Tag: Documentary Film Review
This Is Home | Review
Home is Where the Heart is? Shiva Shines a Light on Refugee Life in America
Raging into its sixth year, with roughly half a million...
Boom for Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat | Review
No Longer The Same Old SAMO: Driver Delivers Daring Docu On Basquiat
Jean-Michel Basquiat is arguably one of the most enigmatic and influential artists of...
The Man Who Stole Banksy | 2018 Tribeca Film Festival Review
Anti-American Graffiti: A Cultural Critique Built on Street Art
Marco Prosperio’s ambitious debut feature The Man Who Stole Banksy is a far-reaching plunge into the...
Filmworker | Review
By The Power Of Kubrick: Zierra’s Delightful Spotlight On Vitali Ultimately A Mixed Bag
Stanley Kubrick has inspired artists the world over, creating movies so...
Salome (2013) & Wilde Salome (2011) | Review
Love’s Labours Found: Pacino’s Wilde Meditations at Long Last Find Life
Oscar Wilde’s 1891 tragedy Salome (originally written in French) has generated countless resurrections since...
Our New President | 2018 Sundance Film Festival Review
What Is Reality? Pozdorovkin’s Vertiginous Nightmare Of Subjective Journalism
After a year since the commencement of the Trump presidency, its critics and supporters vary in...
The Rape of Recy Taylor | Review
A Tale of Two Women: How Buirski Bumbled Taylor’s Essential Role in America
There are certain seminal butterfly effect individuals in this nation's complex history,...
The Work | Review
Walking the Line: McLeary Finds Freedom in Folsom
The barbed wire and prison walls of Folsom soar over inmates and visitors with a baleful presence,...
Bobbi Jene | Review
Art Meets Life: Lind Illustrates Why It Isn’t As Simple As It Seems
The world of modern dance is brutally competitive, artistically challenging, and both...
Mrs. Fang | 2017 Toronto International Film Festival Review
Death Be Not Proud: Bing’s Chilly Portrait of Death a Cultural Critique of Contemporary China
Celebrated Chinese documentarian Wang Bing scored a major coup with...
Trophy | Review
Crocodile Tears?: Clusiau and Schwarz Take Aim at Hunters & Conservationists
The ethical debate and moral implications on the industry that is trophy hunting have grown...
Machines | Review
Navigating the sea of weathered faced laborers pulling in twelve-hour work shifts, Rahul Jain embraces the cinéma vérité aesthetic to relay a real time...
Brillo Box (3ȼ Off) | Review
What is Art Now? Skyler’s Personal Take on Warhol is Both Sincere & Insightful
Though the merits of pop artist Andy Warhol are still debated...
Who the F**k is That Guy? | Review
When The Music Stops: Stone Plays Ghostwriter to Alago’s Autobiography
Ripping power chords and grainy black and white photos contextualize the atmosphere of the vibrant...
Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World | Review
Beat The Drum: Bainbridge & Maiorana Define the Source for Our Favorite Music
Rarely do documentaries so tactfully strike at the very heart of what...
The Skyjacker’s Tale | Review
Victim or Villain? Kastner’s Paradoxical Docu Goes Far, Not Nearly Far Enough
Coming across as a sort of hybrid between what one might find on the...
The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman’s Portrait Photography | Review
Big Pictures Worth A Thousand Words: Morris and Dorfman Dig Through The Archives
Errol Morris’s interest in still photography is no secret, having written the Penguin...
Mifune: The Last Samurai | Review
The Hidden Mifune: Docu on Japanese Legend Hits Highs and Lows
The half century on-screen career of Toshirô Mifune is one of extravagant grace, pursuing a...
All Governments Lie: Truth, Deception, and the Spirit of I.F. Stone | Review
Hiding in Plain Sight: Peabody’s Timely Indictment of American Journalism
The seemingly brash title of Fred Peabody’s latest documentary alludes to a turn of phrase...
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail | Review
Financial Risk: Steve James Banks on Chinatown Community Bank and Finds Political Returns
Steve James has a habit of sticking up for the little guy, as...
Into the Inferno | Review
Herzog And The Goblets of Fire: Following In The Volcanic Footsteps Of Katia and Maurice Krafft
Who could have imagined more fitting new subject matter for...
Theo Who Lived | Review
Make Love Not War: Schisgall Documents the Terrors of the Syrian Conflict
Any sustained ignorance of the last couple of years with regards to the...
Amanda Knox | Review
Foxy Knoxy Rides Again: McGinn & Blackhurst Take On Murder Media Circus With Elegant True Crime Saga
Sometimes the preferred version of a song might actually be a...
JT + The Tennessee Kids | 2016 Toronto Int. Film Festival Review
Demme & Timberlake Don Suit & Tie In Masterful 20/20 Experience Concert Doc
It’s been 32 years since Jonathan Demme immortalized David Byrne and the...
The War Show | 2016 Toronto Int. Film Festival Review
Demonstrating To Breathe: Heartbreaking Spiral Into Syrian Oblivion Moves in Micro-Operatic Movements
Syria and the Arab Spring are not exactly new subjects for a documentary...
The Islands and The Whales | 2016 Hot Docs Festival Review
Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Day's Sophomore Effort Investigates Cultural & Environmental Repercussions
Very much a microcosm comparable to the cultural inertia invested in the...
How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change | 2016 Hot Docs Review
Where To Save Next: Fox Expands Fracking Fight To Wage War On Climate Change Via Globetrotting Personal Doc
After successfully warding off the fracking industry...
Contemporary Color | 2016 Hot Docs Review
On An Ultralight Beam: Ross Brothers Turn David Byrne's Color Guard Dream Into Vivid Sensorial Masterpiece
Back in January of 2015, former Talking Heads frontman David Byrne...
Unlocking The Cage | 2016 Sundance Film Festival Review
Breaking Through The Bars: Hegedus & Pennebaker Go Ape In Court With Animal Rights Activist Steven Wise
Having long ago been crowned the king and queen...
Plaza de La Soledad | 2016 Sundance Film Festival Review
Waiting For Tonight: Goded Finds Friends in Circle of Sex Workers
Having spent the last 20 years visiting Mexico and the notoriously dangerous streets of the...
Where To Invade Next | Review
It's been a relatively quiet six years since Michael Moore unleashed Capitalism: A Love Story back in 2009, but little did anyone know he's been...
Hitchcock/Truffaut | Review
Face-off: Kent Jones Unpacks The Bible Of Auteur Interviews
It's kind of odd to think that the Cohen Media Group picked up Kent Jones' slickly produced...
In the Basement | Review
Dungeons, Nazis and Latex Babies: Seidl Puts Modern Cave Dwellers on Display
Paradise trilogy helmer Ulrich Seidl returns to docu form in what could easily...
The Royal Road | Review
Jenni Olson begins The Royal Road, her latest emotional excavation of Hollywood nostalgia via Benning-esque 16mm landscape portraiture, by self-referentially quoting Michel Chion on...
Heart of a Dog | Review
Essay films rarely get as much attention as Laurie Anderson's Heart of a Dog as already attracted. The highly regarded performance artist and musician has long...
The Russian Woodpecker | Review
Signals Over The Air: First Time Filmmaker Chad Gracia Sees Russian Conspiracy Theory Transform Into Truth
At the dark heart of director Chad Gracia’s messy,...
Western | Review
Fractured Frontier: Ross Bros. Witness Bordertowns Running Afoul Under Threat of Storm Clouds & Cartels
The brothers Ross, Bill and Turner, have been rightly hailed...
The Hard Stop | 2015 TIFF Review
Prior to the outrage manifested within the 'I Can't Breathe' movement in the wake of several high profile murders of unarmed black men by...
Welcome to F.L. | 2015 TIFF Review
Alma Matters: Dulude-De Celles Yields Heartrending Results with Docu Debut
Following last year's Sundance award-winning selected fictional short La Coupe, Geneviève Dulude-De Celles makes her feature debut splash in...
Meru | Review
Treacherous Journey to The Top Shows Unmeasured Determination
At over 20,000 feet, the highest peak of the Meru Mountain, also known as the Shark’s Fin,...
Counting | Review
Overheard Yet Alive: Cohen Continues Poetic Pursuit of Travel
Jem Cohen invites us once again on a lackadaisical travelogue through cityscapes and unkempt streets, through...
Cartel Land | Review
Good, Bad & Ugly: Heineman Embeds in the Borderlands
Towards the end of Matthew Heineman's remarkable Cartel Land, which sees the filmmaker embedded deep within two...
A Poem is a Naked Person | Review
Taste of Starlight: Blank’s Debut a Fascinating Time Capsule
Highly regarded documentarian Les Blank’s 1974 debut finally sees an official theatrical release over forty years...
The Look of Silence | Review
Examining Eyes, Hearts & Minds: Oppenheimer Sees This Time From The Viewpoint of the Victims
Joshua Oppenheimer rocked the world of cinema with his groundbreaking...
Stray Dog | Review
Still Learning New Tricks: Hall Heals Via Empathy & Remembrance
Much less cinematically invigorating than Akira Kurosawa's noir of the same name and miles away from Tsai...
What Happened, Miss Simone? | Review
Writing on the Wall: Garbus Offers Compressed Portrait of Soul-Gospel-Jazz Queen
Nina Simone, a prominent musician-turned-civil-rights-activist, left behind a legacy in which the latter part...
The Wolfpack | Review
Voyeuristic & Bizarre: A Look Into a Litter of Brothers and Their World of Movies
As an exemplar of the term “stranger than fiction”, The Wolfpack’s...
Above and Below | 2015 Hot Docs Review
Both the title and premise of Swiss director Nicolas Steiner’s latest documentary mildly echoes the recently released and quickly disregarded found footage horror schlock...
I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story | Review
8 Feet Tall and Light as a Feather: Walker and LaMattina Chronicle the Life and Love of a Puppeteering Legend
You’d be hard pressed to...
Iris | Review
Summer Hours: In Life's Twilight, Maysles Looks at a Late Life Fashion Icon and Finds Love in Work, Marriage & Stuff
Watching Iris, a...
