Alone in the Wilderness (Dick Proenneke & Bob Swerer Jr., 2004)
There's an interesting intertextual study to be made here. You've got Proenneke's original footage; his diaries as reworked by writer Sam Keith; Swerer Jr.'s reading of Keith's book, as narration, in the guise of Proenneke; additional footage shot by Swerer Jr. and (distractingly) intercut with Proenneke's; and additional narration by Wendy Ishii, which is distractingly incongruous in its own right. As an editorial effort,
Alone in the Wilderness is something of a mess but not so much than it can mask the glory of Proenneke's original effort. I pride myself as being a very patient person, having being raised in the wild by a band of jigsaw puzzles, but this guy puts me to shame. As if the intricate the labor he puts in to build his cabin in the Alaskan wilderness isn't painstaking enough, he's doubles down on the monotony by filming the process himself (mostly). It's impressive to behold, to say the least, and I'd love to see more of his primary text someday, without the layers of interference.
Grade: B-
Law and Order (Frederick Wiseman, 1969)
Years and years of
Cops makes this film less singular that it must have been in 1969, when it won the Emmy for Best News Documentary, but the tableau created by Wiseman's film creates perhaps a more vivid portrait of not just the police but also those policed. The threat of violence is everywhere, on both sides, but always just a threat: a kid being cut loose despite making threats to kill cops; a guy threatening to kill the guy who molested someone if the cops don't do something about it; a policeman's brutal chokehold on a prostitute. Even when the cops are putting together a crib to temporarily house a lost kid, it's their holstered guns that draw the eye's attention. There's a timelessness to this pervasive sense of threat, but also a specificity here to a year (1968) and a place (Kansas City, Missouri). That place, more specifically, is a predominantly black neighborhood that's patrolled by a predominantly white police force; a neighborhood that saw rioting in 1968, apparently, with the ripple effects still being felt. It's all pretty interesting, to be sure, especially the way some of these very real people seem like over-the-top performances from a fiction film.
Grade: B
Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. (Errol Morris, 1999)
I remember being lukewarm on my appreciation of this film, but now I find that I actively dislike it with reservations. Morris' style here really bugs me. It's a very slow film, with about half an hour of material stretched to ninety minutes, and every cut to black (of which there are many) felt like a gut-punch to my engagement. The reenactment footage is a bit ugly, and the other very foregrounded stylistic choices did little to enhance my appreciation of the story being told. All that being said, Leuchter
is a very interesting subject a living, breathing example of how very ordinary men can do extremely bad things, convincing themselves all the while that they're in the right. So, you know, it's timely and stuff.
Grade: C+
Seventeen (Joel DeMott & Jeff Kreines, 1983)
Seventeen, a portrait of high school kids, is mainly of interest just as an authentic-feeling document of a time and place 1981 in Muncie, Indiana with Q95 FM providing the rock radio soundtrack. The structure is a bit haphazard, especially as one individual girl (Lynn) takes center stage for the first three-fifths of the film but then falls too much to the background. But the content is almost always interesting, despite a few scenes running long and making me ask, "Why am I watching this?" And the sustained focus on Lynn is appropriate, for she's a white girl with a black boyfriend, which at first seems accepted by everyone as no big deal (gratifying to see), but before you know it someone has a cross burning outside their house. The film is probably at its best when it keys into the underlying racial tensions, and it could have been even better had the black perspective had been given more voice. The white, oft-racist contingent of 1981 Muncie feels like it'd be hungering to make America great again in another 35 years, giving the film special resonance right now. There's not a great sense of hope for the future here, which make the the glimpses we get into the home economics and government classes at the high school extra fascinating and even ironic. The Home Ec class, taught by an older woman, seems a bastion of 1930s ideals, largely irrelevant to the lives of these scraggly 1980s kids. And the teacher of government class is so quietly earnest in the face of his students' gross indifference that it's downright sad. Though it's not as sad as when a kid dies in a car accident and his friends get drunk and request "Against the Wind" from the radio station. Bob Seger's voice, made tinny by the film's sound recording, gave me crazy chills.
Grade: B
Undefeated (Daniel Lindsay & T.J. Martin, 2011)
This 2012 Oscar winner is a nice look at high school sports as almost a form of social work and of character development. I really like the focus on the kids as people more than as players. It's telling that we don't even learn the first names of the guys at the star positions the running back, quarterback, and wide receivers. Instead, it's a linebacker and a couple linemen that take center stage. The coach is a good protagonist and a tribute to the difference that one guy can make in people's lives, and how a strong sense of responsibility often carries with it the weight of sacrifice. His emphasis on character and discipline and "team first" leads to some really good emotional moments. The score is unfortunate and the editing is just okay. The success of
Undefeated is found more in its individual scenes than in the flow between them. I wish that the games themselves had been better filmed; a clearer understanding of what these guys contribute on the field would have provided nice contexts for their stories. From what I understand, the filmmakers' interest here began with a newspaper article about a promising black football player living part-time with a white family to make it through high school and earn a college scholarship, reminiscent of
The Blind Side. It's a tribute to the filmmakers that, once they began filming, they adapted and expanded their focus, rather than zeroing in on that original story, which, while still a good facet of the film, is one of the less interesting parts.
Grade: B
My Best Fiend (Werner Herzog, 1999)
Herzog is quite the raconteur, but the kind that I don't really trust. His language is too often overheated, his past self too omniscient, and his present self too borderline self-aggrandizing. I wish the focus here was less on Herzog and more squarely on Kinski, even though Kinski scares me. He seems crazed to the point of being dangerous, so much so that I fear I'll regret having watched this when it negatively colors my next viewings of
Aguirre and
Fitzcarraldo. Those two films are disproportionately featured here, to the point where I just wanted to be watching
Burden of Dreams again instead. I was playing a drinking game whereby I had a sip every time Kinski blinked. One hundred minutes later, my glass was still untouched. Despite some misgivings, I'm still glad I watched
My Best Fiend. It's almost always interesting and after
Genghis Blue and
Buena Vista Social Club, I'm extra grateful for the strong production values.
Grade: B-
13th (Ava DuVernay, 2016)
A tough one to review. As political propaganda, it gets points for being propaganda with which I agree. As a film ... it's alright. The interviews are filmed with annoying style, some of the editing is atrocious, and a few other choices are cringe-worthy. It's a survey lecture that's wants to avoid feeling like it's lecturing, so I understand the gravitation towards being hip and cool, or at least trying to be. But, yeah, those elements aren't for me. And content-wise, it's frustrating to me that over the course of two hours, we never address the original thinking behind that language in the 13th Amendment, or any variations to how it's been interpreted over the years. All told,
13th might prove to be more important than good.
Grade:
At All Costs (Mike Nicoll, 2016)
In some ways,
At All Costs is the film that the makers of
Hoop Dreams originally set out to make: a study of the monied interests of youth basketball (e.g., recruiters, scouts, camps, shoe companies, etc.). Even though
Hoop Dreams evolved into a much different film telling a much more personal and human story
At All Costs still operates very much in its shadow. Nicoll's documentary feels like it's always pecking on the shell of its subject and only rarely breaking through. The main point of interest to me is the story of Parker Jackson-Cartwright and his very invested father and the parallels to
Searching for Bobby Fischer. Parker, despite being undersized, is so clearly a gifted athlete, but also clearly a teenage boy that's sacrificing the essence of that time of his life for a better future. That's an interesting dynamic, especially factoring in the fact that he seems privileged not just by his gifts but also by social class and familial support. I want to resent him, but his unassuming personality with its hint of nerdiness makes that impossible.
This March Madness, I'll be watching Arizona's games with a strong rooting interest, injuries permitting.Grade: B-
Muscle Shoals (Greg 'Freddy' Camalier, 2013)
"Now Muscle Shoals has got the Swampers," says the Lynyrd Skynyrd song 'Sweet Home Alabama'. "And they've been known to pick a song or two." If you've ever wondered what that lyric is referring to but have been too lazy to Google it, well have I got the film for you! Muscle Shoals is a very small town in Alabama where some of the best music of the past fifty years has been recorded. There are a few good musical moments in this documentary and any number of fun facts and ancedotes; there's also an interesting personal story of tragedy and triumph. Ultimately, though, it's all a bit cursory, with nothing much to elevate it beyond, "Hmm, yeah, I guess that's all pretty interesting." And I hate when docs repeatedly incorporate their subjects into the b-roll, like models at a photo shoot, and you can just hear the director saying, "Hey guys, can you walk down this bridge towards the camera and look thoughtful?" "Hey, Rick, can you stand in front of this barn for us? Now can you turn sideways?" Et cetera. Just makes me feel bad for all involved.
Grade: B-
Last Chance U (Greg Whiteley, 2016)
This six-episode Netflix series grew on me with every episode. East Mississippi Community College has been a junior college football powerhouse the past few years, a way station for players talented enough to play for top schools and ultimately in the NFL but lacking either the academic credentials or the personal discipline. The first couple episodes are a bit on the ordinary side, like a lesser season of HBO's
Hard Knocks, but
Last Chance U ultimately succeeds by being not just about college football and recruitment but also about race and life in the rural south and pathways to success and the gap between knowing what you have to do and actually doing it. Everything with Ronald Ollie is a clear highlight; it's near impossible not to root for him. The counselor who guides these athletes through their academic hurdles is a great screen presence, tough and maternal and passionate and a great de facto interviewer. The head football coach is equally fascinating, more for his flaws than his virtues. He makes a for a fascinating comparison with the coach from
Undefeated.
Grade: B
Undefeated,
13th,
At All Costs,
Muscle Shoals, and
Last Chance U are all streaming on Netflix.
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