Coming to DVD/VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, January 16:
WHAT LIES UPSTREAM
Director:
Cullen Hoback
Premiere:
Slamdance 2017
Select Festivals:
Hot Docs, Seattle, AFI Docs, Traverse City, Dallas, Sonoma, Ashland
About:
The filmmaker investigates the coverup behind drinking water contamination in West Virginia.
I previously wrote about the doc here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
Coming to DVD and VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, January 16:
100 MEN
Director:
Paul Oremland
Premiere:
Frameline 2017
Select Festivals:
New Zealand, Outfest, NewFest, LGBT fests in Lisbon, Sydney, and Palm Springs
About:
A personal reflection on how society’s relationship to homosexuality has changed during the filmmaker’s life.
Oremland recounts all the men he has slept with in his life, speaking to those he is able to track down, and in the process considers how these experiences demonstrate changes to the expression of gayness and to society’s acceptance. Following mostly a chronological review, accompanied by the filmmaker’s memories of the incidents – from clandestine, anonymous encounters to more longterm, significant relationships – Oremland also weaves in developments in his career, making film and television projects with gay themes. The focus, however, thankfully remains broader, allowing this to move beyond the insular and diaristic to a more universal consideration of the experiences of gay men between the 1970s and the present, from the sexual freedom of gay liberation to the emergence of AIDS, monogamy to open relationships, exploration of drugs and fetishes, the impact of technology like Grindr on the gay scene, and the opening up of military and marriage to the gay community.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to PBS’s American Experience and to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, January 16:
THE SECRET OF TUXEDO PARK
Director:
Rob Rapley
Premiere:
American Experience (January 2018)
About:
The little-known story of the Wall Street tycoon-turned-scientific benefactor who helped win WWII.
Tuxedo Park, an unassuming village 40 miles north of New York City, served as the site of a cutting edge laboratory during the 1930s and ’40s, overseen by Alfred Loomis. After making his fortune on Wall Street, and cagily avoiding the crash of 1929, the wealthy gentleman scientist opened his mansion, known as Tower House, to pioneering thinkers in science and engineering from home and abroad, defying the isolationism of the time. As war erupted in Europe, and convinced that America inevitably would be drawn into the conflict, Loomis began developing game-changing technology to combat the Axis’ seemingly unstoppable war machine. Working in secret, Loomis and his team would perfect short wave radar technology in his Rad Lab, as revealed in Rapley’s informative, if conventional, biographical profile. While the dramatic introduction of atomic bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki would steal radar’s thunder – and the notoriously press-adverse Loomis was content to remain unheralded – the technology he developed was said to have won the war, while the atomic bomb merely ended it.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
Coming to PBS’s Independent Lens tonight, Monday, January 15:
I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO
Director:
Raoul Peck
Premiere:
Toronto 2016
Select Festivals:
DOC NYC, New Orleans, New York Film Festival, the Hamptons, Chicago, Virginia, AFI Fest, Philadelphia
Notable Recognition:
The doc was nominated for the Academy Awards.
About:
James Baldwin’s unfinished book on three key civil rights leaders prompts an all-too timely reflection on the state of race relations in America.
I previously wrote about the doc here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to CNN this Sunday, January 14:
TROPHY
Directors:
Shaul Schwarz and Christina Clusiau
Premiere:
Sundance 2017
Select Festivals:
SXSW,CPH:DOX, Full Frame, Dallas, Encounters, Jerusalem, Melbourne, Moscow, Sun Valley, Montclair
About:
An exploration of the complex intersections between wildlife conservation and big game hunting.
I profiled the doc before Sundance here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Recommendations, Releases, Sundance
Coming to theatres tomorrow, Friday, January 12:
WHAT LIES UPSTREAM
Director:
Cullen Hoback
Premiere:
Slamdance 2017
Select Festivals:
Hot Docs, Seattle, AFI Docs, Traverse City, Dallas, Sonoma, Ashland
About:
The filmmaker investigates the coverup behind drinking water contamination in West Virginia.
Hoback, taking a crusading Michael Moore/Josh Fox approach, appears throughout his film as an onscreen guide and narrator – an unnecessarily excessive and at times clumsy device – as he tries to get to the bottom of a spill that took place in early 2014 in Charleston’s Elk River which might never have been revealed save for a distinctive licorice smell in the drinking water. Fingers point to Freedom Industries, but Hoback suspects the chemical company is a convenient fall guy for a much deeper problem. The filmmaker finds compelling figures in local health department head Dr Rahul Gupta, who questions the safety of the contaminated water despite state official reassurances; and in Randy Huffman, head of WV’s Department of Environmental Protection, who is surprisingly open about how the organization primarily serves to help corporate exploitation of resources. Hoback’s digging revels the collusion of corporate interests with the government, evidence of regulatory capture in a broken system that works for industry rather than the public good.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Releases
New to DVD this week:
CITY OF TREES
Director:
Brandon Kramer
Premiere:
American Conservation Film Festival 2015
Select Festivals:
St Louis, Annapolis, Full Frame, and at enviro fests in Washington DC, Yale, and Princeton
About:
A well-intentioned plan to benefit an impoverished community leads to controversy.
I previously wrote about the doc here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
New to VOD this week:
TAKE MY NOSE… PLEASE!
Director:
Joan Kron
Premiere:
Miami 2017
Select Festivals:
Martha’s Vineyard, Berkshire, SF DocFest, Newport Beach
About:
Two comediennes contemplate the impact of having plastic surgery.
I previously wrote about the doc here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, January 9:
THIS IS BOB HOPE…
Director:
John Scheinfeld
Premiere:
American Masters (Nov 2017, abridged version)
About:
An in-depth look at the life and eight-decade career of the comedian and performer.
I previously wrote about the doc here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Recommendations, Releases
Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, January 9:
DINA
Directors:
Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles
Premiere:
Sundance 2017
Select Festivals:
DOC NYC, Nantucket, True/False, Full Frame, SF Jewish, Seattle, Sheffield, Sun Valley, Sarasota
About:
A profile an unforgettable woman as she seeks to realize her desires.
My pre-Sundance look at the doc may be found here.
Filed under Documentary, Film, Film Festivals, Recommendations, Releases, Sundance
what (not) to doc 