The season premiere of Independent Lens will feature Macky Alston’s film LOVE FREE OR DIE.
PBS documentary show Independent Lens on Tuesday, August 14 announced a partial lineup for its 2012-13 season, set to begin on October 29. The new season also marks the show’s move to Mondays, following a Thursday timeslot that filmmakers had protested as partially responsible for a sharp drop in viewership for both Independent Lens and POV.
The new season will kick off with LOVE FREE OR DIE, director Macky Alston’s portrait of Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson, the first openly gay person in that church to become a bishop. Also in the fall season will be Brad Lichtenstein’s AS GOES JANESVILLE, about a Wisconsin town struggling to adapt to the closure of a GM plant and SOLAR MAMAS, Jehane Noujaim and Mona Eldaief’s look at India’s Barefoot College, which gives impoverished women the education and skills they need to succeed. The show’s second half of the season will contain several festival heavies, including Eugene Jarecki’s THE HOUSE I LIVE IN; DETROPIA by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady; and AI WEIWEI: NEVER SORRY by Alison Klayman.
The New York Film Festival on Friday, August 17 revealed the main slate lineup for its 50th edition, set to run September 28 – October 14. A fair number of docs were included in the list, including Paolo and Vittorio Taviani’s CAESAR MUST DIE, which won the Golden Bear prize at this year’s Berlinale. Making its world premiere at the festival will be a new film from Alan Berliner, FIRST COUSIN ONCE REMOVED, about poet and translator Edwin Honig’s battle with Alzheimer’s disease.
The Patrick Shen-directed film LA SOURCE is among those docs screening at LA’s DocuWeeks program.
The Los Angeles component of DocuWeeks, the theatrical documentary showcase overseen by the International Documentary Association (IDA) began on Friday, August 10, and is set to run through August 30. Susan King of the Los Angeles Times profiled the film program, taking a closer look at Patrick Shen’s film LA SOURCE, about a Haitian hoping to provide his village clean water. Christopher Campbell of the Documentary Channel blog also noted the launch of the LA portion of the DocuWeeks program, but took a closer look at the New York City DocuWeeks program, which is set to run through August 23.
The film world this week lost director Mel Stuart, a filmmaker perhaps best known for directing the 1971 version of the film WILLY WONKA & THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY, but who also won awards for his work as a documentary producer and editor. Adam Benzine of Realscreen provided a rundown of Benzine’s impressive body of doc work, and he was also remembered on the IDA blog by Thomas White.
The friends of director John Maringouin (BIG RIVER MAN, RUNNING STUMBLED) have rallied to raise funds to help pay for desperately needed cancer treatment. While almost $36,000 has been raised thus far, Maringouin needs at least almost $60,000 as a down payment just to get the surgery scheduled. If interested in making a contribution, or to learn more about Maringouin, please click here.
The Toronto International Film Festival announced its full doc lineup last week.
The Toronto International Film Festival on Tuesday, July 31 officially announced its full doc lineup, after the festival’s gala and special screening were announced the previous week. At Realscreen, Adam Benzine spoke with our own Thom Powers—TIFF’s doc programmer—about this year’s selections, which are intended to highlight newer names to the doc world. Benzine also produced a pretty comprehensive rundown of some films to look out for at the festival. But the LA Times’ Nicole Sperling noted that the festival will feature new films from some heavy hitters as well, including the prolific Alex Gibney, PBS stalwart Ken Burns and Britain’s Julian Temple. Gibney’s new film, MEA MAXIMA CULPA, focuses on the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal, while Burns’ new work, THE CENTRAL PARK FIVE, examines the wrongful conviction of several boys charged with the rape of a Central Park jogger. At the Documentary Bog, Jay Cheel hunted down the trailers for several of the films bowing at TIFF.
The doc world this week lost one of its most enigmatic and inspiring heroes in Chris Marker, born Christian Francois Bouche-Villeneuve, the director of such films as SANS SOLEIL and LA JETEE. The range of tributes that hit the web after are a tribute to the wide-ranging impact and influence that Marker had on the filmmaking world. At the New York Times, Dennis Lim penned a great obit for Marker, noting his forward thinking approach to filmmaking in describing him as a “transmedia artist long before the term was coined.” Ronald Bergan of The Guardian also wrote an obit for Marker, describing him as the inventor of the cinematic essay. Realscreen’s Kevin Ritchie rounded up some tributes from other accomplished filmmakers that began to populate the web and social media as news of Marker’s passing spread. At the Documentary Channel blog, Christopher Campbell did the same. Zachary Wigon at Filmmaker Magazine also wrote a heartfelt encomium for Marker. For those interested in seeing at least some of Marker’s work, LA JETEE is available for viewing at the Short of the Week website.
Docuweeks kicked off its 16th year in New York City on August 3. The program will run until August 23 here, and from August 10-30 in Los Angeles. Ernest Hardy of The Village Voice provided an in-depth look at the film program, which is presented by the International Documentary Association. Christopher Campbell also has a nice overview, complete with trailers for several of the film. And Basil Tsiokos of the What Not to Doc blog noted a handful of films on his must-see list.
Box Office Mojo reported that AI WEI WEI: NEVER SORRY cleared $45,000 in five theaters over its opening weekend.
Alison Klayman’s film AI WEI WEI: NEVER SORRY has finally been released in theaters, after racking up festival laurels and media attention for months. Writing for the POV blog, Tom Roston interviewed Klayman, discovering that Ai was pleased with the way the film turned out. Christopher Campbell had his own interview with Klayman, who admitted that she didn’t realize when she began working on the film that it would touch on such a wide variety of issues—art, activism and freedom, to name a few.
Writing for Movies.com, Campbell also did an end-run around the political discussions surrounding THE DARK KNIGHT RISES to name NEVER SORRY the best superhero film of the summer, based largely on the incredibly fearless acts of dissent and political activism that Ai engages in in China. J.P. Sniadecki at Cinema Scope had an interview with Ai himself, and talked to him about the artist’s use of documentary techniques in his work, for a nice change of pace. And Ryan Lee Wong of The Margins magazine worked up a review of NEVER SORRY, writing that the film “traces the transformation of a controversial Chinese artist into an international icon of dissent.”
Swedish filmmaker Malik Bendjelloul’s SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN, one of the doc darlings of this year’s Sundance festival, also got its theatrical release this week. The film earned a critic’s pick from Manohla Dargis of the New York Times, who said of Bendjelloul, “Using a well-balanced mix of talking-head interviews, archival imagery and some dreamy animated sequences, Mr. Bendjelloul builds a narrative that simultaneously moves in two seemingly opposite if complementary directions.” And writing for the Wall Street Journal, Anthony Kaufman profiled SUGAR MAN producer Simon Chinn, who has also found success producing some other big budget docs, including MAN ON WIRE and THE IMPOSTER.
Lauren Greenfield’s THE QUEEN OF VERSAILLES commanded heavy media attention prior to its theatrical release this week.
The doc that seemed to have a stranglehold on media attention this week was far and away Lauren Greenfield’s THE QUEEN OF VERSAILLES, a portrait of timeshare mogul couple David and Jackie Siegel. At Indiewire, Nigel Smith on July 18 posted an interview with Greenfield. At the Documentary Channel blog, Christopher Campbell pointed readers toward a Doc Talk profile of the film. In this week’s Docutopia blog, Anthony Kaufman drew some parallels between the content in Christopher Nolan’s last installment of his Batman trilogy THE DARK KNIGHT RISES, and the doc. Filmmaker Magazine played host to a Susanna Locascio-penned review of the film, which it described it as “a complicated, fascinating, and humbling film, perfectly calibrated to the zeitgeist.” And the film’s DP, Tom Hurwitz, was kind enough to share some cinema verite shooting techniques he employed on the film.
The Sundance Institute on Monday, July 16 named 11 projects to its summer creative producing labs, five of which were documentaries. Those docs selected for the program were DIRTY WARS: THE WORLD IS A BATTLEFIELD with producing fellows Anthony Arnove and Brenda Coughlin; SOLARIZE THIS (working title) with fellow Shalini Kantayya; THESE BIRDS WALK with fellows Omar Mullick and Bassam Tariq; THE NEW BLACK with fellow Yoruba Richen; an Untitled Gay Retiree Project with fellow PJ Raval; and WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL? with fellow Lucas Ochoa. The fellows will be able to avail themselves of intensive workshops and meetings with executives for feedback and pitch sessions.
Filmmaker Magazine this past week also loosed its list of the 25 New Faces of Independent Film on the world. Included in the tally were a number of doc filmmakers, including Drea Cooper and Zackary Canepari (California is a Place); Penny Lane and Brian Frye (OUR NIXON); Alexa Karolinski (OMA & BELLA); Chris Dapkins (THE SWELL SEASON); Omar Mullick and Bassam Tariq (THESE BIRDS WALK); Jason Tippet and Elizabeth Mims (ONLY THE YOUNG); Terence Nance (AN OVERSIMPLIFICATION OF HER BEAUTY); Wu Tsang (WILDNESS); and Katherine Fairfax Wright and Malika Zouhali-Worrall (CALL ME KUCHU).
