The film DIRTY WARS by director Richard Rowley was one of several docs to screen at Sundance thus far.
The week documentary news was dominated by the start of the Sundance Film Festival, which began Thursday, Jan. 17. On Sundance’s blog, Eric Hynes and other writers recapped Day Two of the festival, with a strong focus on docs. On the POV blog, Tom Roston interviewed two of the festival’s senior programmers, David Courier and Caroline Libresco. Roston also highlighted a few films screening at the festival, FIRE IN THE BLOOD by Dylan Mohan Gray; THE WORLD ACCORDING TO DICK CHENEY by R.J. Cutler; and WHICH WAY TO THE FRONT LINE FROM HERE? THE LIFE AND TIME OF TIM HETHERINGTON by Sebastian Junger. The Hetherington doc was also profiled by Stuart Hughes of the BBC.
Los Angeles Times critic Kenneth Turan also provided his own overview of the docs set to screen at Sundance, while Karen Kemmerle of the Tribeca Future of Film blog highlighted some Twitter feeds worth following during the festival. Mark Olsen had coverage of the film AFTER TILLER by Martha Shane and Lana Wilson, while Eric Kohn wrote up BLACKFISH for Indiewire. At The Hollywood Reporter, John DeFore reviewed Richard Rowley and Jeremy Scahill’s film DIRTY WARS. Shiela Nevins of HBO spoke with Brooks Barnes of the New York Times about the film LIFE ACCORDING TO SAM.
There was also an abundance of interviews with Sundance filmmakers being churned out this week. The Filmmaker Magazine blog had one with CRASH REEL director Lucy Walker, while Jim Allen of the website talked with musician Dave Grohl, director of the doc SOUND CITY. At Realscreen, Adam Benzine had an interview with director R.J. Cutler, while Kelly Anderson chatted with Morgan Neville, director of TWENTY FEET FROM STARDOM. And Slovej Schou spoke with STORIES WE TELL director Sarah Polley for Entertainment Weekly.
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PUSSY RIOT - A PUNK PRAYER plays in Sundance's World Documentary Competition.
I asked filmmakers in Sundance’s World Documentary Competition to describe what attracted them to their subject and what conversations they hope the film will start. Below are responses from 9 of the 12 films. As I receive others, I’ll update this page. In a future post, we’ll hear from directors in the Doc Premieres section. See the previous post on the US Documentary Competition. Thanks to Erik Spink for helping me compile this survey.
Zhao Qi, Fallen City
I remember feeling the first jolts in my office in Beijing that day on May 12th, 2008. An hour later, we learned there had been an earthquake in Sichuan. When I set foot in the worst-hit city Beichuan 3 days after the earthquake, it was a sea of wreckage before my eyes. No road was flat; no building was standing straight. Smoke and dust mixed with the smell of rotten corpses and disinfectants, wafted in the air.
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Alan Berliner discusses memory, poetry, and the process of making First Cousin Once Removed
When director Alan Berliner introduced First Cousin Once Removed on Tuesday, he told the STF audience, “Making this film challenged every assumption I’ve ever had about the notion of memory.” The film is a portrait of Berliner’s cousin, Edwin Honig, a poet and teacher who spent the last years of his life suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Berliner interviewed Honig on multiple occasions, documenting different stages of his dementia. The resulting film is a visually poetic exploration of memory, family, and identity. Honig passed away in 2011, but Berliner shared his hope that “with this film, I’ve preserved Edwin’s mind.” After the screening, Berliner joined STF’s Thom Powers for a conversation about his relationship with Honig and the filmmaking process.
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MANHUNT, directed by Greg Barker, premieres in Sundance Documentary Competition.
I asked filmmakers in Sundance’s US Documentary Competition to describe what attracted them to their subject and what conversations they hope the film will start. Below are responses from 13 of the 16 films. As I receive others, I’ll update this page. In future posts, we’ll hear from directors in the World Competition and Doc Premieres section. Thanks to Erik Spink for helping me compile this survey.
Audrey Ewell, 99% – The Occupy Wall Street Collaborative Film, @99_film, @AudreyEwell
When people take to the streets en masse in your country and a national and even worldwide movement takes off, how do you NOT get interested in that? Not only has this not happened in my lifetime, it’s also fundamentally different than justice movements of the past. And I’d be lying if I said that the experimental process we employed on the film wasn’t also a little bit intriguing to me.
Our film not only goes behind the scenes of the Occupy movement to reveal what really happened and what it was and is all about, it also exposes the latticework of corporate, financial and political power operating behind the vestige of American democracy. Monumental economic and social decisions are being made, and if people don’t involve themselves in those conversations, their interests simply aren’t being protected. This film doesn’t really leave any room for doubt about that. The only question is, where does it go from here? And that’s an answer that can only be answered over time. This film lays the framework for us to understand the factors that got us into such a mess in the first place, and at the explosive birth and growth of this movement, so we may better understand what comes next.
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WHICH WAY IS THE FRONT LINE FROM HERE? on Tim Hetherington, premiering at Sundance.
Tomorrow the Sundance Film Festival kicks off with over 40 feature documentaries. Here are nine that I’ve seen in various stages of completion and predict will make waves in Park City and beyond.
BLACKFISH (US competition) – What caused an Orca whale to kill its trainer at Sea World? Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite conducts an impressive investigation, demonstrating this wasn’t an isolated incident. If you own stock in an aquatic amusement park, sell now.
THE CRASH REEL (Doc Premieres) – Snow boarding champion Kevin Pearce was favored for Olympic greatness until he had a horrific crash during a practice run in Park City. Two-time Oscar nominee Lucy Walker (Waste Land) follows Pearce in recovery to explore the world of extreme sports and its growing pressures and dangers.
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