Category Archives: Film

Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, August 14: PATAGONIA RISING

Brian Lilla’s look at a controversial hydroelectric plan premiered at Newport Beach last year. It screened extensively at festivals in Chile, as well as at Hot Springs and the San Francisco Doc fest.

I wrote about the film upon its theatrical return here.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, August 14: THE GOOD LIFE

Eva Mulvad’s profile of a modern day Big and Little Edie made its premiere at CPH:DOX in 2010. Its festival circuit included screenings at IDFA, Thessaloniki Doc, Tribeca, San Francisco, and Karlovy Vary, winning an award at the latter.

I included the doc in my IDFA roundup here.

Coming to DVD and VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, August 14: INVENTING OUR LIFE: THE KIBBUTZ EXPERIMENT

Toby Perl Freilich’s film on the Zionist Kibbutz movement has screened extensively at Jewish film festivals, including San Diego and Toronto, as well as in Haifa.

I wrote about the doc upon its theatrical release here.

Coming to NYC’s Maysles Cinema for a one-week run beginning next Monday, August 13: THE CHILEAN BUILDING

Macarena Aguiló’s exploration of a little-known politically-motivated social experiment in Chile’s tumultuous history made its premiere in 2010. Among its stops on the festival circuit were FIDOCS, IDFA, DOK Leipzig, New York International Latino, DOCS Barcelona, and Thessaloniki Doc, among many others, picking up more than a half dozen awards along the way.

Aguiló delves into her own history to tell the story of Proyecto Hogares (referenced as either “Project Homes” or “Project Home”) – a safehouse in Cuba for the children of Chile’s leftist freedom fighters. While their biological parents fought against the injustices of Pinochet’s regime back home, their sixty children were raised communally in the titular Cuban home-in-exile by “social parents,” twenty adults who could not fight but served the revolution by bringing the next generation to adulthood. While some have fond memories of their time in Cuba, others were deeply scarred by a sense of abandonment that haunts their family relationships to this day. Aguiló, her surrogate siblings, and both social and biological parents reflect on their history together through animation, archival photos and diaries, and emotional interviews, presenting an intimate and engaging personal history that is broadened by shared experiences and circumstances to transcend the individual and instead represent a nation’s difficult history in microcosm. The film demonstrates the limits and sacrifices born of revolutionary commitment, and how much the personal truly is political.

Coming to DVD and VOD next Tuesday, August 14: PARADISE LOST 3: PURGATORY

Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky’s West Memphis Three trilogy ender made its world premiere at Toronto last year. After the release of the three men, an addendum was added, premiering at the New York Film Festival, with additional festival exposure at the Hamptons, IDFA, Thessaloniki Doc, and elsewhere. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

I wrote about the film prior to its broadcast premiere here.

Currently available on SundanceNOW: WALK AWAY RENEE

Jonathan Caouette’s follow up to TARNATION made its world premiere at last year’s Cannes. Since then, that original version of the film screened at Moscow, Poland’s New Horizons, and a number of other festivals. After reworking the film, Caouette screened the current, revised version at BAMcinemaFest and Outfest, and it’s this version that made its VOD premiere in late June.

Caouette’s first film also had somewhat of a similar origin – originally debuting in late 2003 at NYC’s experimental LGBT fest, MIX in a three-hour version that included some sci-fi elements, Caouette edited the film dramatically in time to officially premiere the new version at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, removing the fictional elements. While I haven’t seen the original version of his latest film, my understanding is that it too included some more fantastical, fictional elements that have largely been excised in the new version. Like TARNATION, the new film is focused on Caouette and his relationship with his mother, Renee LeBlanc, a schizophrenic for whom he’s functioned as a caretaker for several years. Less experimental and poetic than the first film, but still very much poignant, Caouette’s follow up shows a filmmaker who is more mature and perhaps more inured to the realities of dealing with the mental illness that plagues his mother and the impact it has on his life. The film follows Jonathan as he travels with Renee from Texas to New York, having decided to transition her to an assisted-living facility closer to his home. Beyond the road trip aspect, which results in its own share of drama when Renee loses the meds that keep her on the precarious side of stable, the film also fills in viewers on the time between the end of TARNATION and the present film. This includes Jonathan’s son Joshua moving in with his dad and his partner David, soon followed by both Renee and her father, Adolph Davis – a living situation that clearly couldn’t have been easy for anyone. Caouette has received criticism in the past for focusing his work on his mother’s compromised state, but it would seem unavoidable that this should be included as the content of his filmmaking – her condition, and that of his unusual and difficult upbringing had, and continues to have, a profound affect on his life. That he is able to process and transform these challenges through his films is a testament to the power of creativity and art.