jerusalem, Montreal’s Festival du Nouveau Cinéma, Viennale, Manchester, and Rendezvous With Madness, among other events.

A widely-respected pioneer of structuralist film, Paul Sharits made experimental work from the mid-1960s until his strange death in 1993. A visual artist who became fascinated by 16mm film and the flicker effect of projection, he produced touchstone films like T,O,U,C,H,I,NG, (1969) and later further deconstructed conventional film to create innovative new forms of expression that presaged gallery and museum installation work. Miron, a filmmaker and scholar, incorporates interviews, archival footage, and samples of Sharits’ work to give the artist his due here. While likely best appreciated by those already familiar with the innovator’s body of work, Miron’s film provides ample background and context, including a consideration of the impact of Sharits’ bipolar disorder, to provide a primer for the uninitiated that may very well spur them on to seek out more of his influential films.

Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, May 31: THE STATE OF MARRIAGE

Jeff Kaufman’s chronicle of the legal origins of marriage equality made its debut at Provincetown last year. Other screenings have included Brattleboro, Santa Fe, GlobeDocs, and the Austin LGBT fests.

While same-sex marriage legalization became part of the national debate over the past few election cycles, the battle for this civil right has been waged over long decades. Kaufman’s film recognizes the importance of the precedent set in Vermont as a pivotal part of the story, and focuses on the significant efforts made by a trio of female attorneys to bring marriage quality to that state. Galvanized by a child custody case in the early 1990s involving the surviving lesbian partner of a woman who was killed in a car accident, small-town Vermont lawyers Susan Murray and Beth Robinson sought out support for protections for other same-sex couples. After they found a partner in Mary Bonauto, a Boston-based civil rights advocate, they laid the groundwork to argue for the constitutionality of same-sex marriage, adopting a strategy that humanized the issue and found parallels in the once-banned practice of interracial marriage. Even after they found partial victories – legalized civil unions rather than full marriage – they continued their struggle, causing rifts between those who felt they were overreaching and others who were willing to accept the compromise. While the larger story is by now well-known, and Kaufman’s approach ultimately fairly conventional, the film succeeds in presenting a detailed look at the hard-fought grassroots campaign that enabled the freedoms that are enjoyed today.