Category Archives: Recommendations

Coming to VOD today, Wednesday, February 1:
FROM THIS DAY FORWARD

Director:
Sharon Shattuck

Premiere:
Full Frame 2015

Select Festivals:
DOC NYC, AFI Docs, Hot Docs, Framline, Outfest, Camden, Traverse City, Frameline, Outfest, LGBT fests in Seattle, North Carolina, Milwaukee, and Austin

About:
A portrait of the filmmaker’s father, who transitioned from male to female.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

New to VOD on iTunes today, Tuesday, January 31:
MIRIAM: HOME DELIVERY

Director:
Juliet Jordan

Premiere:
DOC NYC 2015

Select Festivals:
Ambulante

About:
A portrait of a modern-day midwife.

I previously wrote about the film for DOC NYC’s program, saying:
Juliet Jordan offers an inside look at what some consider to be the world’s second-oldest profession: midwifery. As a homebirth midwife, Miriam performs a service once commonplace, but now increasingly rare as the process of childbirth firmly moved to a hospital setting. The filmmaker immerses viewers in Miriam’s mission, driving along with her across NYC as she assists expectant mothers, from her clients among the Orthodox Jewish community to the dramatic home birth that falls during the Hurricane Sandy blackout.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, January 31:
DANNY SAYS

Director:
Brendan Toller

Premiere:
SXSW 2015

Select Festivals:
London, San Francisco Jewish, Provincetown, Sound + Vision, Big Sky, Montclair, Melbourne, CPH:DOX, Athens

About:
A portrait of an unsung music world impresario.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

Coming to PBS’s POV tonight, Monday, January 31:
SEVEN SONGS FOR A LONG LIFE

Director:
Amy Hardie

Premiere:
Scotland (October 2015)

Select Festivals:
SXSW, Margaret Mead, Aspen, DOXA, GlobeDocs, Guth Gafa, EBS, Documentary Edge, DocPoint

About:
Hospice patients confront mortality through music.

Set in Strathcarron Hospice in Scotland, Hardie’s film follows nurse Mandy Malcomson, whose love of singing has encouraged a music therapy program for the residents, and six of her charges. Not a musical in a strict sense, the doc instead intermittently weaves in a number of songs, supplementing both observational and interview-based footage of the institution, its patients, and their caregivers. Some songs are performed impromptu by patients, like the Sinatra crooning Tosh and amateur opera singer Dorene, while others are more elaborate, produced in a music-video style, such as nurse Mandy and patient Nicola’s poignant duet of REM’s “Everybody Hurts.” Hardie wisely shows restraint here, preventing the proceedings from becoming either too twee or too dour, and ultimately focuses on the powerful impact this community support has on dealing with the complex reality of terminal illness and mortality.

Coming to theatres next Friday, January 27:
BEHEMOTH

Director:
Zhao Liang

Premiere:
Venice 2015

Select Festivals:
IDFA, New Directors/New Films, Dubai, True/False, DocAviv, Moscow, Sheffield, Melbourne, Stockholm, Hong Kong, Istanbul

About:
A poetic meditation on the environmental impact of China’s rapid economic development.

Taking a more experimental approach than his past work, the social issue documentarian exposes the ecological and human costs of industry through unsettling tableaux of destroyed landscapes set to Dante’s THE DIVINE COMEDY. Using visually impactful images of the stark borders between verdant fields and neighboring desolation, the filmmaker demonstrates the devastation wrought by dangerous coal mining practices. Occasionally, he inserts naked figures within these hellscapes, but these unnecessary stylistic flourishes carry far less weight than images of miners and their families suffering from their toxic work. While its attempt to merge nonfiction with video art is not always successful, the film’s imagery proves disturbingly memorable.