Of the four major theatrical releases for documentary this week, I’ve seen three of them. The one I haven’t seen is the most popular, 20 Feet From Stardom, which was a big hit at Sundance and a subsequent festival favorite throughout the half year since then. I really do want to see it, but I just haven’t been given the opportunity to do so. Of the three I have seen, I recommend them all.

The nuclear power doc Pandora’s Promise will have you wondering differently about the scary alternative energy source. The highly award-winning gay rights in Uganda doc, Call Me Kuchu, will put you through different emotions, as it’s positively moving yet also heartbreaking. My pick of the week, though, is the Tomi Ungerer profile, Far Out Isn’t Far Enough. You can tell I loved it as I’m quoted on the above poster, but I also want to highlight that one in the bunch since it’s the less-hyped of the four. Probably because it’s not the biggest issue or the biggest crowd-pleasing subject matter. But you won’t regret spending time with Ungerer in the film.

Learn about about these four new films below.

Call Me Kuchu

Directed by Katherine Fairfax Wright and Malika Zouhali-Worrall

What it’s about: The “kuchu” activists of Uganda, who are fighting for LGBTI rights in a country that still sees homosexuality as a crime, one that lawmakers are trying to see punishable by death. At the center of the story is David Kato, Uganda’s first openly gay man, who is a great leader of the movement to stop the horrible legislation.

How it’s about: From my 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival dispatch for Movies.com: “There is a shocking moment in this film that I could see viewers taking issue over, similarly to how the real tragedy of Dear Zachary is somewhat exploited for the sake of its storytelling. But I’m more upset over the fact that I’d never even known about the “kuchu”…With endearing and commendable characters and stories, the film is like Uganda’s Word is Out, Before Stonewall and After Stonewall wrapped up in one moving and powerful feature debut from co-directors Katherine Fairfax Wright and Malika Zouhali-Worrall.”

Recommended if you like: The Times of Harvey Milk; Small Town Gay Bar; The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till; Dangerous Living: Coming Out in the Developing World

Awards: Winner of the Teddy for Best Documentary and the Cinema Fairbindet Prize and named Second Place Winner for the Panorama Audience Award for Best Documentary Film at the 2012 Berlin International Film Festival. Winner of the Best International Feature Award at the 2012 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival. Winner of the Human Rights Award at the 2012 Dokufest Kosovo. Winner of the Amnesty International Human Rights Award for Best Film at the 2012 Durban International Film Festival. Winner of the Victor Rabinowitz and Joanne Grant Award for Social Justice at the 2012 Hamptons International Film Festival. Winner of the International Human Rights Award at the 2013 Cinema for Peace Awards. Winner of the Best Documentary award and the Audience Award at the 2012 Madrid LGBT Film Festival. Winner of the Best Documentary award at the 2012 Side by Side LGBT Film Festival. Winner of the Best Documentary Feature award and the Audience Award at the 2012 Seattle LGBT Film Festival. Winner of the Best Documentary award at the 2012 Santa Fe Independent Film Festival. Winner of the aGLIFF Award for Best Documentary at the 2012 Austin Gay & Lesbian International Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the 2012 San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2012 Freiburg Gay Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2012 Hamburg Queer Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the 2012 Torino International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. Winner of the AT&T Audience Award at the 2012 Frameline Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2012 Watchdocs Film Festival. Nominated for the 2012 International Documentary Association Humanitas Award.

Now Showing: At the Quad Cinema in NYC. Opens next week at the Laemmle Music Hall in Los Angeles. For more info on these and upcoming openings (and current festival screenings), check the film’s screenings page.

Trailer:

Far Out Isn’t Far Enough: The Tomi Ungerer Story

Directed by Brad Bernstein

What it’s about: Tomi Ungerer, famous author and illustrator of children’s books and infamous author and illustrator of adult works. He is also known for his bold advertising campaigns, Vietnam War protest poster designs and the recently opened Tomi Ungerer Museum in Strasbourg.

Interviewees: Tomi Ungerer, Maurice Sendak, Jules Feiffer, Patrick Skene Catling, Michael Patrick Hearn and Burton Pike.

How it’s about: From my 2012 Toronto International Film Festival dispatch for Movies.com: “Come for the appearance of late children’s book author Maurice Sendak and you’ll be pulled in by Ungerer, a reluctant yet uncontained subject who is easily the most wildly fascinating artist profiled in a documentary since Crumb. Like his friend Sendak, he’s a legend of picture books, though he became blacklisted and banned after he started also producing works of erotica. Born in Strasbourg in 1931, he experienced life’s darkest absurdities early on and has continued to adapt and be a wise witness of man’s constant cycles of fear, hypocrisy, contradiction and revolution while latching onto a philosophy of “coping, not hoping.” Filled with raunchy humor (“a behind is like a smile you can hold in your hands”), sheer bursts of humanity and the wonderful drawings, both G- and X-rated, of a deeply imaginative and insightful soul.”

Recommended if you like: Crumb; Beware of Mr. Baker; Beauty Is Embarrassing

Awards: Winner of the Best Documentary Feature award at the 2013 Nashville Film Festival. Winner of an Honorable Mention for the John Schlesinger Award at the 2013 Palm Springs International Film Festival. Winner of the Audience Award for Documentary Feature Film at the 2012 Warsaw International Film Festival.

Now Showing: At the Lincoln Plaza Cinema in NYC. Opens next week in Los Angeles, Chicago and Montreal. For more info on these and upcoming openings, see the film’s playdates page via First Run Features.

Trailer:

Pandora’s Promise

Directed by Robert Stone (Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst; Oscar nominee for Radio Bikini)

Executive Produced by Paul Allen (co-founder of Microsoft), Sir Richard Branson (Founder and Chairman of Virgin Group) and Frank Batten, Jr. (Chairman and CEO of Landmark Communications)

What it’s about: Formerly anti-nuclear environmentalists who have completely changed their view on the issue and now embrace nuclear power as the best alternative energy source — not as being perfect but just the favored choice during the crisis of climate change.

Interviewees: Gwyneth Cravens (author of Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy), Len Koch (nuclear engineer), Stewart Brand (author of Whole Earth Discipline: An Eco-pragmatist Manifesto), Richard Rhodes (Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb), Michael Shellenberger (co-author of Break Through: From the Death of Environmentalism to the Politics of Possibility), Mark Lynas (author of Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet and the companion book Pandora’s Promise), Dr. Charles Till (Director of the Reactor Development Program at the Argonne National Laboratory, 1980-1998)

How it’s about: One of the most provocative documentaries of the year, it’s the latest in a recent crop of films going against the grain of popular opinion on an issue. The basic argument that nuclear power is our best solution now is carried by the stories of people who have flipped on the subject. Meanwhile, Stone and Lynas travel the world measuring radiation levels in major cities and sites of nuclear accidents, including Chernobyl and Fukushima. Whether or not you want to believe in the alleged safety of nuclear over the decades worth of information and evidence of the contrary, you should be aware that this isn’t an advertisement for nuclear nor is it intended to be pro-nuke so much as anti-global warming. And it’s a big enough deal that I’ve already started receiving releases debunking the film, which I don’t need because I don’t blindly watch docs nor am I a passive sponge for their information. But I am always into films that challenge the primary mindset on a subject and/or issue and give me new ways to see and think about anything.

Recommended if you like: Windfall; Cool It; The City Dark

More on the film: My interview with Stone plus an exclusive clip

Now Showing: Nationwide in select cities, including NYC, Boston, Denver, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Washington, DC. Expands further through July. For more info on these and upcoming openings see the film’s See the Film page.

Trailer:

20 Feet From Stardom

Directed by Morgan Neville (Troubadours, also producer of Pearl Jam Twenty)

What it’s about: “A spotlight on the untold true story of the backup singers behind some of the greatest musical legends of the 21st century. Triumphant and heartbreaking in equal measure, the film is both a tribute to the unsung voices who brought shape and style to popular music and a reflection on the conflicts, sacrifices and rewards of a career spent harmonizing with others. These gifted artists span a range of styles, genres and eras of popular music, but each has a uniquely fascinating and personal story to share of life spent in the shadows of superstardom.” – from the official synopsis.

Starring: Darlene Love, Merry Clayton, Judith Hill, Claudia Lennear, Lisa Fischer, Táta Vega

Interviewees: Bruce Springsteen, Mick Jagger, Sting, Stevie Wonder, Bette Midler, Sheryl Crow

How it’s about: “The power of collaboration combating the allure of the spotlight is a recurring theme among Stardom’s other subjects, and to see their contributions finally given some due attention, whether by the industry or this film, makes for an altogether irresistible experience…between the welcome anecdotes, the wealth of archival footage on display, the well-polished production values and an inevitably remarkable soundtrack spanning the greatest decades of American rock and soul, Stardom mostly hits the right notes.” – William Goss, Film.com

Awards: Winner of the Special Jury Prize for Documentary Feature at the 2013 RiverRun International Film Festival.

Now Showing: At the Angelika Film Center and the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center in NYC and The Landmark in Los Angeles. For more info on these and upcoming openings see the film’s playdates page.

Trailer:

Sunday is Father’s Day, and just as Documentary Channel did last month for moms we’re bringing you a marathon devoted to dads in docs. Beginning at 5pm ET on June 16, you’ll be treated to four films — two features and two shorts — focusing on very different kinds of stories of fathers. There’s one about a famous spy dad, another about an extraordinarily rugged dad, one on black men and another on gay men. Check out a bit of info on each below.

5:00pm:  The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby

It’s a common genre these days, first-person documentaries made about the filmmaker’s parents. And personal profiles of fathers are most typical. But not all are also about famous people. Tell Them Who You Are is, and now here’s another. However, Carl Colby’s doc can’t feature the subject fully since former CIA Director William Colby died 15 years ago. Anyone who loves spy stories, James Bond and the like, should find this to be an incredible biography.

Watch a DocTalk episode featuring Carl Colby discussing the film:

7:30pm: A Family Portrait

This short documentary by Jeffrey Haig and Melissa Leu looks at a gay married couple raising two children (Alen works while John is a stay-at-home dad) and the difficulty it’s been for them to be accepted as a legitimate family. The film has won awards and honorable mentions at the Los Angeles International Film Festival, the Seattle True Independent Film Festival, Worldfest Houston International Film Festival, Mexico International Film Festival and Indie Fest USA.

8:00pm: This Way of Life

Last month Documentary Channel included this award-winning film in the Mother’s Day marathon, but it does largely concentrate on paternal relationships so it’s a good selection for both parental holidays. Maybe more appropriate for Father’s Day. It’s intimately centered on four years in the life of a whole Maori family of eight (not including their 50 horses), though Peter, the patriarch, is a European who has been adopted into the culture and is through and through a Maori in every way but skin color. In addition to showing his role as a father there’s a lot of drama to be found in the relationship between him and his own adopted dad. Director Thomas Burstyn is normally a cinematographer by trade, and it shows in the film’s glorious visuals.

10:00pm: Seen Also In Men

In this half-hour short documentary about the contemporary struggles of single black fathers, director Velissa Robinson presents three en who seek to have better relationships with their children than they had with their own dads.

In honor of Flag Day this Friday, Documentary Channel invites you to spend the evening with two films that look into what it means to be an American today. Check out info on this double-feature, titled “Raise the Flag,” below:

Patriocracy

Filmmaker Brian Malone takes a look at the political polarization that is hurting America in this documentary about hyper-partisanship. Featuring interviews with former Sen. Alan Simpson, Pat Buchanan, Sen. Kent Conrad, Sen. Mark Warner, Sen. Mike Crapo, Rep. Rob Andrews, Rep. Jim Cooper, Rep. William Cassidy, former Rep. Mickey Edwards, former Rep. Bob Inglis, former Rep. Bart Stupak and many others (plus news personalities and academics), the film addresses how the U.S. is never going to progress or solve its many problems so long as the divide of extreme left and extreme right keeps politicians from agreeing on anything.

Last fall, ahead of both DOC’s premiere of this film and Election Day, Malone told CNN that the film is a “real look in the mirror” and “reality check” in terms of making us take responsibility as citizens. He also noted that it’s up to the people to influence how Washington is functioning these days. “Members of Congress respond to the people that they hear from,” Malone said. “If more rational, more thoughtful conversation entered into the interaction with our constituents, I would bet that you would see a change.”

[Friday, June 14, 8pm ET]

200 American Voices

You don’t get more Flag Day-appropriate than “The Pledge of Allegiance,” which is used as a springboard for this labor of love documentary by Ron Fenley. The main subject, though, is a provocative discourse on patriotism, freedom and the American Dream and how today’s Americans view these concepts. 200 Americans, to be specific, from all over the nation.

[Friday, June 14, 10pm ET]

One of the most provocative films of the year, Pandora’s Promise tells us that nuclear energy is currently the best solution to fighting climate change. Interestingly enough, it’s a documentary by Robert Stone, who received an Oscar nomination 25 years ago for his anti-nuke feature Radio Bikini. He and a number of other environmentalists profiled in the new film have completely changed their view on the issue and now embrace the alternative energy source — not as being perfect but just the favored choice.

I talked with Stone last week about the film, which definitely made me look at nuclear in a new way. We discussed the initial obstacles of making a documentary that goes against so many people’s ideas on its subject and how it got even more difficult after the Fukushima disaster, as well as the reaction to it as a finished product, how it’s apparently really influencing viewers on the matter. Read our conversation in its entirety below. But first, check out an exclusive clip from the film right here:

You were already making this film for two years before Fukushima, correct?

I was well into production when Fukushima happened. The initial impulse to make it was my own growing awareness that the approach the environmental movement (and I would include myself in this) had taken to combat climate change for 25 years — hoping that wind and solar would replace fossil fuels, hoping that energy efficiency would reduce our demand for energy, hoping there would be an international agreement to put a price on carbon — that all of these things were failing abysmally. The climate crisis was getting worse, and getting worse at an accelerating rate. Some new thinking had to be done to stop this and time was running out.

A lot of environmentalists who I respect a great deal, particularly Stuart Brand who I know and is a friend, had started to speak out about rethinking nuclear energy. The more they looked into it, the more they realized that most of what they believed about it to be true was actually wrong. I found that fascinating, and the more I looked into it, it appeared that nuclear really was the elephant in the room that nobody was talking about. Nobody was touching this subject. So I decided to take it on.

I made a couple environmental films in the last seven years or so, and I began my career years ago with an anti-nuclear film, so I felt a moral responsibility to do this once I became impassioned about it, even though it was a difficult thing to embark on as a documentary filmmaker. I felt like the right person to do this, because I had impeccable anti-nuclear and environmental street cred to pull this off. Then halfway through production Fukushima happened.

Stuart Brand in ‘Pandora’s Promise’

What was the thinking when that happened?

I remember a lot of people calling me and saying, with a hint of schadenfreude, “I assume you’re abandoning your project, Robert.” No, not at all. The opposite. Suddenly the entire world was talking about this obscure subject that I was making a movie about. Up until that point nobody was talking about it. They were [now] talking about it in a negative way, but the entire world was talking about nuclear energy and what do we do if we shut all these plants down.

It provided me with a contemporary hook to frame the movie around. I had to rethink a lot of it, because obviously that was the baggage that everyone was going to come into the movie theater with. Fukushima would be first and foremost in their mind. But the ultimate story and case to be made for nuclear power was unchanged as it relates to climate change, certainly.

The disaster has definitely made this film an even more topical work, which actually is probably good for drawing people to see it. Do you see it as sort of benefit?

Sure. The grim joke among documentary filmmakers is that the worse things get for your character the better things get for your movie. If your central character dies or gets shot or run over by a bus, as sad as that may be, it’s drama for your movie. In my case nothing worse could have happened to nuclear energy, if you consider that my central character, than what happened to Fukushima. But it did provide a level of drama and story that I think does make the issue more relevant, more on people’s minds.

The brightly lit streets of Tokyo in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo: Robert Stone

When you say this was a difficult film to embark on as a documentarian, do you mean because the angle of the film is so against what the popular belief and consensus is on the subject?

If I had decided particularly after Fukushima to make an anti-nuclear film, given my background I could have gotten funding in a heartbeat. I probably could have done a dozen anti-nuclear films. But this film, nobody wanted to touch it. None of the sources of funding that I normally approach — PBS and places like that — wanted to go near it. They didn’t want to do a film that was pro-nuclear. They didn’t want to do a film that profiled people who changed their minds. The whole approach to it ran counter to what was the established thinking in that world.

But I was determined. I wanted creative control over this film. I wasn’t going to change my way to do it. I knew the story of conversion was the way to tell the story, that the same people who are anti-nuclear become pro-nuclear. That was the hook. Rather than having pro-nuclear people and anti-nuclear people, which certain television people had pushed on me.

So I ended up having to do it completely independently. Impact Partners came on board. You know who they are, they financed The Cove, The Island President, The Queen of Versailles. They’re big backers of independent documentary films for movie theaters. A lot of the funding came from people in Silicon Valley who are engineers and technology people. I was extremely careful not to take any money from anybody with any connections or investments or anything connected to the nuclear industry obviously.

An image of the earth from space in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo: Robert Stone

I read that you originally set out to just make a film about those people who had flipped on the issue, as well as your own flip. Did you just want to show that process of you all changing your minds and not worry about needing to try to convince others?

I don’t see this as a pro-nuclear film. Some people go into it thinking it’s pro-nuclear and get their banner up, and then immediately they get a little disarmed because we go to Fukushima and both Mark [Lynas] and I are deeply upset about what we’re seeing. I wanted to tell a personal story. It’s my personal story and the personal story of the people in the film. We lay out exactly why we were anti-nuclear, all the reasons to be anti-nuclear that we thought, then why we changed our mind. And it puts the whole thing in a larger context.

It’s very easy if you just look at nuclear energy and say, “Well, I don’t like it.” You say all the bad things about it. You could say the same thing with “I don’t like coal” or “I don’t like gas.” There’s a film all about how horrible wind power is. I don’t know if anybody’s made an anti-solar power film, but I’m sure somebody’s going to. The people in my film, what I love about them is they’re not stepping back and saying this is about choosing one energy source over another. This is about how do we solve the climate crisis, practically, realistically and quickly, and what are the tools available to us to do it. Let’s go through it, what works and what doesn’t work.

Nuclear is simply a means to an end. Nobody thinks… and I certainly don’t; I don’t give a damn about nuclear power; I’d be happy to power the world on algae if that would work. In that sense it’s not a pro-nuclear film, it’s a film that’s offering a viable solution to the climate crisis and is in fact a really hopeful environmental documentary, which is a rare thing these days.

Mark Lynas records the radiation level in Oxford with a geiger counter in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo: Robert Stone

I like that you bring up Windfall. I thought about that film while watching this because they both sort of go against the grain of popular thought. I’m curious, though, since this is a personal story for you why you didn’t let yourself be more of a presence in the film.

Not like Michael Moore, no.

But even when you’re heard during interviews you sound very objective on the subject even though you’re focusing on the one side and admit to aligning with your subjects.

I’m glad you say that, because that’s what I tried to convey.

Electric wires in a slum in Brazil in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo credit: Robert Stone.

What kind of blowback have you experienced from the anti-nuke establishment? And I’m especially curious about those who haven’t seen the film because people like to criticize things before they see them.

There’s an awful lot of that going on. The criticism of the film has almost entirely come from people who haven’t seen it.

The reception to the movie has been overwhelmingly positive. Going to Sundance — that’s a hardcore environmental left place, I would say, a bastion of anti-nuclear activism if ever there is one, in the film community at least — I would say 80% of the people walked out of the film favorable to what we were saying. It completely flipped from going in. I would ask going in and then coming out. People were changing their minds.

One of the most amazing screenings I had was at Mountain Film in Telluride, which is an environmental film festival. All the leaders in the environmental movement were there. Wind power people and solar people… There was a big environmental conference going on. There were about ten anti-hydro-fracking movies there. It was an activist, environmental film festival. There were 650 people packed to the gills, and they watched the film and it was like 98% that the people in that auditorium were won over. People were coming up to me saying they completely changed their mind. People who’d been against nuclear their whole life.

The environmental movement, the grass roots, has seen this movie and been incredibly supportive of it. The only resistance has come from the leadership in the environmental movement who haven’t seen the film yet. Most of them haven’t seen it. Usually the leadership is an older generation, they’re beholden to donors who are in their 60s. Young people are totally digging the movie, totally getting it. They’re not afraid of technology. They grew up with it. The existential threat that’s hung over them is climate change, not a Soviet nuclear attack. They come at this movement totally differently respective to the older generation anti-nuclear activists.

A cube of uranium in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo: Robert Stone

Let’s talk about the visual rhetoric of the film. You’ve already got a subject that’s hard to sell. What ways did you think to show that nuclear is actually safe? Because unlike a lot of films out there that can use death and destruction ironically to appeal to audiences, there is nothing so “sexy” about the imagery of safety.

Fear sells, always has, always will. If you do it right, though… Let’s look at the election of 2008, or the last election, it was hope versus fear. Hope won. That was the card the Republicans chose, fear, fear, fear. And people turned away from it. It sells, it gets ratings, but so does hope. That’s what I’m counting on, and so far the response has been really good.

But in terms of the earlier part of your question, I really needed to respond to every objection to this technology and address it honestly. Wherever the chips may fall. That’s why I went to Fukushima and I went to Three Mile Island and I went to Chernobyl. I went inside the reactor at Chernobyl. I don’t think any filmmaker has ever done that besides me. Not that I know of. To show that yeah this happened. Let’s look at what happened, the context of what happened. I had to address that, I had to address the safety issue, I had to address the waste issue, I had to address the proliferation issue, I had to address all of that stuff, sure.

A geiger counter records the radiation level at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in a scene from PANDORA’S PROMISE. Photo: Robert Stone

Now that you’ve seemingly made one of the most challenging docs of all time, what’s next? Or are sticking to this film and devoting your energy to its message for a while?

I do not know what I want to know next for a movie. This is probably the movie that’s going to be on my obituary. It’s probably the most important film I will ever make. It’s more than a movie for me. This really is about something way bigger than anything I’ve ever been involved in. And the people I’ve met along the way are some of the most incredible people I’ve ever met.

My mission is to get as many people from the United States and around the world to see this movie and to start talking about this and to truly try to make a difference. As long as I can keep doing that, I’m going to keep doing that. I’m having a great time showing this film around. And I feel like I’m actually making a difference and maybe making a little small dent in the universe, which, who could ask for more than that?

Pandora’s Promise is now playing in NYC and opens nationwide in select cities tomorrow.

A bunch of goodies hit stores this week as the new DVD releases for documentary include a double shot of both Paul McCartney (star of Rockshow and interviewee in The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg) and Allen Ginsberg (subject of The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg and featured subject in Ferlinghetti: A Rebirth of Wonder). It’s a special week in that three of the featured selections are not brand new. Two of them are works originally shot in the 1970s (McCartney’s Rockshow and the X-rated-film-focused A Labor of Love) while Jerry Aronson‘s Ginsberg mega-doc project was initially released in the feature-length form in 1994.

I haven’t had a chance to dip into that two-disc set yet, so I’ve only seen two of this week’s films, and as ¡Vivan Las Antipodas! is one of my favorite docs of last year (and this year I guess), it’s my top recommendation. Just, if you missed it on the big screen, try to watch it on as large a TV as possible. Additionally the doc In Organic We Trust is also on DVD today, but I didn’t get any info on it in time to include it, and also I want to point out that Oscar nominee How to Survive a Plague has now been released on Blu-ray.

Learn more about these six new releases below:

¡Vivan Las Antipodas!

Directed by Victor Kossakovsky (Hush!)

What it’s about: A look at the world’s antipodes, which are locations that have a direct diametric opposite that’s also on land (there are fewer of these places than you’d think). Kossakovsky takes us to Argentina, Shanghai, Botswana, Spain, Russia, Chile, New Zealand and Hawaii, where we see a man living next to flowing lava.

How it’s about: Here’s what I wrote of the film from True/False last year: “A remarkably cinematic work…stunning in both its photographic mastery and its conceptual design, this film is a spectacular work of art…While the cinematography alone would be worthwhile by itself, it’s the clever juxtapositions and visual trickery achieved through editing and special effects that make this film so special. Kossakovsky plays with the idea of antipodes, giving us plenty of upside-down shots, reflective bodies of water, horizontal split-screens imaginatively presenting the world as having a literal top and bottom. And we’re shown paralleled views of life and land, what matters in the world and what matter makes up the world. Much of Antipodas is like a game, it causes us to look closely and from a distance, perusing the frame for clues as to what we’re looking at and how to see things differently after the film is done.”

Recommended if you like: Life in a Day; Koyaanisqatsi; TV’s Planet Earth

Awards: Winner of the Cinematic Vision Award at the 2012 Silverdocs Documentary Festival. Winner of the True Vision Award at the 2012 True/False Film Festival. Winner of the RIFF Environmental Award at the 2011 Reykjavik International Film Festival. Winner of the Mayahuel Award for Award for Best Iberoamerican Documentary at the 2012 Guadalajara Mexican Film Festival. Winner of the Best Full-Length Documentary award at the 2011 Message to Man International Documentary Festival. Winner of the WWF Award for the Best Film in the Habitat Section at the 2012 Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival. Winner of the Golden Gentian – City of Trento Grand Prize at the 2012 Trento International Film Festival. Winner of the Ecomountain Award at the 2012 Cervino CineMountain Film Festival. Winner of the Grand Prix at Yekaterinburg 2012. Nominated for the Best Documentary Award at the 2011 European Film Awards.

DVD Extras: None

Clip from the film:

Rockshow

Directed by Paul McCartney (Magical Mystery Tour)

Starring Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney and the rest of Wings, Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi

Edited by Thelma Schoonmaker (Woodstock; most of Martin Scorsese’s movies) with Marc Cerutti and Paul Stein

What it’s about: “In 1975 and 1976 Paul McCartney and Wings undertook the epic Wings Over the World tour, the largest scale tour they would ever undertake as a band. From this tour came both the legendary Wings over America triple live album and the concert film Rockshow. Although filmed on this tour at the enormous Kingdome in Seattle, Rockshow, originally a cut down version of the concert, was not premiered until November 1980 in New York and April 1981 in London. It was released on Betamax and later on laserdisc. Now for the first time the complete full length concert is being made available fully restored from the original 35mm film and with restored & remastered sound, including a 5.1 mix for the first time. This is Paul McCartney and Wings live on stage in a concert that is destined to live forever!” – Official synopsis.

Track Listing: 1) “Venus And Mars” / “Rock Show” / “Jet” 2) “Let Me Roll It” 3) “Spirits Of Ancient Egypt” 4) “Medicine Jar” 5) “Maybe I’m Amazed” 6) “Call Me Back Again” 7) “Lady Madonna” 8) “The Long And Winding Road” 9) “Live And Let Die” 10) “Picasso’s Last Words” 11) “Richard Cory” 12) “Bluebird” 13) “I’ve Just Seen A Face” 14) “Blackbird” 15) “Yesterday” 16) “You Gave Me The Answer” 17) “Magneto And Titanium Man” 18) “Go Now” 19) “My Love” 20) “Listen To What The Man Said” 21) “Let ‘Em In” 22) “Time To Hide” 23) “Silly Love Songs” 24) “Beware My Love” 25) “Letting Go” 26) “Band on the Run” 27) “Hi Hi Hi” 28) “Soily”

How it’s about: “My jaw dropped due to the sheer awesomeness of Paul McCartney’s vocals. Until now unavailable (legally) on any format except Betamax and laserdisc, Rockshow has been expanded to its glorious 129 minute running time and remastered for Blu-ray and DVD. Numerous songs that had been edited out of previous editions have been restored. This is a composite of shows from Paul McCartney and Wings’ celebrated 1976 tour, with songs taken from shows in New York, Los Angeles, and the legendary Kingdome show in Seattle…The transfer is very good considering the inconsistencies of the source materials. This was 1976 and shooting film in a dark, cavernous arena simply did not produce the same results as what we’re accustomed to today. Some footage is startlingly sharp, while other shots (especially medium and wide shots) are soft to varying degrees. The lighting is kind of drab and dull by modern standards, but it’s never difficult to see exactly what the musicians are doing.” – Chaz Lipp, Cinema Lowdown

DVD Extras: Backstage feature, “A Very Lovely Party on tour with Paul McCartney & Wings.” Digibook packaging with a new essay by radio personality Paul Gambaccini.

Also available on Blu-ray.

Clip of “Maybe I’m Amazed!” from the film:

Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary

Directed by Stephen Vittoria (One Bright Shining Moment)

What it’s about: Mumia Abu-Jamal, prolific writer and journalist who has been on Death Row for 30 years for the murder of a Philadelphia police officer.

Interviewees: Cornel West, Alice Walker, Angela Davis, Rubin Hurricane Carter, Dick Gregory, Peter Coyote, Ruby Dee, M-1, Giancarlo Esposito, Amy Goodman, Aya de Leon, Dave Zirin, Tariq Ali, Michael Parenti, Ramona Africa, Johanna Fernandez, Pam Africa and Jerry Quickley.

How it’s about: First of all, this is a long documentary at two hours. That’s not a bad thing, just something worth noting. It’s a packed-in film focused on the life and writings of Mumia without tackling the most expected aspect, his own personal legal case. You won’t hear anything about the cop shooting or the trial or arguments as to innocence or guilt. And that’s a very interesting angle to take considering he’s a figure whose freedom seems to be supported and called for irregardless of the crime.

It’s also a very different film in its mix of interviews with on screen “narrators” reciting excerpts of Mumia’s writings as well as quotes from historical figures and people who have been critical of the man and his fans and supporters (the most effective “narrator” is a little girl who has some strong language to speak). There’s even Peter Coyote doing some traditional narration, yet he’s also sometimes on screen, too, and includes bits of opinion here and there.

Vittoria has a lot going on with address of subject matter and issues that Mumia has written about, such as African-American poverty, the prison and justice system and the idea that Philadelphia has always been one of the racist cities in the U.S. Maybe he could have edited down the running time, but most of what’s in the film feels necessary, and even though it’s kind of all over the place it still plays pretty tightly.

DVD extras: Vittoria’s 25-minute short film on Abu-Jamal’s case, Manufacturing Guilt.

Clip from the film:

The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg

Directed by Jerry Aronson (Oscar nominee for The Divided Trail: A Native American Odyssey)

Interviews: Joan Baez, Beck, Bono, Stan Brakhage, William S. Burroughs, Johnny Depp, Philip Glass, Abbie Hoffman, Hunter S. Thompson, Jack Johnson, Ken Kesey, Timothy Leary, Paul McCartney, Jonas Mekas, Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo, Ed Sanders, Patti Smith, Andy Warhol and Yoko Ono

What it’s about: “Aronson spent 25 years accumulating more than 120 hours of film on Allen Ginsberg, resulting in this comprehensive portrait of one of America’s greatest poets. This deluxe 2-disc DVD set contains the Director’s cut of the award-winning documentary updated and re-mastered. This DVD set includes never-before seen material and historical interviews with friends, family and contemporaries and the latest generation of artists influenced by Ginsberg. This 8-hour compilation illuminates the last 60 years of American culture and the uncertainties and possibilities of current times.” – Official synopsis.

How it’s about: “A work of zero pretensions. This modest documentary seeks to honor its subject, not to bury or compete with it. Humility is an effective strategy: I laughed a little, I cried a little. The spirits were lifted…The end product is frankly adulatory. No reason why it shouldn’t be.” – Darren Reidy, Village Voice

DVD Extras: Exclusive Interviews; Featurette: The Making of The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg; Ginsberg reading selected poems; Bob Dylan and Allen Ginsberg at Jack Kerouac’s grave; William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg at Naropa University; Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg at City Lights bookstore; The Making of the Music Video “A Ballad of the Skeletons”; Ginsberg guides us through an exhibition of his photographs; Excerpts from Scenes from Allen’s Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit by Jonas Mekas; Ginsberg photo gallery; Director’s photo gallery; Memorial for Allen Ginsberg.

New trailer:

A Labor of Love

Directed by Robert Flaxman and Daniel Goldman

Starring Henri Charr (director of The Last Affair)

What it’s about: “In the winter of 1974, a naive independent filmmaker based in Chicago found funding to make his first feature, to be titled The Last Affair.. The one stipulation mandated by his financial backers was that the movie needed to include hardcore sex scenes. A Labor of Love documents the ensuing heartfelt and earnest attempt to create an X-rated movie. Between struggles with the cast and problems with crew and locations, the production forges on in a manner NBC News described as ‘A true human comedy’ and Hadrian Belove of Cinefamily acclaimed as ‘a lost vérité masterpiece … a movie-about-movies documentary classic.’” – Official synopsis.

How it’s about: “An absorbing document that is likely to put even the dirtiest old man off porno movies for at least a month. Because what A Labor of Love captures is exactly what pornography cannot permit: the human reality of the sexual experience. This is demonstrated most memorably in the failure of the leading Man to achieve what my colleague Ron Powers once called ‘the sine qua non of the hard-core film.’” – Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

DVD Extras: Video interview with Robert Flaxman. Audio interview with Flaxman and John Iltis. Original theatrical trailer.

New trailer:

Ferlinghetti: A Rebirth of Wonder

Directed by Christopher Felver (cinematographer on Black White + Gray)

What it’s about: “In this definitive documentary, director Christopher Felver crafts an incisive, sharply wrought portrait that reveals Ferlinghetti’s true role as catalyst for numerous literary careers and for the Beat movement itself. One-on-one interviews with Ferlinghetti, made over the course of a decade, touch upon a rich mélange of characters and events that began to unfold in postwar America. These events include the publication of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, William S. Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, and Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, as well as the divisive events of the Vietnam war, the sexual revolution, and this country’s perilous march towards intellectual and political bankruptcy. Since its inception in 1953, Ferlinghetti’s City Lights Bookstore quickly became an iconic literary institution that embodied social change and literary freedom. Continuing to thrive for over five decades, it is a cornerstone of America’s modern literary and cultural history.” – official synopsis

Featuring: Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Dennis Hopper, Billy Collins, Dave Eggers, Anne Waldman, Michael McClure, Lorenzo Ferlinghetti, Amiri Baraka, David Amram, Erik Bauersfeld Giada Diano, Bob Dylan, Kenneth Rexroth, Robert Scheer, Jack Hirschman, Bill Morgan, David Meltzer, Sylvia Whitman, Al Bendich, George Whitman, Paul Yamazaki, Herb Gold and Jean-Jacques Lebel.

How it’s about: “At times, the film is a mixture of varying forms of multimedia (archive footage, interviews, spoken verse) that recalls Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Howl in its effort to approximate the free-associative energy of the work of Ferlinghetti and the subsequent Beat legends he championed and mentored. At other times, Felver follows an elderly Ferlinghetti around as he visits with his family and reads verses aloud in a nostalgic gambit that recalls the Gary Snyder documentary The Practice of the Wild.” – Chuck Bowen, Slant

DVD extras: Ferlinghetti reads his poem “The History of the Airplane.”

Trailer:

While I’m not certain the documentary seen above is actually a real thing, it’s one highlight of the very interesting crop of films for which we’ve got previews this week. In addition to the film Ghostbusters, subjects receiving the documentary treatment include some legends in design, an important figure in folk music, a major international voice in combat journalism, a modern-day circus strongman, people who’ve been the sole survivor of a plane crash and literal killer whales from Sea World.

Watch them all below.

Another Day of Life

I love documentaries that use animation to aid in the storytelling. I don’t mean the occasional cartoons illustrating points or facts but really great animation that depicts parts of the nonfiction story for which there is no footage and where testimonial isn’t enough on its own. Like Camp 14. This film’s animation is strikingly detailed, too. Directed by Demian Nenow (animator behind the acclaimed short Paths of Hate) and Raul de la Fuente (Nomadak Tx), the film is based on the same-named autobiographical book of Ryszard Kapuscinski, the late Polish journalist, about his coverage of the Angola Civil War in the 1970s. Thanks to the trailer I’m pretty excited for this, but unfortunately it’s not set to come out until 2015.

Bending Steel

I missed this at Hot Docs, but it looks really interesting and now I’m regretting not seeing it then. The debut of filmmaker Dave Carroll, the doc profiles a novice strongman named Chris Schoeck on his way to becoming pro and working at the Coney Island Circus Sideshow. Bending Steel is co-written, produced and shot by Ryan Scafuro, who worked as a cinematographer for The Daily Show. While no official release date has been announced (the filmmakers appear to be self-distributing), there is a free screening on the beach at Coney Island on July 8, as part of this year’s Rooftop Films series.

Blackfish

Here’s the first full trailer for the Sundance hit. I previously shared the teaser back in February, and that was a deeply upsetting spot focused on attacks. This one goes much deeper than I would expect even at two and a half minutes. I nearly feel like I’ve gotten the general idea of the film and the angles it takes on the issue of orca captivity and the chance of injury and death caused by them. It does come off more as a scary thriller, though, on the part of making the whales still seem like dangerous animals rather than on humans doing horrible things to them in the first place. Directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite, this doc remains one of my most anticipated of the year. Magnolia Pictures and CNN Films will release it theatrically on July 19.

Design is One: Lella & Massimo Vignelli

I don’t know a whole lot about design. That’s my brother’s game. But I love films about it. You’ve got Gary Hustwit’s trilogy (Helvetica; Objectified; Urbanized) and Eames: The Architect & The Painter, for instance, and now this one about the Vignellis. All I really know is that I’m a huge fan of Massimo Vignelli‘s 1972 subway map. The doc is by co-directors Kathy Brew (producer of Regret to Inform) and Robert Guerra (Langlois) and will be out soon via First Run Features, but there is no release date info yet. There will be screenings of the film next month in Seattle at the ByDesign 13 series.

In Search of Blind Joe Death – The Saga of John Fahey

James Cullingham‘s hour-long documentary on folk guitar legend John Fahey (“the father of American Primitive Guitar”) won the Platinum Remi Award back in April at the 2013 Worldfest-Houston International Film Festival. It features interviews with Pete Townshend of The Who, Joey Burns of Calexico, Chris Funk of The Decemberists, Dr. Demento and blues guitarist Terry Robb. Following special events and festival screenings in Paris, Copenhagen, Madrid, Australia and Maryland over the next two months, First Run Features opens the film theatrically in NYC on August 16.

Soul Survivor

Imagine being in a plane crash and not only surviving but being the only person to do so. There are actually more than a few people who’ve experienced such a miracle wrapped inside of a tragedy, and this doc lets us meet four of them. The first is the film’s primary character, a man who ventures out to find others like him in order to know people who understand what he went through. This seems like a fascinating story and subject matter and the film, by Ky Dickens (Fish Out of Water), looks good enough that I’m surprised I haven’t heard about it. There’s no indication that it has played any festivals, though it has been screening in preview events in places where some of the crashes occurred. No official theatrical release date has been announced, but it will play Lexington on July 18, and Reno and Phoenix will follow.

Spook Central

Maybe you’ve heard about Room 237, the documentary about crazy theories and analyses of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. I guess that’s not going to be an isolated occurrence, and I guess that’s not a bad thing even if it makes that doc less significant. Already we’ve got a trailer here for a similar documentary featuring Australian fans talking about different theories and analyses of Ghostbusters, the 1984 blockbuster comedy. Some of the points made in the film have to do with smoking, junk food, Coca-Cola, ADHD and sex. I wonder how much of it is argued well and if there’s anything as crazy as the moon landing hoax part of Room 237. People are wondering if this is a real thing. It seems so, and even if it’s not, it’s a fun trailer. According to producer/director Ivo Shandor (that’s a name from the film, by the way, so who knows what his real name is), the doc will be out this September.

This interview was originally published during the Sundance Film Festival on January 14, 2013. It is being reposted today as the film makes its television debut tonight on another network and will be screening at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, which begins Thursday. 

One of my most anticipated documentaries of this year’s Sundance Film Festival is Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer, which follows the trial of three members of the Russian feminist punk rock group Pussy Riot. Less than a year ago, Maria “Masha” Alyokhina, Nadezhda “Nadia” Tolokonnikova and Yekaterina “Katya” Samutsevich were arrested for the collective’s performance in a Moscow cathedral, which was in protest of Vladimir Putin’s reelection.

By August they were all convicted and sentenced, with much of the world infuriated by this human rights travesty, likening the events to Stalin’s “show trials.” It’s an ongoing story of appeals and international responses, with one of the young women out on probation and the other two now serving time as political prisoners.

Clearly the film has had a quick turnaround, and that’s partly why I haven’t yet seen even a teaser let alone the whole feature. But I think this will be an important documentary, possibly this year’s Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, and so I took the opportunity, sight unseen, to interview Oscar-nominated producer Mike Lerner (Hell and Back Again), who makes his directorial debut with Pussy Riot, and his co-director, Maxim Pozdorovkin. The following exchange was conducted via email:

Documentary Channel Blog: What drew you guys to make this documentary?

Mike Lerner: What drew me was the image of Pussy Riot performing in Red Square in front of the Kremlin. I wondered, who are these people, what do they want, what the hell are they going to do next?

Maxim Pozdorovkin: One of the first things that drew me was a sense of a shared past with the characters. We had lived through similar times, listened to the same loud records, read the same poets and philosophers. I have found myself at family dinner tables arguing that Russian society could benefit from a feminist upheaval. The parents of the three members of Pussy Riot recalled having similar arguments with their daughters. As I listened to the girls’ testimonies in the courtroom, I discovered more similarities: a commitment to leftist politics, a love of the Russian avant-garde and its legacy, an interest in performance art as a political force, a rejection of the neo-liberal policies of the Yeltsin era.

Co-directors Mike Lerner (L) and Maxim Pozdorovkin (R).

How did the two of you come together as co-directors?

MIKE: Maxim and I are friends, and I had started making the film already when Maxim turned up at the court in Moscow where the Pussy Riot trial was going on. I knew immediately that I wanted him to help me tell this story. His insights and understanding of Russian culture combined with our mutual love of punk rock have been hugely inspiring in the making of the film.

MAXIM: This seemed like the perfect story on which to collaborate. When I first met Mike, we got along immediately having similar taste in film, music, and politics. It’s hard to imagine a better foundation for a partnership.

Mike, how did the decision to direct come about, and how did you find directing as opposed to just producing?

MIKE: When I saw this story in the press I immediately knew I had to make this film. It speaks so much to everything I am passionate about, art, music, dissent, thinking for yourself, defense of justice and the pursuit of gender and social equality. I think the main difference between producing and directing is that producing is all about the big picture — seeing the film in all its aspects and the issues and problems that threaten its success whilst directing is all about falling in love with the story, attention to detail, single-minded focus on how the story will best be told. It’s been quite a steep learning curve, and combining both of these perspectives is exhausting but just about the most satisfying thing I have ever done, and I am incredibly fortunate to have had this opportunity.

This appears to be a very quick production given that it’s not even been a year since the initial cathedral performance/protest. When did you hit the ground and begin shooting?

MIKE: We started shooting in March, soon after the arrest. I knew I wanted the film to be about the trial so we had to wait for that process to be carried out. I also knew that we wanted to end the film with the verdict — well, the appeal verdict as it turned out.

MAXIM: After the verdict and the appeal, I knew that we had an incredible story on our hands and needed to make the film as quickly as possible. Once I came back from Moscow, we plunged straight into the edit and will only come up for air once in Park City.

And how did you know when to stop filming what is still an ongoing human rights story?

MIKE: True, the story of what has happened to Nadia, Masha and Katia is ongoing, but the story of the Trial of Pussy Riot has had its effect. Their trial tells us a great deal about the viability of freedom of expression not only in Russia but in the rest of the world.

MAXIM: While the Pussy Riot movement continues, the story of Nadia, Masha and Katia had a very clear ending. Our film tells the story of their incredible “punk adventure,” as one of the girls puts it.

What is your primary aim with the film, to tell an interesting character-based nonfiction narrative or to put out a call to action in support of these women?

MAXIM: As Mike and I began to discuss the film, it became apparently clear that once Nadia, Masha, and Katia had been arrested and had their balaclavas removed, the biggest question became: Who are these three girls and how did they end up where they are? Looking behind the masks, we uncovered three incredible stories. Through these characters we look at Russia today, its history, the role of feminism in society, the threat of religious fundamentalism and, most importantly, the political power of art. The epic story of these girls is an extraordinary window onto all these issues.

MIKE: The characters of this film are obviously important (and compelling to say the least), but the interesting thing about Pussy Riot is their desire for anonymity — their actions are the important thing, not their personalities. If there is a call to action it is for all of us to examine the limits of freedom of expression in our own society. Freedom is always being attacked on many levels and it takes people like Nadia, Masha and Katia to show how important it is not to accept any limit on the defense of justice. One aim of this film is to try and convey an insight into the current state of freedom in Russian and the power of artists to highlight injustice.

What sort of access does the film present?

MAXIM: It is no exaggeration to say that the access the film provides to the three arrested members of Pussy Riot is nothing short of incredible. Not wanting to give away too much of the film, I’ll just say that the audience will be up close and personal with Nadia, Masha, and Katia in ways that they are not expecting. While the filmmaking process was full of detours and unexpected twists, the courts and the Russian news agencies were incredibly helpful in providing some of the material for this film as well as access to all stages of the trial.

MIKE: Obviously the three main protagonists were only available for limited periods to talk. But what the film does is, through the trial, allow these women to speak for themselves. We do have great insight about them from their friends and family, but due to their incredible performance in court we get a very complete picture of who these women are and what they are hoping to achieve.

Did either of your backgrounds help in any way with the access or how you approached the subject matter?

MAXIM: In terms of personal access, having a shared background and worldview (not to mention a shared love of punk rock and avant-garde art) with the protagonists has really helped me understand all the implications of this story with all its rich historical and social resonances.

MIKE: I think what helped with our access was our early enthusiasm for the story and our love of punk rock.

In one short sentence, what is the best reason you can give for Sundance audiences to check out Pussy Riot — A Punk Prayer?

MIKE: The stars of this film, Nadia, Masha and Katia are three of the most remarkable women you will ever meet, and their courage, wit and sheer balls will make your visit to the movie theater one that you will never forget.

MAXIM: The film is entertaining, dramatic, shocking, thought provoking and hilarious — and that’s just the first twenty minutes. It’s about a Pussy Riot unleashed onto an unsuspecting world. What more is there to say?

Pussy Riot — A Punk Prayer premieres on HBO tonight and screens at NYC’s Lincoln Center as part of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival on June 17 and 18. 

This week’s theatrical releases for documentary include three films I haven’t yet seen. But all are high on my to-see list. I’m fascinated by the idea of Morton Downey, Jr., who I knew of but never really watched as a kid, and that’s good enough reason to see the doc on him, Évocateur. I’m a fan of a lot of what 4th Row Films puts out (such as Kati With an I and Making the Boys), so I’m willing to give Hey Bartender a shot. And, most of all, Dirty Wars is a really hot film right now due to its relevance to the drone conversation as well as its overall investigation into contemporary covert wars. It sounds like a fascinating mix for doc fans.

Learn about about these three new films below.

Dirty Wars

Directed by Rick Rowley (This Is What Democracy Looks Like)

Written by journalist Jeremy Scahill (author of best-seller Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army and the accompany book for this film, Dirty Wars: The World Is A Battlefield) and David Riker (non-doc Sleep Dealer)

What it’s about: “What begins as a report into a U.S. night raid gone terribly wrong in a remote corner of Afghanistan quickly turns into a global investigation of the secretive and powerful Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). As Scahill digs deeper into the activities of JSOC, he is pulled into a world of covert operations unknown to the public and carried out across the globe by men who do not exist on paper and will never appear before Congress. In military jargon, JSOC teams “find, fix, and finish” their targets, who are selected through a secret process. No target is off limits for the “kill list,” including U.S. citizens. Drawn into the stories and lives of the people he meets along the way, Scahill is forced to confront the painful consequences of a war spinning out of control, as well as his own role as a journalist.” – From the official synopsis.

How it’s about: “Mr. Scahill, 38, narrates the film like a hard-boiled gumshoe following leads in a film noir. The cinematography includes some noirish touches, and there is somber music by the Kronos Quartet. Like Inside Job, Charles Ferguson’s incendiary exposé of Wall Street malpractice, Dirty Wars cuts to the chase.” – Stephen Holden, New York Times

Awards: Winner of the Cinematography Award for Documentary at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, “For elevating the art of observational cinema through sophisticated lensing and electric color palette.”

Now Showing: Now playing at IFC Center and Lincoln Plaza Cinemas in NYC, the Landmark Theater West LA in Los Angeles and the E Street Cinema in Washington, DC. Opens wider next week in cities including Boston, Chicago and Berkeley. For more info on these and upcoming openings, check the film’s screenings page.

Trailer:

Évocateur: The Morton Downey Jr. Movie

Directed by Seth Kramer, Daniel A. Miller and Jeremy Newberger (co-directors of The Linguists)

What it’s about: “Controversial talk-show host Morton Downey, Jr. In the late ‘80s, Downey tore apart the traditional talk format by turning debate of current issues into a gladiator pit. His blow-smoke-in-your-face style drew a rabid cult following, but also the title “Father of Trash Television.” Was his show a platform for the working man or an incubator for Snooki and The Situation? [Évocateur] dissects the mind and motivation of television’s most notorious agitator. Lower the safety bar for a rollercoaster ride through Downey’s euphoric ascent to fame and nauseating plummet to infamy. ” – From the official synopsis.

Interviewees: Herman Cain, Pat Buchanan, Chris Elliott, Gloria Allred, Sally Jessy Raphael, Alan Dershowitz, Curtis Sliwa, Richard Bey and Steven Pagones

Herman Cain and Curtis Sliwa in ÉVOCATEUR: THE MORTON DOWNEY JR. MOVIE, a Magnolia Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

How it’s about: “[Kramer, Miller and Newberger] entertainingly chronicle his rise and fall, which occurred, in television terms, in blindingly quick fashion…a fairly prosaic, straightforward affair. But its central figure is so colorfully compelling that it’s nonetheless riveting from start to finish.” - Frank Scheck, The Hollywood Reporter

Now Showing: In NY, L.A. and NJ. Opens next week in Miami. For more info on these and upcoming openings, see the film’s playdates page.

Trailer:

Hey Bartender

Directed by Douglas Tirola (All In: The Poker Movie)

Produced by Tirola and Susan Bedusa (Kati With an I; All In: The Poker Movie)

What it’s about: “Two bartenders trying to achieve their dreams through the world of bartending. After being injured a Marine turns his goals to becoming a rock star bartender at the best cocktail bar in the world. A former bank executive who bought the corner bar in his hometown struggles to keep it afloat in a community that no longer values a place where everyone knows your name. Featuring the most famous bartenders in the world along with unprecedented access to the most exclusive bars in New York City” – From the official synopsis.

Commentary by: Graydon Carter, Danny Meyer and Amy Sacco.

How it’s about: “Promising and enjoyable when Tirola simply trains his camera on one of his many superstar bartenders, among them Graydon Carter and Dale DeGroff, allowing them to wax eloquent on their trade as an existential art of connection among people. They’re right, but they’re also hams, which is precisely in keeping with the mythology they’re charged with putting forth. Various kinds of bartenders are discussed—the sage, the mixologist, the rock star—and a number of drinks are fashioned in hypnotic slow motion that emphasizes the aesthetic satisfaction of a true cocktail. The governing theme is similar to many of the foodie docs that have been released over the last few years: Any and all aspects of life are capable, and worthy, of being elevated to the level of art.” - Chuck Bowen, Slant

Now Showing: Village East Cinema in NYC. Opens next week in L.A., Columbus, Denver, San Diego, Seattle, Tulsa and Wichita. For more info on these and upcoming openings see the film’s Facebook page.

Trailer:

This Friday, as part of our weekly music-themed “Soundcheck” series, Documentary Channel presents an encore presentation of The Hip Hop Project, an inspiring film from 2006 produced by Bruce Willis, Queen Latifah, Q-Tip and Qiana Wallace (manager of Q-Tip and A Tribe Called Quest) and featuring Willis, Doug E. Fresh and Russell Simmons. The focus is on a program for teens in New York City (the titular Hip Hop Project) started by a formerly homeless kid named Chris ‘Kazi’ Rolle, who now empowers his young students by teaching them to express, create and collaborate and ultimately record a hip hop CD together (also available on iTunes) after four years of soul searching and talent honing.

This was one of the first docs I ever reviewed back when I was a staff writer for AOL’s Cinematical blog, filing praise from its premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival (then it was also known as “Word.Life”). Here’s some of what I had to say at the time:

[The Hip Hop Project] is about a cycle of expression and inspiration born out of Kazi’s own problems growing up, and so the film does well to follow his soul-searching journey as he revisits the Bahamas home where he was abandoned as a child, and also as he later reunites with his estranged mother. In tracking the origins in addition to the proceedings of Kazi’s program, the documentary gives hope that the cycle will continue, and that not only is the featured incarnation of HHP only the beginning, but that HHP itself will inspire the creation of more programs like it.

As far as I can tell, the Hip Hop Project still exists to a certain extent (see the organization’s website and Facebook page), and even more so is its original umbrella organization, Art Start. Kazi also continues to inspire and empower people through different projects and speaking engagements. As for other subjects in the film, I only know that “Princess” (aka Diana Lemon) took over as head of the HHP and also started her own thing, a music showcase specifically for women to express themselves called The Power of the P. She also runs an annual fundraiser for Sickle Cell Research. See her website bio for more of an update.

The Hip Hop Project has won several awards, including Best Documentary honors at international film fests in Harlem, Savannah, the Turks and Caicos Islands and Indianapolis (Heartland) and Audience Awards at Zurich, Urbanworld Vibe, Spaghetti Junction and Martha’s Vineyard African American fests. Also the Boston Film Festival gave it an award for Best Score.

Here is the official trailer for the doc:

John Huston’s ‘The Battle of San Pietro’

Next Thursday is the 69th anniversary of the landing at Normandy during World War II. Now we know the date of June 6 as D-Day and commemorate the occasion with a day of remembrance — even if it’s not an official national holiday. Documentary Channel will pay its respects to those who took part in that operation as well as all veterans and casualties of WWII with a curation of films about the conflict, including films from the war and later films about it.

Each night from Saturday through Wednesday (June 1-5), you’ll find one or two documentaries in honor of the occasion and then we are devoting all of Thursday (June 6) to a marathon event presenting 12 separate films (some of them repeats from the lead-up days). There are a lot of classics in the bunch from important filmmakers like John Huston, John Ford, Frank Capra, Gregg Toland, Stuart Heisler, David Miller and Robert Drew, so don’t miss them.

Below is some info on the 17 films being shown as part of our “Remembering D-Day” program as well as separate clips or promos for each. First, though, here’s a brief preview for the whole series:

Tin Can Sailors Will Not Be Forgotten

Director Greg Berg made this documentary in honor of his father and the men who served alongside him aboard the USS Morris, a destroyer that was involved in the Guadalcanal Campaign in the Pacific during World War II and barely avoided being sunk by Kamikaze. The film is based around the annual reunion of survivors who make up the USS Morris Veteran’s Association and features, through first-person interviews and narration provided by many of these vets, an oral history of that part of the war. The score by co-director Stephen Greaves won a Gold Medal award at the 2011 Park City Film Music Festival. [Saturday, June 1, 8pm ET]

Below is the DocTalk segment on Tin Can Sailors Will Not Be Forgotten featuring Berg and Greaves discussing the film:

Prelude to War

The first installment of Frank Capra‘s Why We Fight films produced for the American war effort, this educational propaganda film went on to become one of the four titles to jointly win the inaugural Oscar for Best Documentary in 1943. At first intended compulsorily for the training of enlisted men as a way to show the cause of World War II and the reason the U.S. has entered the conflict, it later played theatrically to the public, for the same purpose. Hollywood actor Walter Huston narrates the story of the lead-up as the film also compares the freedoms of America with the “slave world” dictatorships of Hitler, Mussolini and Yamamoto. Also part of the National Film Registry as part of the whole series, it’s also one of the wartime projects that effects legend Ray Harryhausen worked on. [Sunday, June 2, 8pm ET]

Here is a short preview piece about the Why We Fight series featuring appearances from Gore Vidal, Graydon Carter and John Eisenhower (son of the president):

Moscow Strikes Back

One of the above film’s co-winners of the inaugural Oscar for Best Documentary, this Soviet film gives an account of the Battle of Moscow, when the Allied nation defensively defeated the Germans in Moscow in late 1941. Directed by Ilya Kopalin and Leonid Varlamov and shot on the front lines, the film was given a translation for its U.S. release by later-blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter Albert Maltz and journalist-turned-screenwriter Eliot Paul. New narration was also recorded for this version by actor Edward G. Robinson. [Monday, June 3, 8pm ET]

Here is the first part of the film to give you a tease:

Let There Be Light

The third war documentary directed by John Huston (who had his father, Walter Huston, narrate), this film was made by the U.S. Army Signal Corps at request by the government in 1946 but after minimal showings went unreleased for 34 years due to its controversial subject matter. The focus is on soldiers’ emotional and psychological recovery after the war and was mostly shot at a psychiatric hospital on Long Island. Vets are treated with drugs, hypnosis and shock treatment — the last of which Huston claimed to have filmed but which isn’t in the film itself. After the long suppression, which was due to fears that it would discourage potential enlisters, the doc was released publicly in 1980 and also screened at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival. A few years ago it was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation through the National Film Registry, and more recently it was a huge inspiration on Paul Thomas Anderson‘s The Master, which features some lines of dialogue directly lifted from the old film. This was also the last of the wartime films that Ray Harryhausen worked on. [Monday, June 3, 9:30pm ET]

Watch a clip here:

Search for the Flyboys: Ghosts of Palau

Directed by Stephen Narisi (a producer of America’s Most Wanted) and narrated by General Wesley Clark (former Supreme Allied Commander), this documentary is about an investigation by military anthropologists to identify the remains of a missing WWII aviator who went down over the Palau Islands in the Pacific. [Tuesday, June 4, 8pm ET]

Watch a trailer for the film from its premiere on Documentary Channel:

From Two Men and a War

Direct Cinema pioneer Robert Drew (Primary; Crisis) turned the camera on himself for this 2005 documentary about his own personal experiences as a fighter pilot during WWII. The other man of the title is Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Ernie Pyle (whose words are read by actor Cliff Robertson). It’s interesting for how much the film is unlike the more famous early work by the filmmaker, as there are reenactment sequences and voiceover narration (by Drew) along with archival footage and photos — including material shot by John Huston. Anne Drew, Robert’s late wife, produced the documentary. [Wednesday, June 5, 8pm ET]

Watch a Documentary Channel promo for the film with Robert and Anne Drew talking about it:

D-Day Marathon

1:00pm: The Negro Soldier

Another doc involving the work of Frank Capra (producer) and Ray Harryhausen (special editing effects), this propaganda film directed by Stuart Heisler (The Glass Key) and written by notable early African-American filmmaker Carlton Moss was obviously focused on the African-American experience in the war and was used for recruiting black men for the effort. It was so popular that it was also eventually shown to white troops during orientation. In 2011, the Library of Congress selected the film for preservation through the National Film Registry.

1:50pm: Seeds of Destiny

Oscar winner for Best Documentary Short in 1947, this postwar propaganda film by David Miller (Sudden Fear) focuses on orphaned children who were in prison and refugee camps, bombed-out buildings and hospitals. Actor Ralph Bellamy narrates and the editing is by Gene Fowler, Jr., who’d later earn an Academy Award nomination for his work on It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Given that it helped raise more than $200 million for the relief effort, it’s considered one of the highest-grossing films of all time. Watch a brief clip below:

2:15pm: Moscow Strikes Back

3:30pm: From Two Men and a War

5:00pm: Prelude to War

6:00pm: December 7th: The Pearl Harbor Story

Produced by John Ford, who co-directed with legendary cinematographer Gregg Toland (Citizen Kane; Wuthering Heights), this propaganda film won the 1944 Oscar for Best Documentary Short. Narrated by Hollywood screenwriter James Kevin McGuinness, it’s a heavily dramatized doc about the infamous attack and was begun shortly afterward to show people the chronology of what occurred. Walter Huston is in front of the camera in this one, starring as Uncle Sam. Documentary Channel is showing the short version rather than the long-censored feature-length cut. Watch a brief clip below:

6:30pm: Treasures of the Academy – Episode 1: WWII Docs

A special presentation on documentaries that won the Academy Award during World War II. Films referenced include Prelude to War (and the Why We Fight series in general), Seeds of Destiny, With the Marines at Tarawa and John Ford‘s excellent The Battle of Midway.

7:00pm: The Battle of San Pietro

Also known as simply San Pietro, this film is directed by John Huston for producer Capra and is about the Battle of San Pietro Infine, a major step in the Allied Italian campaign in December 1943. Unlike a lot of other war documentaries of the time, which compiled footage for recruitment and training purposes, this is one that really captures the conflict first-hand, up close. Similar to John Ford’s Battle of Midway (watch it on the Doc Channel YouTube channel), you can feel the danger the director and crew put themselves in to get this material. Hardly propaganda, this is the hell of war and a battle in which more than 1000 U.S. soldiers were killed. As a result of this, the film did not receive a secondary release out to the public. The Library of Congress chose the documentary for preservation as part of the National Film Registry in 1991. Check out the beginning of the film below:

7:45pm: Women in Defense

Made just before the U.S. entered the war, this 1941 film instructed women on how they could help out during the conflict — namely working in factories or as nurses for the American Red Cross. Hollywood actress Katherine Hepburn narrates with commentary written by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. Some places credit John Ford as the director, though I’m not certain that’s a fact.

8:00pm: Let There Be Light

9:15pm: Wherever Brave Men Fight

A 1964 episode of the TV documentary series The Big Picture, this production by the Department of Defense tells the story of the U.S. Army Infantryman and is narrated by actor Vic Morrow, who at the time starred on the WWII drama series Combat!. See him in a brief clip below:

10:00pm: Iwo Jima: 50 Years of Memories

This 1996 documentary directed by Paul Molina tells the story of the Battle of Iwo Jima and features men talking about their experiences there as part of “Operation Detachment” for the first time in half a century.