Category Archives: Recommendations

New to VOD via Microsoft this week:
HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT

Director:
Kent Jones

Premiere:
Cannes 2015

Select Festivals:
DOC NYC, Telluride, Deauville, Toronto, San Sebastian, London, Mill Valley, Tallgrass, Chicago, AFI Fest, Tallinn Black Nights, Denver

About:
A look back at the legendary interview between the director and French New Wave founder and cineaste.

I previously wrote about the doc here,

Coming to VOD via Starz on Demand today, Friday, February 3:
AFTER SPRING

Directors:
Steph Ching and Ellen Martinez

Premiere:
Tribeca 2016

Select Festivals:
Nantucket, New Orleans, Sheffield, Zurich, AFI Docs, Bergen, One World, Greenwich, Hot Springs Doc

About:
An intimate look at life in a Syrian refugee camp.

I previously wrote about the doc for Nantucket’s program, saying:
More than four million people have fled Syria in the wake of civil war. Many have ended up at the Zaatari refugee camp, seven miles across the border in Jordan, which now houses 80,000 Syrians, more than half of them children. Though Zaatari was built as a temporary haven, as war rages on, refugees reluctantly begin to see it as home, complete with a bustling economy and a sense of community that reflects its inhabitants’ resilience. Martinez and Ching immerse viewers in camp life by profiling two families and several aid workers attempting to make the best of the present while facing an uncertain future.

Coming to PBS’s Independent Lens this coming Monday, February 6:
BIRTH OF A MOVEMENT

Directors:
Susan Gray & Bestor Cram

Premiere:
Independent Lens (February 2017)

About:
An African-American newspaper editor led a civil rights struggle against DW Griffith’s THE BIRTH OF A NATION.

In 1915, Griffith’s epic became a box office sensation, heralded as a new achievement in the still nascent medium of film, and drew praise from President Woodrow Wilson, who viewed it in the White House – the first motion picture ever screened there. Based on Thomas Dixon’s THE CLANSMAN, the film offered a shameful, revisionist history of the American South that portrayed African American men as subhuman rapists of white women and positioned the Ku Klux Klan as heroes, helping spur on a resurgence for the racist organization. Recognizing its divisiveness, theatres banned African Americans from attending screenings in places like Boston, where William Monroe Trotter was editor of the Boston Guardian, an independent African-American newspaper. Trotter, Harvard’s first Phi Beta Kappa and a contemporary of WEB Dubois, decried the appeasement to Jim Crow championed by Booker T Washington, and was an early supporter of the NAACP and its push for equality. As detailed in Gray and Cram’s engaging film, when THE CLANSMAN came to Boston as a play in 1910, Trotter used his connections to shut down its production, but when he later took on the film adaptation, his calls for censorship proved more challenging. Despite this, Trotter did succeed in mobilizing his fellow African Americans to take a stand, serving as a precursor to later civil rights struggles and underscoring the power of media representation to influence public perception, for good and for ill.

New to VOD this week:
GUN RUNNERS

Director:
Anjali Nayar

Premiere:
Hot Docs 2016

Select Festivals:
Palm Springs, Aspen, Atlantic

About:
Two Kenyan men turn in their guns as part of a government disarmament program to pursue running instead.

When Nayar’s film begins, old friends Julius and Robert live in the bush in hiding, self-proclaimed warriors dependent on guns for power and respect. To address gun violence while also promoting competitive running, the Kenyan government institutes a plan that provides amnesty and a pair of running shoes in exchange for disarmament. While the more innocent Julius jumps at the chance to take up his childhood love of running, Robert is initially hesitant, concerned for his safety, but eventually comes around to participate in the program. Julius begins to excel in running, is invited to a special event at the United Nations, and dreams of qualifying for the NYC Marathon, but it’s soon revealed that he has a penchant for getting married and not supporting his spouses or children. Robert, meanwhile, tires of the training regiment and turns to farming to support his own family, while also dabbling in some shady local politics, much to the consternation of his wife. Nayar chose appealing, if somewhat guarded, subjects to follow, and occasionally lets their stories meander, but ultimately crafts an engaging look at what they do with their second chance.

Coming to PBS’s AfroPoP this coming Monday, February 6:
BLACK OUT

Director:
Eva Weber

Premiere:
IDFA 2012

Select Festivals:
Paris’ International Environmental Film Festival, One World, Movies That Matter, Full Frame, Planete+ Doc, Aljazeera, Doxa, Los Angeles, Open City Docs

About:
Guinean students struggle to study despite a lack of consistent electric power.

I previously included the doc in my IDFA coverage here.

Coming to VOD via iTunes today, Friday, February 3:
BRIGHT LIGHTS: STARRING CARRIE FISHER AND DEBBIE REYNOLDS

Directors:
Alexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens

Premiere:
Cannes 2016

Select Festivals:
Telluride, New York, Chicago, AFI Fest

About:
A portrait of the beloved and recently departed mother/daughter celebrities.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

Coming to VOD via Amazon today, Friday, February 3:
TOMORROW WE DISAPPEAR

Directors:
Jimmy Goldblum and Adam Weber

Premiere:
Tribeca 2014

Select Festivals:
Hot Docs, Melbourne, Austin, Aspen, Hot Springs Doc, Camden

About:
A community of Indian artists and performers find their longstanding home threatened by development.

I previously wrote about the doc here.