Category Archives: Releases

Coming to theatres today, Friday, October 13:
THE DEPARTURE

Director:
Lana Wilson

Premiere:
Tribeca 2017

Select Festivals:
Hot Docs, Sheffield, Bergen, Reykjavik, Vancouver, Mumbai, Moscow, Warsaw

About:
A Japanese priest who works as a suicide counselor must deal with the burden of his mission.

Former punk rocker-turned-Zen Buddhist priest Ittetsu Nemoto runs a one-man suicide prevention hotline. Called upon day and night by desperate people, Nemoto finds purpose in his calling, but he increasingly has little time for his wife or young son. When counseling those who reach out to him, he asks them to write down the people, things, and dreams they cherish most, then has them destroy each one in turn, to provide a tangible sense of what dying would take away from them. When he faces his own mortality via a health crisis, Nemoto must weigh what he too is willing to give up. Though a quiet, smaller project, Wilson’s affecting film carries a profound message about mortality, suffering, and sacrifice.

Coming to theatres today, Friday, October 13:
HUMAN FLOW

Director:
Ai Weiwei

Premiere:
Venice 2017

Select Festivals:
Telluride, Hamptons, Mill Valley, Haifa, Atlantic

About:
An overarching view of the global refugee crisis.

Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei, who has been documenting the refugee crisis via outlets like Instagram for some time, travels the world over a year, visiting more than 20 countries to try to capture the almost unfathomable scale of the greatest humanitarian crisis of the century. Not constraining his cameras to any one familiar locale, Ai instead bears witness to the seemingly endless movement of displaced persons throughout the world, from African rafts seeking landfall in Europe and Syrian tent cities in Jordan to Kurds in Turkey, Myanmar Rohingya seeking safety in Bangladesh, and visits to the US/Mexico border. While refugees are occasionally heard from, the film largely positions them as a silent mass entity, underscoring their statelessness and their multitude – a provocative approch that may not sit well with viewers seeking a closer human connection and the perspectives of individuals directly part of the crisis. Instead, headlines and statistics play on screen, and commentary comes from experts who also take a broader view. What’s undeniable, however, is that Ai has crafted disturbingly striking images that should leave an indelible impression on viewers.

Coming to theatres today, Friday, October 13:
FOR AHKEEM

Directors:
Jeremy S Levine and Landon Van Soest

Premiere:
Berlin 2017

Select Festivals:
Nantucket, Hot Docs, Tribeca, Sheffield, AFI Docs, Florida, Montclair, Documentary Edge, DOK.fest Munich, DMZ Docs, Message to Man, Milwaukee, Antenna

About:
An African-American teenage girl strives to graduate from high school.

I previously wrote about the doc for Nantucket’s program, saying:
After being expelled from her St Louis high school, Daje is given a final chance to succeed. Placed in an alternative school for delinquent youth, the strong-willed young woman initially excels, but a new relationship with her classmate Antonio changes both their lives. Set against the charged backdrop of Ferguson MO, Levine and Van Soest’s film is an intimate and frank story of the coming of age of an African-American teenager today.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Friday, October 13:
L7: PRETEND WE’RE DEAD

Director:
Sarah Price

Premiere:
DOC NYC 2016

Select Festivals:
Doc’n Roll, Los Angeles Punk, Sydney Underground, Noise Pop

About:
A candid look at the influential band.

I previously wrote about the film for DOC NYC’s program, saying:
Grab your backstage pass and take a visceral immersion into the 1990s with one of its seminal grunge punk bands, L7. Pigeonholed as an all-female band despite their every effort, L7’s fierce members struggled against music industry and fan expectations even as they contended with questions of celebrity and success. Assembling a dynamic combination of never-before-seen homevideo footage, candid interviews and raucous performances, director Sarah Price explores the rise and fall of the influential band.

Coming to theatres this Friday, October 13:
THY FATHER’S CHAIR

Directors:
Antonio Tibaldi and Alex Lora

Premiere:
IDFA 2015

Select Festivals:
DOC NYC, True/False, Thessaloniki Doc, Documenta Madrid, Docaviv, Dokufest, Flahertiana, Docs Against Gravity, Biografilm, Antenna

About:
Threatened with the loss of their home, two brothers must face some difficult truths.

I previously wrote about the film for DOC NYC’s program, saying:
Sixty-something Orthodox Jewish identical twins Abraham and Shraga live together in their childhood home in Brooklyn. Since the death of their parents, they have lost control of their surroundings, allowing trash to pile up and stray cats and vermin to move in. Forced into action by their neighbor, the brothers agree to let a professional cleaning crew invade their unclean sanctuary. Led by Hanan, a sympathetic Jewish man, the cleaners gently cajole and negotiate with the brothers to confront their demons and finally let things go.