Category Archives: Releases

Coming to VOD today, Friday, June 7: THE IRAN JOB

Till Schauder’s look at culture clash and Iranian basketball had its world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival last year. It went on to screen at Vancouver, Hawaii, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Denver, and Documentary Edge. The film has also enjoyed a theatrical run throughout the US and Europe. It now comes to cable VOD, iTunes, and Amazon Instant Video.

I previously wrote about the doc upon its theatrical release here.

Coming to WORLD Channel’s Global Voices series this Sunday, June 9: GARBAGE DREAMS

Mai Iskander’s portrait of an embattled Egyptian recycling community had its debut at SXSW in 2009. It had an extensive run on the festival circuit, including IDFA, Dubai, Lone Star, Ashland, and Nashville, among others, picking up numerous awards. It went on to win at the IDA Awards, and was nominated for a DGA Award and shortlisted for the Best Feature Documentary Oscar. After its broadcast, the doc will be available for a limited time on WORLD’s website.

Historically, Cairo has not had a conventional sanitation system. The city’s garbage instead has been tended to by the minority Zaballeen, a community of Coptic Christians subsisting on the trash they collect and recycle, creating an efficient system that has lasted for generations. In 2003, all that changes as Cairo privatizes these traditional services to a multinational sanitation service that recycles only a fraction of the garbage they collect, disposing of the rest in growing landfills, and, in the process, threatening the future of the Zaballeen and their only real income stream. Iskander follows three teenage Zaballeen over several years as they contend with the changes to their trade and deal with the transition to adulthood. Well shot, and impressively balancing multiple subjects – including the fascinating garbage village the community has constructed for themselves on the outskirts of the city – the film offers insight about a unique group of people, their ingenuity to take others’ trash and turn it into treasure, and the local consequences of modernization and globalization.

Coming to DVD next Tuesday, June 11: ¡VIVAN LAS ANTIPODAS!

Victor Kossakovsky’s breathtaking study of polar pairs had its world premiere at Venice in 2011, when it opened the festival. Its festival circuit has included a wide range of events, including IDFA, Message to Man, DOK Leipzig, Docpoint, Ambulante, Documentary Fortnight, True/False, It’s All True, San Francisco, and Hot Docs. The doc recently enjoyed a US theatrical release via Cinedigm’s Docurama festival.

I included the film in my Hot Docs coverage here.

Coming to theatres and to VOD this Friday, June 7: HEY BARTENDER

Douglas Tirola’s exploration of cocktail culture had its world premiere a few months ago at SXSW. It’s since gone on to screen at Montclair and now opens simultaneously in select theatres and on VOD via FilmBuff.

I included the doc in my SXSW coverage here.

Coming to theatres and to VOD this Friday, June 7: ÉVOCATEUR: THE MORTON DOWNEY JR MOVIE

Daniel Miller, Seth Kramer, and Jeremy Newberger’s chronicle of the unlikely rise and crushing fall of the trash-talking late-night host debuted at Tribeca last year. It went on to screen at IDFA, Montclair, TromaDance, and Denver, among other fests.

I previously wrote about the doc out of Tribeca here.

Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, June 4: A GOOD DAY TO DIE

David Mueller and Lynn Salt’s exploration of Native American activism premiered at deadCENTER in 2010, picking up a best documentary prize. Other fest screenings have included Hot Springs, Denver, and imagineNATIVE. FilmBuff releases the doc on iTunes and XBOX today.

I wrote about the film upon its DVD release last week here.

Coming to theatres via Cinedigm’s Docurama Festival initiative today, Tuesday, June 4: LONDON: THE MODERN BABYLON

Julien Temple’s tour of 20th and 21st century London made its debut at Toronto last year. It has screened at IDFA, Göteborg, Tampere, and Torino, among other fests, and was nominated for best doc for both the European Film Awards and the British Independent Film Awards. The film wraps up Cinedigm’s seven-film program bringing feature documentaries to theatres weekly in up to fifteen US markets, including NYC, LA, Pasadena, Encino, San Diego, Palm Desert, Austin, San Antonio, Phoenix, Cleveland, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Hartford, New Haven, Ithaca, Richmond, and Helena. The films are also available for additional theatrical-on-demand screenings via Tugg. In NYC, Cinema Village will screen the doc today, Thursday, and Saturday.

Temple, working with editor Caroline Richards, has crafted a remarkable chronicle of a city, moving from before the first World War through to 2012 as London prepares for the Olympics. Packing more than a hundred years of history into just over a two hour film, it’s surprising how comprehensive, yet still impressionistic, it all comes off. Although there are some present-day interviews, the vast majority of the project is a quick-fire collage of often fascinating archival footage, covering not only the familiar aspects of British history – WWII’s Blitz, 1960s’ Swinging London, 1980s’ Thatcherism – but also touching on other intriguing facets of the sociocultural development of the metropolis, from the suffragette movement to the influx of immigrants from former British colonies and the xenophobia that resulted. By the project’s nature, Temple doesn’t stick with any one person or time period for very long, keeping an energetic pace that carries the viewer like a rollercoaster ride through the dense expanse of the past century, straying from a strictly linear path with an occasional time displaced flash forward juxtaposition cleverly connecting the distant past with more recent developments that speak to similar concerns. This, combined with the doc’s driving soundtrack and a recurring visual motif of the crowd (or mob at times), reflect Temple’s punk sensibility – a welcome approach that lends a distinctive and youthful energy to the project that keeps it from ever becoming a dry, academic exercise.