Category Archives: Documentary

Coming to theatres tomorrow, Friday, October 30: THE ARMOR OF LIGHT

Abigail Disney’s look at the intersection of evangelical faith and gun rights made its world premiere at Tribeca. Other fest screenings have included Traverse City, AFI Docs, Hamptons, Galway, Montclair, and SF Jewish, among others.

Disney’s directorial debut sees her taking on two hot-button conservative issues that oddly aren’t typically linked: abortion and gun rights. Wondering how it is possible to hold both the belief that all life is sacred and that one has the right to bear lethal arms, the perhaps too tentative but thoughtful film focuses on an evangelical minister who has wrestled with what he sees as a contradiction. Reverend Rob Schenck, a long-time pro-life activist, was raised in a secular Jewish household before converting to Christianity, and was among the mass of evangelicals who switched political affiliations in the wake of Ronald Reagan, forming his Religious Right conservative base. Despite his leanings, Schenck has ruffled fellow conservatives and evangelicals by taking a stance for gun control after witnessing the too-frequent occurrences of mass shootings in recent years. Disney follows the reverend as he meets with other conservatives, questioning the morality of putting firearms before Biblical strictures against killing. Joining him as a secondary character is Lucy McBath, the mother of Jordan Davis, who features prominently in another documentary this year, 3 1/2 MINUTES, TEN BULLETS, underscoring the racial element that often haunts pro-gun rhetoric. In a smart move, recognizing the need to reach out to audiences beyond the already converted, Disney is offering free tickets to NRA members at select venues throughout the country.

Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, October 27: GTFO THE MOVIE

Shannon Sun-Higginson’s look at the hostile treatment of women in gaming debuted at SXSW this Spring. It went on to screen at DOXA, IFF Boston, Global Visions, and SF DocFest.

I previously wrote about the doc upon its VOD release here.

Coming to theatres today, Friday, October 23: INDIA’S DAUGHTER

Leslee Udwin’s account of the national response to an infamous crime made its debut on the BBC earlier this year. In addition to broadcast in other European nations, the doc has screened at Sheffield, Biografilm, AFI Docs, Tallgrass, and will appear at next month’s Denver film fest.

The gang rape of Jyoti Singh on a bus in India in December 2012 was particularly notable not for its reprehensible brutality, but in its unexpected role in catalyzing a movement against sexual violence in the nation. Where women previously were expected to remain silent and bare the blame for rape and other abuses, in the direct aftermath of the discovery of Singh’s mutilated body, Indian women and their allies rose up to demand justice. Udwin’s film, which has generated no shortage of controversy on the subcontinent, lays out the simple particulars of the crime and offers a sense of the victim via emotional interviews with her parents and a close friend, but largely focuses on the paradigmatic shift that her tragedy engendered. Most eye-opening here is an extended interview with one of the perpetrators, Mukesh Singh, who claims he just drove the bus. Expressing not a shred of remorse and instead actively blaming the victim, he, like the defense attorneys commenting here, represent the outdated, and clearly dangerous, view of gender disparity that lay at the heart of sexual violence. While the filmmaking here is, for the most part, fairly conventional, in capturing these sentiments with such disturbing frankness, Udwin creates a striking, cautionary call to action.