Theatrical Releases

Every Friday we update you all with the week's theatrical documentary releases. Now, this is not a perfect process as our beloved genre prefers the rolling/limited release schedule instead of a big nationwide or international-wide release. So apologies if a film isn't out in your area or if you are a filmmaker and we missed the boat on announcing your documentary's big day (if that is the case, please let us know and we'll correct the mistake).Now, with that introduction out of the way, here's this weekend's releases with their current rating on the amazing website Rottentomatoes.com: The Elephant in the Living Room - (rating - 100%) Winner of four Best Documentary Awards, The Elephant in the Living Room explores the controversial American subculture of raising the deadliest and most exotic animals on earth as common household pets. The story follows the journey of two men at the heart of the issue. One, Tim Harrison, an Ohio police officer whose friend was killed by an exotic pet, and the other, Terry Brumfield, a big-hearted man who struggles to keep two pet African lions that he loves like his own family. (Rottentomatoes.com) Circo - (rating 100%) Set in the cinematically rich milieu of a century-old traveling circus in rural Mexico, Circo follows the family-run "Circo Mexico" as they struggle to stay together despite mounting debt, dwindling audiences, and a simmering family conflict. The hardscrabble founders, the Ponce family, have lived and performed on the back roads of Mexico since the 19th century. Tino, the ringmaster, is driven by his dream to lead his parents' circus to greater success. He corrals the energy of his whole family, including his parents, his brother and his four young children, towards this singular goal. But his wife Ivonne is determined to make a change. Feeling exploited by her in-laws, she longs to return her kids to a childhood lost to laboring in the circus. Through an intricately woven story of a marriage in trouble and of a century-old family tradition that hangs in the balance, Circo asks: To whom and to what should we ultimately owe our allegiances? (Rottentomatoes.com) Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead - (rating 50%) The film follows the reboot mission of its filmmaker, Joe Cross. One hundred pounds overweight, loaded up on steroids and suffering from a debilitating autoimmune disease, Cross is at the end of his rope. With doctors and conventional medicines unable to provide a solution, Joe turns to the only option left: the body's ability to heal itself. He trades in the junk food and hits the road with juicer and generator in tow, vowing only to drink fresh fruit and vegetable juice for the next 60 days. Across 3,000 miles Joe has one goal in mind: To get off his pills and get healthy. Part road trip, part self-help manifesto, Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead defies the traditional documentary format to present an unconventional and uplifting story of two men from different worlds who each realize that the only person who can save them is themselves. (Rottentomatoes.com) Wretches and Jabbers - (rating 60%) Directed by Academy Award winner Gerardine Wurzburg (Educating Peter), Wretches & Jabberers follows two men with autism, Tracy Thresher and Larry Bissonnette, who embark on a global quest to change attitudes about disability and intelligence. Determined to put a new face on autism, the men travel to Sri Lanka, Japan and Finland, where at each stop they challenge public attitudes about autism and issue a hopeful message to reconsider competency. (Rottentomatoes.com) To Catch a Dollar: Muhammad Yunus Banks on America - (no rating provided) Professor Muhammad Yunus never wanted to be a banker and he certainly never imagined winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Yet his quest to help the working poor invest in themselves led to both. Known as the father of microcredit, Yunus spent years developing the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, and in 1983 it became a fully licensed bank with a twist-it was owned by its borrowers-mainly poor women, and its mission was to eradicate poverty, not make a profit. Grameen is now in 38 countries and has made over 100 million microcredit loans. As the U.S. credit market crumbled and the giant banks of Wall Street faltered one by one, Grameen put 500 potential female borrowers into groups of five, with loans of up to $3,000 dispersed for small business ideas that each group had developed. To Catch a Dollar follows the journey of two borrowers and their Grameen group manager and the enormous life changes they each undergo. (Rottentomatoes.com)

Ken Burns Civil War documentary to re-air

If you know documentaries, then you probably know Ken Burns... and if you know Ken Burns, then you definitely know his iconic documentary on the American Civil War. Originally released back in 1990, this slow moving, but thorough film is considered the quintessential work on time period.

Now, Ken Burns: Civil War is well over twenty years old and many younger documentary lovers haven't seen this yet (you'll notice a current lack of a review on this site), and PBS knows this. So to remedy the issue, they are re-releasing the film starting this Sunday. Stretching through Thursday in two hour chunks, it might seem like quite the effort to sit through, but if you can find the time, I suggest tuning in.

Head on over to the PBS website to learn more.

Charges could be filed against documentary subjects

In a somewhat tragic turn of events, Police officials from Shelby, Ohio indicated they were considering pressing charges against the subjects of the documentary Heroin in the Heartland. The film aired on the Oprah Winfry Network last week and provided an in-depth look at drug use in the small Ohio community. The charges are a result of the film showing participants actually buying and using illegal drugs. Because of this, Shelby's police chief said he is recommending the county prosecutor press charges against those seen in the show. My personal opinion is it would be a shame to charge these people, not because what they did wasn't wrong (illegal is illegal) but because they clearly risked a great deal just getting on camera to tell their story. Documentary filmmakers need honesty from their subjects, and this would definitely cause people to think twice about letting filmmakers get close.

Festival Scope = amazing idea

You ever hear of an awesome film festival in another country and wish you could be there to see the films? Are you a director and wish your feature could be viewed by more than just the handful of audience members catching the one festival screening you have?

Well now there is hope! Festival Scope is an awesome site that works in conjunction with film festivals around the world to stream films to site members. Currently you have to receive approval from the site to get access, but this is a great idea that hopefully is opened to the public in the near future.

We've already seen how Netflix and Hulu have helped usher documentaries to audiences worldwide and the next logical jump would be to bring the film festivals to the fans.

Head on over to festivalscope.com to learn more and try and gain access.

Theatrical Releases

Every Friday we update you all with the week's theatrical documentary releases. Now, this is not a perfect process as our beloved genre prefers the rolling/limited release schedule instead of a big nationwide or international-wide release. So apologies if a film isn't out in your area or if you are a filmmaker and we missed the boat on announcing your documentary's big day (if that is the case, please let us know and we'll correct the mistake).Now, with that introduction out of the way, here's this weekend's releases with their current rating on the amazing website Rottentomatoes.com:

Queen of the Sun - (rating - 83%) In 1923, Rudolf Steiner, an Austrian scientist, philosopher & social innovator, predicted that in 80 to 100 years honeybees would collapse. Now, beekeepers around the United States and all over the world are reporting an incredible loss of honeybees, a phenomenon deemed "Colony Collapse Disorder." This "pandemic" is indicated by bees disappearing in mass numbers from their hives with no clear single explanation. The queen is there, honey is there, but the bees are gone. Queen of the Sun investigates the long-term causes behind the dire global bee crisis through the eyes of biodynamic beekeepers, commercial beekeepers, scientists and philosophers. Together they take us on a journey through the catastrophic disappearance of bees and into the mysterious world of the beehive. The film unveils 10,000 years of beekeeping, illuminating the deep link between humans and bees and how that historic and sacred relationship has been lost due to highly mechanized industrial practices. (Rottentomatoes.com)

My Perestroika - (rating - 83%) When the USSR broke apart in 1991, a generation of young people faced a new realm of possibilities. An intimate epic about the extraordinary lives of this last Soviet generation, Robin Hessman's documentary tells the stories of five Moscow schoolmates who were brought up behind the Iron Curtain, witnessed the joy and confusion of glasnost, and reached adulthood right as the world changed around them. Through candid first-person testimony, revealing verité footage, and vintage home movies, Hessman reveals a Russia rarely ever seen on film, where people are frank about their lives and forthcoming about their country. Engaging, funny, and positively inspiring, in My Perestroika politics is personal, honesty overshadows ideology, and history progresses one day, one life at a time. (Rottentomatoes.com)

Thunder Soul - (no rating provided) Straight out of a high school in Texas, the electrifying Kashmere Stage Band was the brainchild of gifted music teacher Conrad Johnson. Johnson's dynamic arrangements transformed the idea of the high school band, and brought his students worldwide recognition. That success changed not just their lives, but the fortune of their whole community. As one spectator remarked, "They were on fire." He was right -- they still are. (Rottentomatoes.com)

Documentary filmmaker Richard Leacock passes away

Richard Leacock, one of the forefathers of cinema verite, passed away Wednesday at the age of 89.

Leacock was known for his cinematography work on Primary, a documentary following John F. Kennedy's presidential campaign. But probably more importantly, he figured out a way to sync recorded audio and video - a key limitation to capturing quality audio outside studios. As a result, filmmakers were able to capture real life with all the wondrous sounds we are now so accustomed to in the documentary world.

Leacock may not be a household name, but he certainly influenced all the household names that came after him. Documentary film fans owe him a great deal of respect and this site in particular mourns the loss.

Trailer: Greatest Movie Ever Sold

I love me some Morgan Spurlock, so the trailer for his most recent film has made me quite giddy. Already featured at Sundance and SXSW, The Greatest Movie Ever Sold is primed to keep the Spurlock firmly in the spotlight as the documentary genre's most entertaining directors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3aslwHzBBo

After you watch the trailer, head on over to the film's official website to learn more about the documentary. The Greatest Movie Ever Sold follows Spurlock as he investigates product placement in American culture by making a film funded solely by product placement and advertisements. It's set for a limited release April 22nd.

Theatrical Releases

Every Friday we update you all with the week's theatrical documentary releases. Now, this is not a perfect process as our beloved genre prefers the rolling/limited release schedule instead of a big nationwide or international-wide release. So apologies if a film isn't out in your area or if you are a filmmaker and we missed the boat on announcing your documentary's big day (if that is the case, please let us know and we'll correct the mistake).Now, with that introduction out of the way, here's this weekend's releases with their current rating on the amazing website Rottentomatoes.com:

Bill Cunningham New York - (rating - 92%) - "We all get dressed for Bill," says Vogue editrix Anna Wintour. The "Bill" in question is New York Times photographer Bill Cunningham. For decades, this Schwinn-riding cultural anthropologist has been obsessively and inventively chronicling fashion trends and high society charity soirées for the Times Style section in his columns "On the Street" and "Evening Hours." Documenting uptown fixtures (Wintour, Tom Wolfe, Brooke Astor, David Rockefeller-who all appear in the film), downtown eccentrics and everyone in between, Cunningham's enormous body of work is more reliable than any catwalk as an expression of time, place and individual flair. In turn, Bill Cunningham New York is a delicate, funny and often poignant portrait of a dedicated artist whose only wealth is his own humanity and unassuming grace. (Rottentomatoes.com)

Nostalgia for the Light - (rating - 100%) - Director Patricio Guzmán (The Battle of Chile, The Pinochet Case) travels 10,000 feet above sea level to the driest place on earth, the Atacama Desert, where atop the mountains astronomers from all over the world gather to observe the stars. The Atacama is also a place where the harsh heat of the sun keeps human remains intact: those of Pre-Columbian mummies; 19th century explorers and miners; and the remains of political prisoners, from the 1973 military coup. So while astronomers examine the most distant and oldest galaxies, at the foot of the mountains, women, surviving relatives of the disappeared whose bodies were dumped here, search, even after twenty-five years, for the remains of their loved ones, to reclaim their families' histories. (Rottentomatoes.com)

South by Southwest spotlights great documentaries

Yesterday we shed light on a few of the many documentaries airing at the South By Southwest film festival the past several days. Well today, Austin360.com is taking a more general look at the awesome documentaries unveiled at this year's event. And while we hate to tell you to head to another site, we must say, the article is a good one (especially if you love documentaries).

Head on over to austin360.com to read why the SXSW film festival is proving our beloved documentary genre is hitting its stride.

South by Southwest Films

So most people know 'South by Southwest' as one of the great American music festivals in the country (especially if you are a fan of more independent artists). But you may not know SXSW also has a pretty expansive film festival as well.

Now again, the number of films (especially documentaries) screening are almost too numerous to discuss here, however, to wet your appetite we'll list the 8 selections chosen for the Documentary Feature Competition. Each of the following films are a world premier (they were also chosen out of a field of over 800 submissions!).

Definitely head to the SWSW website to learn more about these films and countless others.

Better This World
Directors: Katie Galloway & Kelly Duane de la Vega
Two boyhood friends from Midland, Texas cross a line that radically changes their lives. The result: eight homemade bombs, multiple domestic terrorism charges and a high stakes entrapment defense hinging on a controversial FBI informant. (World Premiere)

The City Dark
Director: Ian Cheney
The film chronicles the disappearance of darkness, following astronomers, cancer researchers, ecologists and philosophers in a quest to understand what is lost in the glare of city lights. (World Premiere)

DRAGONSLAYER
Director: Tristan Patterson
Killer Films presents the transmissions of a lost kid, falling in love, in the suburbs of Fullerton, California. Featuring skateboarding, the usual drugs, and stray glimpses of unusual beauty. (World Premiere)

FIGHTVILLE
Directors: Michael Tucker & Petra Epperlein
A documentary about the art and sport of fighting: a microcosm of life, a physical manifestation of that other brutal contest called the American Dream. (World Premiere)

Kumaré (U.S.A/India)
Director: Vikram Gandhi
A documentary about a man who impersonates a wise Indian Guru and builds a following in Arizona. (World Premiere)

LAST DAYS HERE
Directors: Don Argott & Demian Fenton
The film follows middle-aged rocker Bobby Liebling, lead singer of the cult hard rock/heavy metal band Pentagram, as he leaves his parents' basement in search of the life he never lived. (World Premiere)

A Matter of Taste
Director: Sally Rowe
Considered a rising star of haute cuisine, Paul Liebrandt found his career stalled in New York’s austere environment post 9/11. Paul struggles over the next decade as he tries to make his way back to the top. (World Premiere)

Where Soldiers Come From
Director: Heather Courtney
From a snowy small town in Northern Michigan to the mountains of Afghanistan and back, the film follows the four-year journey of childhood friends and their town, forever changed by a faraway war. (World Premiere)