With the Sochi Olympics in full-swing, my latest curated selections for Hulu’s Documentaries page, explores modern-day Russia. Watch these docs now for free!
For more information about the selections, see my Indiewire article.
Category Archives: Documentary
Indiewire @ Hulu Docs: Russian Edition
Filed under Documentary, Film, Indiewire @ Hulu Docs
On DVD/VOD: SICK BIRDS DIE EASY
Now available on VOD and coming to DVD next Tuesday, February 18: SICK BIRDS DIE EASY
Nik Fackler’s hopeless – and partly fictional – journey into the heart of darkness made its debut at Hot Docs last year. It went on to screen at Lone Star, Woodstock, and Poland’s New Horizon fests. It’s now available on iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Xbox, Vudu, and PlayStation.
I included the film in my Hot Docs coverage here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
On VOD: FUREVER
Coming to VOD tomorrow, Friday, February 14: FUREVER
Amy Finkel’s survey of the lasting bond between people and their animals made its debut at Cleveland last year. It went on to screen at New Orleans, Seattle, Hot Docs, St Louis, Las Vegas, Hawaii, Napa Valley, Warsaw, and Brooklyn, among others. FilmBuff now releases the doc on iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Xbox, Sony PlayStation, and Vudu.
I previously wrote about the doc out of Hot Docs here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Documentary Fortnight 2014 Overview
The 13th edition of MoMA’s annual intersection of nonfiction film and art, Documentary Fortnight, begins this Friday, February 14 and runs through Friday, February 28. Twenty new or recent features screen, in addition to shorts, retrospective programming, and an installation, representing twenty countries.
Kicking off the series is Gonçalo Tocha’s THE MOTHER AND THE SEA (pictured), an ethnographic study of Portuguese fisherwomen. Also explicitly focused on women is Xu Huijing’s MOTHERS, about the personal impact of China’s one-child policy on a small rural community, while another coastal setting is the subject of Kelvin Kyung Kun Park’s A DREAM OF IRON, an exploration of Korean industrialization and the divine in the seaside city of Ulsan. Korea also figures in Kim Dong-ryung and Park Kyoung-tae’s TOUR OF DUTY, which revisits an abandoned US military outpost and its notorious red light district.
Expressly political subject matter may be found in Kazuhiro Soda’s CAMPAIGN 2 (pictured), which follows an anti-nuclear Japanese city council election campaign in the aftermath of Fukushima; Victor Kossakovsky and students’ DEMONSTRATION, chronicling the 2012 anti-austerity mass protests in Spain; Peter Snowdon’s THE UPRISING, which imagines a pan-Arab revolution using footage from six Arab Spring nations; and the world premiere of Naeem Mohaiemen’s short AFSAN’S LONG DAY (THE YOUNG MAN WAS, PART 2), an exploration of the connections between German and Bangladesh political activism.
Other films screening include Vitaly Mansky’s PIPELINE (pictured), tracing the communities connected along an oil pipeline between Siberia and Europe; Duncan Campbell’s IT FOR OTHERS, a rumination on cultural commodification; and Amit Dutta’s THE SEVENTH WALK, a study of the work of an Indian abstract painter.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Recommendations
In Theatres: THE NEW BLACK
Coming to NYC’s Film Forum today, Wednesday, February 12: THE NEW BLACK
Yoruba Richen’s exploration of African American communities’ responses to LGBT equality made its debut at the Los Angeles Film Festival last year. Its extensive fest run has included Human Rights Watch, AFI Docs, Frameline, Urbanworld, Citizen Jane, Hot Springs, Polari, and New Orleans, among others.
I covered the doc out of AFI Docs in Indiewire this past Summer, noting:
Yoruba Richen’s new film is a candid, and often eye-opening, look at the complex truth behind the idea that “Gay is the New Black” when it comes to equal rights. The doc uses the 2012 marriage equality fight in Maryland to explore the contributing influence of religion on homophobia in the African-American community, at the same time examining the rhetorical linking of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s with the struggle for LGBT equality. Richen and her team have had a busy few weeks, debuting the doc at LAFF, bringing it home to NYC for the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, and on to AFI Docs, close to the film’s Maryland setting. With the winds shifting on same-sex marriage, this topical film will be making the fest rounds for the next several months.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
On DVD/VOD: BALLROOM CONFIDENTIAL
Coming to DVD and VOD today, Tuesday, February 11: BALLROOM CONFIDENTIAL
Brian Lilla’s look at ballroom dancing amongst a group of Florida retirees has held screenings in San Francisco and Ormond Beach, Florida, where it was shot. It now comes to DVD as well as to VOD via Amazon and Vimeo, expanding later to iTunes and Hulu.
Inspired by his mother’s experiences taking up ballroom dancing – earning her first-time producer credit here – filmmaker Lilla trained his camera on Caleb Young’s dance studio, and on several of the senior women who have found renewed vitality by working with the significantly junior instructor. Young, a NYC transplant to Florida, offers a safe space for his charges to let loose, maybe harmlessly flirt a little, cope in an active way with aging, and gain a sense of efficacy in mastering dance moves. Structured around an impending spy-themed one-night-only dance performance, Lilla’s film is fairly conventional but often entertaining. While it tries to juggle a character or two too many, sacrificing more indepth focus as a result, the film ultimately is able to convey the quiet but affecting impact the subjects’ involvement in Young’s studio has had on their lives.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
On DVD: THE HUMAN SCALE
Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, February 11: THE HUMAN SCALE
Andreas M Dalsgaard’s exploration of urban design and planning had its world premiere at CPH:DOX in 2012. Other festival berths included DocPoint, Planete+ Doc, Hot Docs, Sydney, Seattle, Al Jazeera, DOXA, Revelation, Dokufest, and Traverse City, and the film enjoyed a limited theatrical release last Fall.
I previously wrote about the doc out of Hot Docs here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
On TV: THE PREP SCHOOL NEGRO
Coming to the WORLD Channel’s America ReFramed series tonight, Tuesday, February 11: THE PREP SCHOOL NEGRO
André Robert Lee’s personal reflection on race, class, and educational opportunity made its debut at the Montclair Film Festival in 2012. It went on to screen at DOC NYC, Outfest, St Louis, and at scores of public and private school and community events across the country.
I previously wrote about the film out of DOC NYC here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Special Screening: BROTHERS HYPNOTIC
Coming to NYC’s Stranger Than Fiction series tomorrow night, Tuesday, February 11: BROTHERS HYPNOTIC
Reuben Atlas’ exploration of musical legacy among a band of brothers had its world premiere at SXSW last year. It went on to screen at Hot Docs, Montclair, Los Angeles, Film Society’s Sound + Vision, Urbanworld, Antenna, Indie Memphis, Hawaii, Leeds, Sound Unseen, RIDM, Pan African, and the upcoming Big Sky and Noise Pop.
Atlas offers an intimate profile of the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, consisting of the eight sons of Phil Cohran, a Chicago-based jazz trumpeter who is known for playing with Sun Ra and Earth, Wind and Fire, among others. Cohran and the boys’ mothers introduced them to music at an early age, grooming them to be positive, inspirational young African American role models. After breaking with their father’s leadership, they set their own course, resisting commercialization to make music their own way. Atlas documents their transformation from street performers to independent, internationally touring artists, with occasional high-profile gigs serving as a backing band to the likes of Prince. Simultaneously showing the universal struggles facing independent musicians as well as the specific challenges of escaping their father’s – and his generation’s – shadow, the film is engaging, but does falter a bit in adequately individuating its various subjects’ personalities. Still, Atlas takes on more than the typical music doc often does, offering intriguing musical and political history in Cohran’s story, while maintaining a focus on the present-day concerns of the younger musicians’ careers.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations
On DVD: THE ARMSTRONG LIE
Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, February 11: THE ARMSTRONG LIE
Alex Gibney’s exploration of the cycling champion’s fall from grace had its world premiere at Venice last Fall. It went on to screen at Toronto, London, the Hamptons, Jihlava, Vancouver, and Denver, among others, before its theatrical release, and also made the Oscar documentary feature shortlist.
I previously wrote about the doc out of Toronto here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
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