Coming to NYC’s 92YTribeca as part of the Cinema Tropical Festival this Saturday, February 9: THE LIFEGUARD (EL SALVAVIDAS)
Maite Alberdi’s portrait of a by-the-book Chilean lifeguard made its world premiere at IDFA in 2011. It went on to screen at Full Frame, New Horizons, DOXA, and Edinburgh, among others, and was the winner of Cinema Tropical’s Best Documentary Film award.
I included the doc in my IDFA coverage here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations
Coming to DVD next Tuesday, February 12: PLANET OF SNAIL
Seung-Jun Yi’s acclaimed profile of a disabled couple premiered at IDFA in 2011, taking home the fest’s top prize. Its festival circuit has included Thessaloniki Doc, Tribeca, Planete Doc, Tempo Doc, Hot Docs, and Silverdocs, among others, and it enjoyed a theatrical run at NYC’s Film Forum this past Summer.
I included the doc in my IDFA coverage here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to NYC’s Maysles Cinema as part of Filmwax’s Docularious! series this Saturday, February 9: WHY WE LAUGH: BLACK COMEDIANS ON BLACK COMEDY
Robert Townsend’s overview of the history of black comedy in America made its world premiere at Sundance in 2009. The documentary was acquired by Showtime for its cable broadcast premiere in 2010, and went on to tour at various festivals, film series, and college engagements.
Aided by a copious amount of entertaining clips, a who’s who of comedy weigh in on the development of their profession, and the specific influence black comedians have had, in Townsend’s entertaining and appreciative survey. Going back to the racially charged tradition of minstrel shows and blackface, to early performers like Bert Williams and Lincoln “Stepin Fetchit” Perry, the film explores the representations of black entertainment and entertainers as it moved from stereotypes like Amos ‘n’ Andy to more rounded, yet often still limited, figures over the past century. Cultural critics like Dr Cornel West offer their appreciation for those performers, like Richard Pryor, who candidly expressed a freer point of view, and achieved success because of it. Covering luminaries like Redd Foxx, Dick Gregory, Bill Cosby, Eddie Murphy, Whoopi Goldberg, and Dave Chappelle, and exploring the impact of pioneering programming like the 1970s sitcoms THE JEFFERSONS and GOOD TIMES, as well as later showcases for black comedians such as IN LIVING COLOR, and DEF COMEDY JAM, Townsend cuts a wide swath, addressing the way black comics have used their talents to succeed in the face of societal barriers, employed humor to point out inequalities and rally mainstream support for change, and – perhaps for varying reasons – made us all laugh.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Recommendations, Sundance
The 63rd annual Berlin International Film Festival, or Berlinale, opens this Thursday, February 7 and runs through Sunday, February 17. Nearly 300 feature length films will screen across more than a dozen different sections, with documentaries making up about a third of that impressive tally.
Despite the at times inhospitable winter weather, the Berlinale has consistently drawn the international film community to experience an expansive selection of world cinema in both the main festival and in its accompanying market, the European Film Market. The vibrant city of Berlin itself is arguably the festival’s greatest asset – but that may be my own bias, as I’ve been in love with the city and its people since I spent part of my junior year of college studying there. It pains me to once again miss the festival after attending regularly for over a decade, but if I were there, the following are among the docs I’d want to check out: Continue reading
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Overviews, Recommendations
Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, February 5: BROOKLYN CASTLE
Katie Dellamaggiore’s profile of the impact of a chess program on junior high school students premiered at SXSW last year, picking up an audience award in the process. It went on to screen extensively at other festivals, including Cleveland, Hot Docs, Dallas, and Silverdocs, among others. It becomes available on iTunes and Movies on Demand today.
I wrote about the doc out of SXSW here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, February 5: SOMEWHERE BETWEEN
Linda Goldstein Knowlton’s exploration of cross-cultural adoption made its premiere at Hot Docs in 2011, where it won an audience award. Its festival circuit has included Vancouver, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Portland, and Sidewalk, among others. It continues to play around the US via theatrical screenings organized via Tugg.
I wrote about the doc out of Hot Docs here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, February 5: CONNECTED
Tiffany Schlain’s personal meditation on our (inter)dependence on technology premiered at Sundance in 2011. Since then, it has screened extensively at fests around the world, enjoyed a limited theatrical release, and picked up numerous awards, including from Tribeca, National Geographic, and Berlin. The doc becomes available via iTunes today.
My pre-Sundance profile of the film may be found here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Recommendations, Releases, Sundance
Available on DVD/VOD and screening tonight on PBS’ Independent Lens: AS GOES JANESVILLE
Brad Lichtenstein’s look at the wide-ranging impact of the closure of a GM plant premiered on Independent Lens last October. In addition to its national broadcast, the doc’s festival run has included Chicago, Milwaukee, Albuquerque, Kansas, and Oregon, with Big Sky coming up this month. FilmBuff has made the film available on VOD platforms including iTunes, Amazon, YouTube, Vudu, Roxionow, Xbox, and Playstation.
Lichtenstein exposes the US financial crisis in microcosm, focusing on a small Wisconsin town over three years, beginning in 2009. Faced with the closure of a long-standing, job-providing GM auto plant, Janesville’s citizens are facing desperate times. While some workers are able to keep their jobs, they’re essentially forced to relocate or lose all their benefits, leading to subjects like Angie and Gayle leaving their families in order to provide for them. Others, like Cindy, depend on unemployment and federally-funded re-education programs, in the hopes that they’ll be able to find better jobs in the end. Meanwhile, local business leaders try to kickstart the economy by banding together to woo new enterprises to set up shop in their town, promising costly incentives in the form of tax breaks and reduced regulation. In the midst of this, Republican Governor Scott Walker begins his all-out assault on unions, precipitating massive protests and a divisive recall election. Balancing multiple threads, Lichtenstein’s eye-opening doc reveals the heavy price of partisan politics, corporate greed, and failed economic policies – with the average citizen left wondering how s/he will pay the bills.
Tied to tonight’s Independent Lens’ re-broadcast is the launch of BizVizz, a new iPhone app aiming to provide citizens with information about corporate accountability. Featuring 300 companies and nearly 1000 brands, the app displays a corporation’s tax data, government subsidies, and campaign donation records, helping consumers who want more transparency from the businesses they support. For more information about the app or to download it, visit its website.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Now available to view online: PIONEERS OF THIRTEEN – episode 1: THE ’60S – EXPERIMENTAL DAYS and episode 2: THE ’70S – BOLD AND FEARLESS
Celebrating the 50th anniversary of PBS’ flagship station, Thirteen/WNET, this four-part series, executive produced by Julie Anderson and produced by Charlotte Mangin and Denise A Greene, delves into the channel’s groundbreaking history, decade by decade. The first episode, focusing on the 1960s, originally aired last September, while the episode on the 1970s, the decade that helped define what Thirteen is to many viewers, just premiered last week. The 1980s episode is scheduled for June, while the 1990s is slated for September. The first two episodes in full are now available online at the links in the paragraph above.
At once a tribute to an American institution, a nostalgic look back at our childhoods, and a fascinating history of a scrappy and unlikely television innovator, the series draws from Thirteen’s storied ranks to reveal how the US developed public television in the 1960s. The subtitle of the first episode, EXPERIMENTAL DAYS, suggests the trial and error nature of that initial decade, as the station aired its first broadcast in 1962 against the backdrop of a minuscule budget and much-needed handouts from the other television networks. But as Thirteen’s programming excelled, winning over viewers and critics, and netting awards in the process, it replaced hand-me-downs with governmental and foundation grants, and championed public affairs programming that solidified public television’s reputation for quality, vital programming. From the perspective of the history of non-fiction, Thirteen supported and showcased the work of Frederick Wiseman, the Maysles brothers, and Margaret Mead, while its Public Broadcast Laboratory brought exciting experimental and innovative programming to the airwaves, including BLACK JOURNAL, and workshops to train minorities for careers in film and television. Thirteen capped off its first decade with the development and premiere of its signature series, SESAME STREET, revolutionizing children’s educational programming with the Muppets that are beloved to this day.
The second episode, BOLD AND FEARLESS, sees Thirteen go nationwide before the end of 1970, with an influx of funding for innovative programming. Interviews and archival clips revisit such pioneering series as the controversial satirical variety show, THE GREAT AMERICAN DREAM MACHINE, produced by HBO Documentary Films’ Sheila Nevins, and PBS’ first primetime hit before government interference led to its cancellation; candid public health programming such as VD BLUES; broadcasting the Watergate Senate hearings when the networks didn’t want to, for fear of losing advertising revenue; AN AMERICAN FAMILY (pictured), engrossing non-fiction programming in which America witnessed a marriage fall apart before their eyes, and saw the first openly gay character on television; the literacy promoting children’s series THE ELECTRIC COMPANY; the experimental arts workshop THE TV LAB; and the indepth profiles of BILL MOYERS JOURNAL. The station championed diversity before it was a buzzword, seeing the value in exposing youth to different languages and cultures, expanding the SESAME STREET cast to include Spanish speakers; creating the first national bilingual Latino show, REALIDADES; and broadcasting the “Black TONIGHT SHOW,” SOUL. Thirteen also endeavored to expose America to the arts, airing programs on modern dance, ballet, opera, and theatre through its GREAT PERFORMANCES and other strands. These and other examples of Thirteen’s bold vision – which included the funding of the first US video documentaries made in postwar Vietnam and in Cuba – demonstrate public television’s instrumental role in shaping the nation’s experience of media, culture, and information. Both currently available episodes are worth a watch for the overview they provide of Thirteen’s rich history, and should prove especially useful to media studies programs in the coming years.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations
Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, February 5: JOSEPH CAMPBELL AND THE POWER OF MYTH WITH BILL MOYERS: 25TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION
The seminal six-part series pairing comparative mythology scholar and author Joseph Campbell and noted public television journalist Bill Moyers was originally broadcast on PBS in the summer of 1988. A companion book was released at the same time, expanding on the conversations from the documentary series.
The program, which has proven to be among PBS’ most popular, introduced Campbell and his simple but profound mantra, “Follow your bliss,” to millions. College students at Sarah Lawrence – where Campbell was on faculty – and on campuses around the US were already familiar with his writing, especially through his influential The Hero with a Thousand Faces, which popularized the concept of the hero’s journey and was a mainstay of comparative religion and mythology courses. In Moyers’ series, Campbell emerged as an open, kindly, octogenarian sage, a friendly grandfatherly figure whose every utterance was entrancing – demonstrating not only the titular power of myth but that of storytelling in general. As a high school freshman, my speech and debate coach, Barbara Weiss, had us watch the series as we prepared for the upcoming season. While she found value in what Campbell and Moyers were discussing, it was clear, given the nature of the extracurricular activity she oversaw, that Weiss especially wanted us to be entranced by how Campbell expressed himself, by the way that he could launch into fascinating example after fascinating example at the slightest nudge by Moyers. The program left its mark on me then, confirmed as I rewatched it on the occasion of Athena’s re-issue of the series, which includes all six one-hour episodes, new introductions by Moyers, the initial two-part 1981 BILL MOYERS JOURNAL interview between the men that inspired the series, and an interview with George Lucas on Campbell’s influence on his modern-day mythmaking in STAR WARS. There’s a natural rapport to the conversation that Campbell and Moyers have in the main series, an ease in the way they move from discussions of the hero archetype to the purposes served by myths, from considerations of various myths across different yet surprisingly similar historical cultures to the influence of myths in the modern day. Recorded just before Campbell’s death, Moyers’ interviews captured the elder’s wisdom and disseminated it beyond the halls of academia to the benefit of all who create and absorb stories.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
