documentary

The Central Park Five: a sense of outrage

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THE CENTRAL PARK FIVE

PBS is now broadcasting the excellent documentary The Central Park Five, about the media-driven rush to wrongly convict five young men of the rape attack upon the Central Park Jogger.  The film is co-directed and co-written by famed documentarian Ken Burns (The Civil War, Baseball) , his daughter Sarah Burns and her husband David McMahon from Sarah’s book of the same name.  The Central Park Five is just as credibly researched as Ken Burns’ previous work but has more of a bite, more of a sense of outrage.

The Central Park Five begins with the actual perpetrator of the crime, so we immediately are reminded that the Central Park Five teens are innocent, which helps us absorb their experience through their eyes.  That’s critical for us to understand how they could have been browbeaten into confessing to crimes that they did not commit.

We see their video confessions and hear from the Five and their families today.  We also hear from lawyers, politicians and journalists, but not from the police or prosecutors.

The story of The Central Park Five is remarkably compelling.  It’s also an important film.  Viewers will never assess confessions induced by police interrogations in the same way again.

Beware of Mr. Baker: please don’t hit me again, Ginger

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The documentary Beware of Mr. Baker traces the life of the extremely volatile legendary rock drummer Ginger Baker (Cream, Blind Faith).  Baker is undeniably a musical genius, and the film highlights the stature of his work in both rock and jazz.  Unfortunately, the nasty combination of his aggressively anti-social personality and his heroin addiction precluded successful professional and familial relationships.  We hear about Baker’s good and bad sides from his former Cream band mates Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton, several of his ex-wives and his son, drummer Kofi Baker.  And we meet Ginger Baker himself, for better and for worse.  At one point, the septuagenarian Baker employs his cane to break the nose of the film’s director, Jay Bulger.

Bulger gets credit for comprehensive research into Baker’s life and times, for his inventive use of animation in depicting stages of Baker’s life and for getting the combustible Baker himself on camera.  Beware of Mr. Baker is the skillfully told story of a fascinating life.  Beware of Mr. Baker is now available on VOD through Amazon and other outlets.

 

56 Up: surprisingly mellow

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56 Up is the next chapter in the greatest documentary series ever. Starting with Seven Up! in 1964, director Michael Apted has followed the same fourteen British children, filming snapshots of their lives at ages 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42 and 49 – and now at age 56. Choosing kids from different backgrounds, the series started as a critique of the British class system, but has since evolved into a broader exploration of what factors can lead to success and happiness at different stages of human life.

We have seen these characters live roller coaster lives.  The surprise in 56 Up is how contented they seem to be.  They seem to have independently reached a stage in their lives where they live with acceptance and satisfaction.  Accordingly, it makes for mellow and pleasing viewing for us.

Michael Apted is a big time director (Coal Miner’s Daughter, Gorillas in the Mist, most recently the 2010 chapter of the Chronicles of Narnia saga).  It is remarkable that he has returned so faithfully to his subjects in the Up series.  I’ve included the 7 Up series in my list of Greatest Movies of All Time.

Because Apted includes clips from earlier films to set the stage for each character, you don’t need to watch all eight movies.  Because there is so little conflict in 56 Up, it would be ideal to first screen an edgier film like 35 Up or 42: Forty Two Up.  But 56 Up stands on its own, and it’s another gem in the series.

THE GATEKEEPERS: winning tactics make for a losing strategy

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The Gatekeepers: This Israeli documentary is centered around interviews with all six surviving former chiefs of Shin Bet, Israel’s super-secret internal security force.   We get their inside take on the past thirty years of Israeli-Palestinian history.  What is revelatory however, is their assessment of Israel’s war on terror.  These are hard ass guys who went to the office every morning to kill terrorists.  But upon reflection, they conclude that winning tactics make for a losing strategy.

Filmmaker Dror Moreh also makes file footage pop off the screen with 3D effects, and shows us the night vision helmet cam view of an Israeli military raid on a houseful of terrified Palestinians.  It’s powerful stuff, and a Must See for anyone with an interest in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the American War on Terror.

The Gatekeepers is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and for streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Flixster.

DVD/Stream of the Week: Undefeated – an Oscar winner you haven’t seen

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The extraordinary documentary Undefeated begins with a high school football coach addressing his team:

Let’s see now. Starting right guard shot and no longer in school.  Starting middle linebacker shot and no longer in school. Two players fighting right in front of the coach. Starting center arrested.  Most coaches – that would be pretty much a career’s worth of crap to deal with.  Well, I think that sums up the last two weeks for me.

Undefeated is the story of this coach, Bill Courtney, leading his team through a season.  The kids live in crushing poverty and attend a haplessly under-resourced high school in North Memphis.

Undefeated may be about a football team, but isn’t that much about football.  Instead of the Xs and Os, it shows the emotional energy required of Courtney to keep each kid coming to school, coming to practice and on task.  He gets many of the kids to think about goals for the first time in their lives.  He is tireless, dogged and often frustrated and emotionally spent.

The film wisely focuses on three players, and we get to know them.  Like the rest of the team, all three are from extremely disadvantaged homes.  One is an overachiever both on the field and in the classroom, but surprisingly emotionally vulnerable.   Another has college-level football talent but very little academic preparation.   The third,  recently back from youth prison, is impulsive, immature, selfish and extremely volatile.

Undefeated won the 2012 Oscar for Best Documentary for filmmakers Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin – but it didn’t get a wide theatrical release.  It’s available now to stream from Amazon, Vudu, YouTube and redbox.

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God: the blame climbs until it cannot climb higher

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In Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, documentarian Alex Gibney explores the Catholic Church’s decades-long cover-up of priest abuse from a Wisconsin parish to the top of the Vatican (and I mean the top).  The film begins with the horrifying and disgusting abuse of the most vulnerable – children at a residential Catholic school for the deaf whose devout parents cannot communicate with them through American Sign Language.

At first it seems like another story of Church leaders suppressing the truth to avoid bad publicity and lawsuits – and it is for the first few years.  But then we learn about an American bishop trying to remove a pedophile from ministry, but being thwarted by superiors across the Atlantic.  As Gibney pulls apart the onion, the focus of the story climbs the Church hierarchy.  The brilliant and prolific Gibney’s work includes Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer, Casino Jack and the United States of Money and the Oscar-winning Taxi to the Dark Side.

I also recommend another documentary on this difficult subject, Deliver Us From Evil, which made my top ten list for 2006.  That is the story of a serial pedophile priest moved from parish to parish in the Diocese of Stockton, California.  This has become, sadly, a familiar narrative, but what distinguishes Deliver Us From Evil is its breathtaking interviews with the pedophile himself.

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God is now playing on HBO.

 

Ethel: an interesting woman who has lived an extraordinary life

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Ethel is a fine HBO documentary on the life of Ethel Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy’s widow.   The filmmaker is Ethel’s daughter Rory, her 11th child, born six months after RFK’s assassination.  Rory Kennedy had the advantage of access to a trove of photos and home movies, along with on-camera interviews with her mother and her siblings.  The result is an affectionate and insightful portrait of Ethel, with the view of RFK’s career by his own family.  We are surprised to learn that Ethel was the most competitive member of the family.  We also learn of her impish liveliness, such as dropping “Get a new Director” into the FBI’s basement suggestion box.  Ethel is an interesting woman who has lived an extraordinary life.  Anyone interested in 20th Century American history should see Ethel.

Ethel debuted last week and is being rebroadcast on HBO.

Paul Williams Still Alive: now content in his skin

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Here’s a treat – Paul Williams Still Alive, an affecting documentary about the songwriter, omnipresent in the 70s, but not now.  Because Paul Williams’ life story follows the arc of every episode of VH1’s Behind the Music (hits the show biz big time, does too many drugs, career crashes and burns), this film could have been trite.  Instead, it’s fresh and appealing, chiefly because filmmaker Stephen Kessler is such an unabashed  fan boy who glories in following Williams around, uncovering tidbits like Williams love of eating squid.

The documentary’s other cornerstone is that Paul Williams himself – now twenty years sober –  is a very appealing guy.  Williams doesn’t dwell on the time when he was rich, famous and unhappy.  He has an edge, and doesn’t suffer fools, but he lives in the moment and it’s fun to see a guy now so content in his skin.

Paul Williams Still Alive is available now on Video On Demand, including Amazon Instant Video.

 

 

Herzog’s most American documentary: God’s Angry Man

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Dr. Gene Scott

I am a huge fan of Werner Herzog’s documentaries (Grizzly Man, Little Dieter Needs to Fly, Cave of Forgotten Dreams).  So I was particularly pleased to come across this 1980 Herzog gem.  It’s a 43 minute made-for-TV documentary called God’s Angry Man.

God’s Angry Man is about the late Dr. Gene Scott, a TV preacher who would rail at his audience until they sent him money.  You would think that people would turn off a television personality who was hectoring them, but Scott tapped into something spooky within his flock.  He was mesmerizing.  I myself watched him for many hours late at night, amazed that his followers would tune in to his hard-edged bellowing and choose to be bullied.

Herzog plays it straight and lets Scott speak for Scott, although Herzog must have been puzzled and bemused by the American phenomenon of the TV preacher.

You can watch the entire movie at this slightly creepy Dr. Gene Scott fan page or here on Google Videos.

The Movie Mitt Romney Doesn’t Want You To See

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Mitt Romney has been formally nominated by this week’s Republican Convention in Tampa.  Imagine if Michael Moore directed a profile of Mitt’s career as co-founder of Bain Capital.  Well, the 28-minute short film When Mitt Romney Comes to Town is an even more devastating critique of Romney than a Moore film would be.

The storyline of When Mitt Romney Comes to Town is essentially 1) you are happily living in Middle America, working in a factory and paying your mortgage and your taxes; 2) Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital buys and then loots your company; 3) you lose your job and then your home; and 4) repeat several times.

Amazingly, the film was directed by Jason Killian Meath, a Republican media consultant and culture warrior. During the GOP primary season, it was shilled by a Newt Gingrich-friendly SuperPAC.

Meath’s film is heavy-handed and manipulative (as a Michael Moore film would be). Meath doesn’t have Moore’s sense of humor, but also doesn’t have Moore’s abrasiveness and self-righteousness, which makes his film smoother, more broadly accessible and ultimately more persuasive. In an appeal to Republican primary voters, Meath uses Reaganesque “Morning in America” music and imagery, and I don’t think that it’s an accident that most of Bain Capital’s victims in the film are White.

The oddest thing about When Mitt Romney Comes to Town is that it is not just an attack on Mitt Romney, but against the type of Vulture Capitalism tolerated or even promoted by all recent Republican Congressional leaders and presidential candidates. This is a major thread of the Obama narrative against Romney.

Here’s the entire 28-minute movie.