Produced & Directed by Joe Brewster & Michèle Stephenson Released by Impact Partners USA. 135 min. Not Rated Raising and educating middle-class African-American boys is seen first-hand, cinema verité style, over nine years in the fitful, occasionally insightful, and intimately revealing documentary American Promise. Filmmakers Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson initially picked up their cameras, […]
Directed & Edited by Steve Hoover Produced by Danny Yourd Released by Blood Brother LLC/Tugg Inc. USA. 93 min. Not rated Director Steve Hoover takes his camera and follows his best friend, Rocky Braat, on an adventure that many would never choose. While spending time in Chennai, India, on vacation, Rocky visited an orphanage, home […]
Directed by Roger Ross Williams Written by Williams, Richard Hankin & Benjamin Gray Produced by Julie Goldman & Williams USA. 90 min. Not rated For viewers who know about the Christian Right’s proselytizing in Africa, this film may be too basic. But for those who are unaware, it’s a real eye-opener. The idea that American missionaries […]
Produced & Directed by Megumi Sasaki Released by Fine Line Media USA. 86 min. Not rated Here’s a superhero sequel movie worth seeing! The Vogels, mild-mannered retirees Herb the postal worker and Dorothy the librarian, thrilled viewers in director Megumi Sasaki’s first documentary feature, Herb & Dorothy (2008), and won more admirers after it was […]
Director of Photography/Directed by Kalyanee Mam Produced by Mam & Ratanak Leng Released by Migrant Films Cambodia/USA. 83 min. Not rated Filmmaker Kalyanee Mam (director of photography for the Oscar-winning documentary Inside Job) returns to her native Cambodia for a story of globalization and its impact on people and nature. She introduces viewers to three […]
Produced & Directed by Nick Ryan Written by Mark Monroe Released by Sundance Selects Ireland/UK/USA/Switzerland. 99 min. Rated R In early August 2008, 11 of the 18 mountain climbers who reached the top of K2, the world’s second highest peak, died during the descent, which is regarded as the deadliest 48 hours on the Pakistani […]
Programming a vast array of some 288 features films, the Toronto International Film Festival offers a varied and overwhelming selection. One course of action is to see films by known directors or that have played at other festivals, with some allowance for happenstance, taking a chance on a movie based on the very brief synopsis […]
Directed by James Franco & Travis Mathews Produced by James Franco, Vince Jolivette, Travis Mathews, Iris Torres & Keith Wilson. Written by Mathews USA. 60 min. Not rated With Val Lauren, James Franco, Travis Mathews, Christian Patrick, Brenden Gregory, Brad Roberge, Colin Chavez, A.J. Goodrich, Michael Lannan Filmmakers James Franco and Travis Mathews collaborate to […]
Directed by Sophie Huber Produced by Christian Davi, Chiemi Karasawa, Christof Neracher, Thomas Thümena Released by Adopt Films Switzerland. 77 min. Not rated With Harry Dean Stanton, David Lynch, Deborah Harry, Win Wenders, Sam Shepard & Kris Kristofferson Roger Ebert once noted that no film with character actor Harry Dean Stanton could be all that […]