Category Archives: Releases

Available on DVD: BIG RIVER MAN

John Maringouin’s portrait of Martin Strel premiered at last year’s Sundance, where it won the World Cinema Documentary Cinematography Award, and played more than a dozen other festivals, including the Hamptons, where it picked up the Wouter Barendrecht Pioneering Vision Award. The film came to DVD last week after a limited theatrical release.

The Slovenian long-distance swimmer at the heart of Maringouin’s film might defy viewer expectations – this is no lean, young Michael Phelps type – Strel is in his 50s, has high blood pressure, drinks a lot, and is, frankly, pretty fat. Having set Guinness World Records for swimming the lengths of numerous famous rivers – the Danube, the Yangtze, the Mississippi – BIG RIVER MAN follows his efforts to swim the more than 3000 miles of the Amazon in 2007. Like the best documentaries, it’s not really this feat that makes the film so watchable, it’s the man himself. LIke one of Werner Herzog’s protagonists, Strel basically loses himself in his obsession, risking his health and life to meet his goal, and Maringouin’s there to capture it in its delirious glory.

Coming to DVD tomorrow, December 14: DOUBLE TAKE

Johan Grimonprez’s clever documentary/narrative hybrid premiered at Berlin last year and went on to screen at numerous international festivals including London and IDFA before coming stateside at this year’s Sundance. Kino picked up the intriguing film for a limited release and are bringing it to DVD tomorrow.

Constructed in many ways as a film essay, DOUBLE TAKE reflects on the culture of fear that persists to the present day by focusing on the figure of Alfred Hitchcock and his late 1950s and early 1960s films. Setting them against the backdrop of Cold War paranoia, Grimonprez recasts the director from his infamous cameos to leading man in a delightfully subversive story of doppelgangers, filmmaking, advertising, and manipulation. Perfectly in keeping with Hitchcock’s self-reflexive showmanship, the film is equal parts game and avant-garde collage of the Master of Suspense’s film and TV work, making for compulsive viewing.

Coming to DVD this coming Tuesday, December 14 (and already available on VOD/iTunes): EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP

This is-it or isn’t-it a real doc by enigmatic British street artist Banksy debuted as a surprise screening at this year’s Sundance, with examples of his infamous graffiti appearing around Park City in a brilliant promotional tie-in/lead-up to the premiere. It’s had a critically well-received, if limited, release, and is shortlisted for the documentary Oscar.

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Coming to DVD next Tuesday, December 14: JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK

Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg’s candid portrait of the groundbreaking 75-year-old comedienne premiered at Sundance this year, where editor Penelope Falk picked up an award, and went on to be acquired by IFC Films for a very successful theatrical release this past Summer.

In no way the kind of puff piece that too-often easily results from celebrity documentaries, JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK appreciates the complexity of its subject. At the heart of the film is a look at what drives comedians like Rivers – the need to perform, the need to keep on working, long after most people her age would be content to sit back and enjoy their accomplishments. A funny, poignant, and subtle examination of aging and the need to continue to feel relevant, it goes beyond the surface plastic surgery and the easy punchline to reveal a fascinating performer.

Coming to DVD next Tuesday, December 14: GASLAND

My thoughts on Josh Fox’s Sundance award winner are here.

DVD release info.

Premiering on TV Monday, November 29 at 9PM EST on National Geographic and coming to DVD on Tuesday, December 7: RESTREPO

Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington debuted their film at this year’s Sundance, where it claimed the US Documentary Grand Jury Prize. It was released theatrically in the Summer, and now has its TV and DVD premiere less than two weeks after the film has been shortlisted for the Academy Awards.

Junger and Hetherington gain remarkable access to the men of the US Army’s Second Platoon in this harrowing look at the Afghanistan War. Set in an outpost in the dangerous Korengal Valley named after a lost soldier, RESTREPO documents one year in the trenches, as the soldiers fight al Qaeda and the Taliban, intensely bond like only people in their position can, and deal with the uncertainty of life and death in wartime. The result is a powerful, affecting portrait, no matter one’s politics.

Coming to DVD next Tuesday, November 23: COUNTDOWN TO ZERO

Lucy Walker’s second of two docs premiering at this year’s Sundance had a limited theatrical release in the middle of the summer via Magnolia.

Less artful than Walker’s previous films (like WASTE LAND), COUNTDOWN TO ZERO nonetheless succeeds in drawing much-needed attention to an issue with global significance – the possibility of nuclear disaster. Investigating the present-day status of nuclear weapons, for the most part removed from the public consciousness once the USSR fell, Walker lets those in the know remind us exactly what’s at stake were something to go wrong – an accident or a use of the weapons during even a limited range war. Balancing this wake up call, and preventing it from becoming just an exercise in scaring the viewer, is the message that something can be done by world governments to make the chance of a nuclear armageddon much more unlikely. Sobering, and worth a look.