Category Archives: Releases

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, September 20: CIRCO

Aaron Schock’s look at Circo Mexico, a multi-generational circus family, premiered at Los Angeles las year, with additional stops on the festival circuit including, among others, True/False, Palm Springs, and the Hamptons, where it was awarded Best Documentary. It enjoyed a limited theatrical release this past Spring.

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

Opening at Brooklyn’s reRun Gastropub Theatre for one week beginning today, Friday, September 16: SOUND IT OUT

Appropriately enough, Jeanie Finlay premiered her impressive music-focused documentary at SXSW earlier this year. The filmmaker has taken the film, about the last record store in a small UK town, to notable fests since then, including Edinburgh, Sheffield, Doxa, deadCENTER, Silverdocs, and others.

I wrote about the doc out of Silverdocs here.

Opening at NYC’s IFC Center today, Friday, September 16 and in LA’s Laemmle Monica 4 next Friday, September 23: JANE’S JOURNEY

Lorenz Knauer’s portrait of Jane Goodall has screened at more than a dozen festivals around the world, including the Hamptons, Abu Dhabi, Palm Springs, Cleveland, and Edinburgh. In addition to a limited theatrical release beginning this week, the film will also be shown at select theatres natiionally on Tuesday, September 27 for a special one-night only event, “Jane Goodall Live!”

Goodall entered the public’s consciousness through her work as a primatologist, having begun field research on chimpanzees in the 1960s. In the mid-1980s, faced with the stark reality that humans had pretty much made a mess of the planet, she turned her efforts away from her beloved chimps to focus instead on broader environmental and humanitarian work. While accompanying Jane back to Tanzania for a visit with the animals that she helped demystify, and to provide pertinent biographical details, the bulk of Knauer’s film instead offers glimpses into the unrelenting schedule that Goodall keeps, traveling an average of 300 days a year in support of a variety of programs and causes. While the effect can be a bit cursory, what never lets the film down is Goodall herself – she projects a sense of tranquility and familiarity that envelops the camera, and the viewer, in a comfortable embrace. While the doc might tend toward the hagiographic, it would be hard to imagine anyone disliking this woman anyway, and the causes to which she has devoted herself are nothing if not laudable. If the goodwill her historic work with the chimpanzees has engendered leads audiences to learn about combating global poverty and climate change, more the better. Just don’t mistake her for Dian Fossey.

Coming to POV next Tuesday, September 20: THE LEARNING

Ramona Diaz followed up on her award-winning portrait of the deposed First Lady of the Philippines, IMELDA, with this look at four decidedly more down-to-earth Filipinas – teachers who leave their homeland to teach in Baltimore MD.

I wrote about the film out of Silverdocs this past June here.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, Tuesday, September 13: THE HOUSE OF SUH

Iris K Shim’s film about murder in a Korean-American family premiered at Hot Docs, screened at notable fests including Denver and Sarasota, and went on to win awards at various Asian-American fests and at the Hamptons International Film Festival.

I wrote about the film in my coverage of Hot Docs for indieWIRE, saying:

The doc aims to uncover the truth behind the sensationalism of a murder involving a pair of Korean-American siblings that has already been adapted into a made-for-TV film (though with the protagonists made Caucasian!). Andrew Suh pleads guilty to the murder of his sister Catherine’s boyfriend, while Catherine runs from the law, eventually found after an appearance on AMERICA’S MOST WANTED. But Shim finds that there’s much more to the story, relating to immigrant identity, rebellion against authority, and the unsolved brutal murder of the Suhs’ mother. The result is compulsively watchable and surprising.

Coming to theatres tomorrow, Friday, September 9: WHERE SOLDIERS COME FROM

Heather Courtney claimed the Best Documentary Editing Award for her doc about a group of young veterans coming home at the film’s world premiere at SXSW earlier this year. It’s since screened at notable festivals including Full Frame, BAMcinemaFEST, Silverdocs, Los Angeles, and Traverse City, where it also scored a Best US Documentary Award.

I wrote about the film out of SXSW here.

Note: Courtney and her subjects will be present for Q&As at the Friday and Saturday evening screenings at Village East Cinemas in NYC.