Category Archives: Releases

Coming to the Spike network today, Monday, August 10 and to DVD/VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, August 11: I AM CHRIS FARLEY

Brent Hodge and Derik Murray’s look back the life and career of the late comedian debuted in theatres last month. It now makes its broadcast debut just prior to its home video release.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

Now available on VOD: BENDING STEEL

David Carroll’s portrait of an aspiring strongman debuted at Tribeca in 2013. Its fest circuit also included Hot Docs, Rooftop Films, Woods Hole, Sidewalk, Calgary, Camden, Hot Springs Doc, Indie Memphis, Denver, Big Sky, RiverRun, Sebastopol Doc, and Belfast. Bond/360 now makes the film available on VOD platforms, including iTunes, Google Play, Amazon Instant Video, and VUDU.

I previously wrote about the doc out of Tribeca here.

Now on DVD: HUMANITY FROM SPACE

Duncan Copp’s overview of mankind’s development from the perspective of space debuted on PBS last month.

Copp’s visually inventive film maps out humanity’s interconnectedness on the globe, utilizing satellite data to draw ever more complex links within and between nations and continents as it relates the story of the growth of civilization and its impact on the Earth. By design, attempting to cover 12,000 years results in a project that’s less comprehensive than it is big picture, eliding the messy particulars for more broad reflections on the past, present, and potential future of the planet. The film is also, on the whole, surprisingly – perhaps naively – optimistic. Despite touching on a swelling population, diminishing natural resources, and climate change, for example, there’s a somewhat blind trust that technological innovation will sort things out. Where Copp is more successful is in using the canvas of the globe to visualize concepts related to the growth of connectivity, such as the origins and development of the power grid; and in laying out some of the innovations that led to paradigmatic shifts in the development of civilizations, such as the shift from hunting-gathering to cultivating land, and the move of the world’s population from the country to the city. With its non-stop narration and surfeit of statistics, the ultimate impression left is of a very slick, very informative lecture – more educational than artful, but featuring some noteworthy graphics.

Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, August 4: ANTARCTIC EDGE: 70° SOUTH

Dena Seidel’s exploration of climate change research made its debut at the Princeton Environmental Film Festival earlier this year. Other screenings included the International Wildlife and Minneapolis film fests before its theatrical release this past Spring.

I previously wrote about the doc here.

Coming to PBS tonight, Tuesday, August 4: JFK & LBJ: A TIME FOR GREATNESS

Alastair Layzell’s re-examination of the civil rights legacy of Lyndon Baines Johnson debuted at the Annapolis Film Festival this Spring. It now makes it broadcast debut in commemoration of the 59th anniversary of the signing of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

Despite its title, Layzell’s film is overwhelmingly focused on Johnson, though the impact – and political opportunity – of Kennedy’s death is noted several times. Designed as a corrective of sorts to the 36th US President’s legacy, marred for many by his role in escalating the Vietnam War, the film instead focuses exclusively on Johnson’s political wherewithal to realize two instrumental pieces of civil rights legislation in the wake of Kennedy’s assassination – the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 – working against expectations given his Southern background, and using his powers of political negotiation, shrewd management of public outrage not only to JFK’s murder but to televised scenes of segregationist brutality in the south, and pointed personal signals that civil rights’ time had come – such as hiring Geraldine Whittington and the first African American secretary to the President, de facto desegregating a Texan whites-only club by insisting that Whittington accompany him, and incorporating the civil rights activism phrase “we shall overcome” into a televised speech before a joint session of Congress. The film is weakened significantly by the decision to employ thoroughly unnecessary scripted re-enactments at times, but otherwise succeeds in conveying LBJ’s significance in bringing change to racial inequality in America, and reminding viewers of the ongoing struggles against renewed voting suppression efforts in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2013 ruling invalidating a key part of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.