Directed by Shosh Shlam and Hilla Medalia Produced by Medalia, Shlam and Neta Zwebner-Zaibert Released by Kino Lorber Films Mandarin with English subtitles USA/Israel. 79 min. Not rated On its own, the Internet can be a scary place. Compounded with addiction, there’s no telling how deeply the rabbit hole might take us. The documentary Web Junkie […]
Produced and Directed by Tracy Droz Tragos and Andrew Droz Palermo Released by the Orchard USA. 91 min. Not rated While watching this film, I thought back to the times that I discussed the topic of poverty in America with my students in government class. It never ceased to amaze me that many of these […]
Directed by Mitra Farahani Produced by Marjaneh Moghimi Released by Music Box Films Farsi with English subtitles USA/Iran/France. 97 min. Not rated Some people make living an art form. This portrait of the artist as an old man follows Bahman Mohassess, an exiled Iranian painter and sculptor, as he attempts to live (and die) according […]
Directed by John Bruno, Andrew Wight, and Ray Quint Produced by Wight and Brett Popplewell Released by National Geographic Entertainment USA. 90 min. Rated PG People often grow up fantasizing about outer space and/or the Earth’s oceans, the two great canvasses available for boundless possibility and discovery. James Cameron is at the far end of the […]
Produced and Directed by Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren Directed by Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren Released by Drafthouse Films USA. 110 min. Not rated In August 1972, John Wojtowicz robbed a bank in Brooklyn, taking hostages and enduring a 13-hour standoff with the police. The unsuccessful heist granted Wojtowicz 15 minutes of fame, which […]
This year, the Tribeca Film Festival gave awards to pointed portraits of political engagement. These documentaries raise thoughtful and tangled issues about how the very personal becomes political. Point and Shoot A shy OCD-beset young guy, Matt VanDyke, left his mother’s Baltimore basement and his girlfriend for a North African-to-Middle Eastern odyssey, and plunged into […]
Directed by Alex Gibney Produced by Gibney and Jack Gulick Released by Kino Lorber US/UK/Nigeria/France. 119 min. Not Rated Finding Fela started out as the making-of the Tony-winning Broadway show Fela!, before journeying with the American production’s tour to superstar Fela Kuti’s home base in Lagos, Nigeria. With the discovery of rare performance outtakes and […]
Directed by Steve James Produced by Zak Piper, James and Garrett Basch Released by Magnolia Pictures USA. 118 min. Rated R Perhaps the most shocking thing about the Roger Ebert documentary Life Itself is the revelation that Ebert became a full-time paid film critic at a major newspaper in the third largest city in the […]
Directed by Dan Krauss Produced by Krauss and Linda Davis Written by Kruass, Lawrence Lerew and Davis Released by Oscilloscope Laboratories USA. 79 min. Not rated As a result of the violence they witness, soldiers often walk a fine line between morality and sanity, a demarcation that’s been well fictionalized in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of […]