All these wonderful things

A Few Words about Cinema Eye 2012 and This Space

Admittedly, we’ve been a stranger around these parts lately, but more on that in a moment.

As I write this, I’m en route to Los Angeles, returning from London, where we just announced the nominees for this year’s Cinema Eye Honors (you can find the full list here).  It was a great experience on this end, terrific to see several weeks (months?) of hard work by a lot of different people come to fruition and wonderful to officially kick off this annual celebration of the artistry of nonfiction filmmaking.

I was struck by a number of things as Wednesday night ended and the word of this year’s nominations was starting to spread to nominees on all parts of the globe. 

First, I realized that I sometimes underestimate the challenge of this part of our Cinema Eye process, the period from engaging our eligible filmmakers to launching the vote to tallying the nominees to relaunching a website complete with new artwork by the amazing Ben Chlapek.  It’s not quite the massive undertaking that the actual event is, but it’s pretty close.

Second, I remembered that despite 11 categories and five (and occasionally six) slots for nominees per award, there were a number of films that I loved this year that weren’t on the Cinema Eye list.  Mostly, this makes me think that this must be yet another great year for documentary (and I do believe that it is) but I still hope that some of my favorites will be recognized elsewhere before the year is done.

So for that reason, I was particularly glad to see HOW TO DIE IN OREGON announced as one of the five films up for the IDA Award for Best Documentary today.  Here’s hoping that the Oscar shortlist and the Spirits might show some love to a couple of my other favorites.

Now, about that absence...

There’s this thing that I’ve been telling folks privately that I should finally share with those of you who still come over here from time to time, wondering why the last post was more than two months ago.

These long stretches are evidence of the fact that this nearly six and a half year endeavour is winding down.  Writing this blog has been a huge surprise for me, quite obviously.  It began as a way to chronicle the work on my film, KURT COBAIN ABOUT A SON, and it became someting else, something that came to change my life in a lot of ways and somehow came to mean something to more people than one could even imagine.

It’s allowed me to meet and talk with filmmakers, travel to festivals, experience parts of this documentary life that I could have never expected.

Without the blog there is no Cinema Eye. 

But without making films there is no blog. 

And it is time to make more films.

Soon, this thing that I’ve done, often late at night after the wife and child have gone to bed, will conclude.  But the thing that it spawned, this thing of Cinema Eye that I’m so proud to share with a core of amazing friends and colleagues and with everyone who has ever been nominated in the now five years of our existence, will thrive.  And proudly so.

And there will be a new focus on the thing that inspired the blog in the first place.

This isn’t goodbye yet - and I’ll try not to make it a long, drawn out goodbye - but the end of this chapter is coming. 

Like my Cinema Eye colleague Sean Farnel said when he signed off from Hot Docs, six years was enough.

He also said, “I work for documentary.”

Allow me to second that emotion.

The Great Lost Opportunity of Current's 50 Docs List

Our long national nightmare is finally over.

Current TV, the still-finding-its-identity network co-founded by Al Gore and newish home to left wing commentator Keith Olbermann, concludes its 5-week documentary film countdown - "50 Docs to See Before You Die" - tonight with the naming of its top 10 choices.

Revealed yesterday by the NY Times' Mike Hale, the top choice of the show's expert panel is Steve James' 1994 classic HOOP DREAMS, with Errol Morris' THE THIN BLUE LINE and Michael Moore's ROGER & ME coming in 2nd and 3rd.  The latter two films had previously been identified by the show as the demarcation of the beginning of the current "golden age" of documentary filmmaking on which the "50 Docs" list would focus.

It's this take on the modern age of documentary that seems to have brought the list and the series the most criticism: the late '80s cutoff forms a handy but ultimately confusing way for the series to eliminate any of the classic films by the Maysles, Robert Drew, Fred Wiseman, early Pennebaker, KOYAANISQATSI, HEARTS AND MINDS, HARLAN COUNTY, SHERMAN'S MARCH and any number of other influential works from contention. 

Despite the fact that the Times' Hale notes the "modern documentary" angle and bemoans the focus on "a relentless preference for the story-based or issue-based films that people now seem to think define the documentary field", commenters on the story still wrestle with the series/list's artificial construct - where is WOODSTOCK? THE LAST WALTZ? 7 UP? THE TIMES OF HARVEY MILK? SHOAH?  The fact that potential viewers are still confused or find the current (get it) focus impractical suggests a basic problem with the premise.

Still, these are lists and lists are supposed to be fun, right?  Get past the confusion and the Times' comment section is filled with people's righteous indigation that their modern favorites have been overlooked.  Or those who argue that something should be higher on the list or lower or not on the list at all.

So if it gets people talking about documentaries, then who's to quibble, right?

Allow us.

TORONTO 2011: Thom Powers on Mavericks Premieres from Maysles & Demme Plus PALIN, PARADISE LOST 3 and "the sexiest Wiseman film ever made"

Earlier today, the Toronto International Film Festival announced the line-up for its Mavericks program, and our eye went immediately to THE LOVE WE MAKE, a decade-in-the-making look at Paul McCartney's organizing of The Concert for New York, a charity response to 9/11, directed by Albert Maysles and Bradley Kaplan. 

The film is set to air on Showtime on September 10 (TIFF opens on the 8th), and McCartney showed up via satellite recently at the Television Critics Association summer press tour to talk about the film - and about his history with the Maysles:

"I first met Albert and his brother David," McCartney recalled, "when we came to America, came to New York, and they were filming us." Their manager, Brian Epstein, had been approached by the Maysles brothers with a pitch to film them in a new way: cinema verite.

"Well, we were very big fans of that," McCartney continued. "That was kind of happening in Europe at the same time it was happening in America. So we loved the idea." And when the quartet met the duo, the Maysles brothers sealed the deal when the Beatles asked what the filmmakers wanted them to do. The reply: "We want you to just ignore us."

McCartney smiled widely. "We thought that was the best piece of direction we'd ever received. 'Oh, ignore you? Yeah, we can do that. I can ignore anyone.' So we did, and we just had a great time. And they were right to direct us in that way, because we completely forget they were there. And so the film is very natural. We'd be in our hotel rooms, talking to deejays, talking to each other. And they would just be behind the couch, filming very quietly."

We talked with Mavericks Programmer (as well as the Documentary Programmer at TIFF) Thom Powers about the new Maysles film, plus the latest collaboration between Jonathan Demme and Neil Young, as well as some of the major titles in the previously announced TIFF documentary line-up, including the very current - and apparently in furious re-edit mode - PARADISE LOST 3.

All these wonderful things: The thing that jumped out at me immediately in the things that you are announcing (today) is, of course, the Maysles/Paul McCartney film.  Do you have any more to say about that?

Thom Powers: Well, you know, it's not often that I see a 16mm, black and white film these days that's brand new.  It's kind of exciting and even more exciting when Al Maysles is behind it.  I really think one of the things that stands out in this film is that quality of Maysles' camera work.  It's shot just a few weeks after September 11, and everyone is a little dazed.  One of the most memorable moments of the film to me is the scene where Bill Clinton comes backstage to say hello to McCartney.  And you have to remember that Clinton has only been out of office for 8 or 9 months and Maysles has a way of capturing that moment that feels very loaded with subtext.

PARADISE LOST Subjects Freed After 18-year Miscarriage of Justice

 

Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin, three men collectively known as the "West Memphis 3", were freed from prison today after more than 16 years.  The three were wrongly convicted in the 1994 murders of three young boys, a court case that was documented in Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky's landmark 1996 documentary PARADISE LOST: THE CHILD MURDERS AT ROBIN HOOD HILLS, which aired on HBO.

The news comes just weeks before PURGATORY, the third film in the PARADISE LOST trilogy, is set to debut at the Toronto International Film Festival.

More from CBS News:

The deal reached Friday is what's known as an Alford plea. Normally, when defendants plead guilty in criminal cases, they admit that they've done the crime in question. But in an Alford plea, defendants are allowed to insist they're innocent, says Kay Levine, a former prosecutor who now teaches criminal law and criminal procedure at Emory University in Atlanta. She is not involved with the Arkansas case.

"It's not an insane strategy decision," Levine said. But, she added: "It's incredibly troubling to us as a free society that people would plead guilty to something that they actually did not do."

In a clip from the forthcoming film [embedded below], Echols is seen telling Berlinger and Sinofsky that if it weren't for the films, he would already be dead.  "I really do believe these people would have gotten away with murdering me if it would not have been for what you guys did, for being there in the very beginning and getting this whole thing on tape so that the rest of the world sees what was happening.  If not for that, these people would have murdered me, swept this under the rug and I wouldn't be anything but a memory right now."

In a statement today, Berlinger said, "What greater gift to a filmmaker than to see their work actually having real world impact."

TORONTO 2011: Doc Premieres from Herzog, Wiseman, Demme, Gibney, Spurlock, Yu, Hustwit, Fricke, Broomfield & Churchill and Berlinger & Sinofsky

[A scene from Davis Guggenheim's new U2 documentary FROM THE SKY DOWN, which was previously announced as this year's TIFF Opening Night film.]

[Editor's Note: Charlotte Cook checks in from London with her thoughts on this year's Toronto International Film Festival documentary line-up.  We'll have more on this in the coming days.]

The majority of documentaries playing at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival were announced Wednesday. We had already learned that this year’s festival would be special for documentaries when Davis Guggenheim’s U2 doc, FROM THE SKY DOWN was announces as the first documentary ever to open TIFF.  Also previously announced was Cameron Crowe’s 20-year history of another popular rock band, PEARL JAM TWENTY.

As we have come to expect, TIFF pulls no punches with a programme full of big name directors such as Werner Herzog, Jonathan Demme, Morgan Spurlock, Alex Gibney and Fred Wiseman.

Gary Hustwit brings the final part of his design trilogy (which began with HELVETICA and OBJECTIFIED) with URBANIZED, which ventures into how the design of our cities and buildings affects our lives. Another Part Three joining the line-up is PARADISE LOST 3: PURGATORY by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky which is already building anticipated buzz.

Mark Cousins’ THE STORY OF FILM: AN ODYSSEY clocks in at 900mins (15 hours), but is likely to be a joy for the completist documentary nerds among us.

It’s great to see the excellent THIS IS NOT A FILM (IN FILM NIST) by Mojtaba Mirtahmasb and Jafar Panahi, which premiered at this year’s Cannes after being smuggled into the country on a USB stick buried inside a cake due to Jafar Panahi’s incarceration and current working ban.

Other eagerly anticipated films are Jessica Yu’s LAST CALL AT THE OASIS, which looks at the current water crisis and Ron Fricke's sequel to Baraka, SAMSARA. One of the most talked about before premiering, and likely after, is SARAH PALIN - YOU BETCHA! by Nick Broomfield and Joan Churchill.

The line-up is also notably drawn from a multitude of different countries, with Bulgaria, Cambodia, Chile and Austria to name a few.

Talking to CP24, Toronto's Documentary Film Programmer Thom Powers said of this year's line-up "It's kind of an insane embarrassment of riches."

The full documentary line-up so far is below, with more to be added:

THE BOY WHO WAS KING by Andrey Paounov (Bulgaria)
CAPRICHOSOS DE SAN TELMO by Alison Murray (Argentina/Canada)
ARIRANGA by Kim Ki-Duk (South Korea)
COMIC-CON: EPISODE IV - A FAN'S HOPE by Morgan Spurlock (USA)
CRAZY HORSE by Frederick Wiseman (France/USA)
DARK GIRLS by Bill Duke and D. Channsin Berry (USA)
DUCH, MASTER OF THE FORGES OF HELL by Rithy Panh (France/Cambodia)
FATHERLAND (TIERRA DE LOS PADRES) by Nicolás Prividera (Argentina)
FIRST POSITION by Bess Kargman (USA)
FROM THE SKY DOWN by Davis Guggenheim (USA)
GERHARD RICHTER PAINTING by Corinna Belz (Germany)
GIRL MODEL by Ashley Sabin and David Redmon (USA)
I'M CAROLYN PARKER: THE GOOD, THE MAD, AND THE BEAUTIFUL by Jonathan Demme (USA)
IN MY MOTHER'S ARMS by Atia Al Daradji Mohamed Al Daradji (Iraq/Netherlands/UK)
INTO THE ABYSS by Werner Herzog (USA)
LAST CALL AT THE OASIS by Jessica Yu (USA)
THE LAST DOGS OF WINTER by Costa Botes (New Zealand)
THE LAST GLADIATORS by Alex Gibney (USA)
PARADISE LOST 3: PURGATORY by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky (USA)
PAUL WILLIAMS STILL ALIVE by Stephen Kessler (USA)
PEARL JAM TWENTY by Cameron Crowe (USA)
PINA by Wim Wenders (Germany/France)
SAMASARA (Originally from Sanskrit) by Ron Fricke (USA)
SARAH PALIN - YOU BETCHA! by Nick Broomfield and Joan Churchill (UK)
THE STORY OF FILM: AN ODYSSEY by Mark Cousins (UK)
THE TALL MAN Tony Krawitz, (Australia)
THIS IS NOT A FILM (IN FILM NIST) by Mojtaba Mirtahmasb and Jafar Panahi (Iran)
UNDEFEATED by Dan Lindsay and TJ Martin (USA)
URBANIZED by Gary Hustwit (USA and UK)
WHORES' GLORY by Michael Glawogger (Austria/Germany)
THE YEAR OF THE TIGER (EL AÑO DEL TIGRE) by Sebastián Lelio (Chile)

SENNA Breaks UK Box Office Records for Documentary

[Editor's note - We're pleased to welcome Charlotte Cook to the blog as she writes from London about the astounding success of Asif Kapadia's SENNA documentary in the UK.]

Director Asif Kapadia's SENNA has broken the record for the highest grossing opening weekend for a documentary in British history. Taking £375,000 (approx $614,000) after opening on Friday 3rd June, it knocks the previous record holder TOUCHING THE VOID off the top spot which opened in 2004 to a weekend gross of $96,973.

Produced by Working Title Films/Universal the film has won Audience awards at this this year's Sundance and LA Film Festivals. Told entirely through archive and voice over, the film chronicles three-time Brazilian world champion Ayrton Senna‘s extraordinary rise through Formula One racing to his tragic death at thirty-four in the San Marino Grand Prix in 1994.

Michael Rapaport's TRIBE CALLED QUEST Docu Storms the Indie Box Office

BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE: THE TRAVELS OF A TRIBE CALLED QUEST, the debut feature by actor Michael Rapaport, finally landed in theaters last weekend after months of behind-the-scenes and in-the-press strife between the director and several of his subjects.  But in the end, the formerly, vocally-opposed Q-Tip and his fellow members of A Tribe Called Quest encouraged fans to see the film - and indeed they did, giving the BEATS the biggest documentary opening of 2011: the film took in a stellar average of nearly $28,000 in 4 theaters.

That tally just edged the opening weekend for one of the biggest docs of the year, Werner Herzog's CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS, which averaged $27,820 on five screens back in late April.  After 11 weeks, CAVE is now zeroing in on $5M, a box office record for Herzog and a signal that he is one of the few directors working in nonfiction who have the strength to pull in an audience based on their name.

BILL CUNNINGHAM NEW YORK, which is nearing the end of its run (with a cume of nearly $1.4M), still holds the per screen record for docs this year.  It opened at the Film Forum in March and took in $33K during its first weekend.

New Trailer for Steve James' THE INTERRUPTERS

We're on record in saying that we think that Steve James' THE INTERRUPTERS is the documentary of the year (with the caveat that we still have a few to see).  Cinema Guild and Kartemquin just launched a new theatrical trailer for the film and it does a good job of capturing the multitude of emotions (as well as James' fine, fine camerawork) that make it such a stunning achievement.

THE INTERRUPTERS opens in two and a half weeks (July 29) at the IFC Center.  I arrives in Chicago two weeks later.

Bar-Lev, Ferguson, Hetherington, Junger & Weyermann Among 10 Invited to Join Academy

[Filmmakers Amir Bar-Lev (left) and Tim Hetherington at the Cinema Eye Honors Nominees Reception in January in New York City.  Photo by Simon Luethi.]

In what constitutes the largest, single-year class of invites to the Academy's Documentary Branch in years, ten have been invited to join AMPAS, including recently minted Oscar winner Charles Ferguson, filmmaker Amir Bar-Lev (MY KID COULD PAINT THAT, THE TILLMAN STORY), Participant Media EVP Diane Weyermann and Davis Guggenheim's producing partner Leslie Chilcott.

The headline, though, was the Academy's invitation to RESTREPO filmmakers' Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger.  It's almost unheard of for the Academy to invite filmmakers based on a single feature film, even if it's Oscar nominated, and is almost certainly a reaction to Hetherington's death in Libya two months ago.  Hetherington is the Academy's first posthumous invitee.

The invite list also includes Carl Deal, whose partner on TROUBLE THE WATER, Tia Lessin, was invited to join a couple years ago, as well as three recently nominated for the Academy's Documentary Short prize: Jon Alpert (CHINA'S UNNATURAL DISASTER: THE TEARS OF THE SICHUAN PROVINCE) and Thomas Lennon & Ruby Yang (THE WARRIORS OF QIUGANG), who won the Short Oscar a few years ago for THE BLOOD OF THE YINGZHOU DISTRICT.

Sean Farnel Steps Down at Hot Docs

[Sean Farnel, right, with Hot Docs' Executive Director Chris McDonald and filmmaker Morgan Spurlock at Opening Night of Hot Docs 2011.  Photo from the Hot Docs website by Joseph Michael.]

In what accounts for major news around here, Sean Farnel announced last night, via his blog, that he was stepping down from his role as Hot Docs' Director of Programming.  After six years at Hot Docs, which followed a six year run programming documentaries at the Toronto International Film Festival, Farnel said that it was time to move on:

"Five years is usually enough to get the job done (give or take a bonus year). As at tiff, I depart with pride, having significantly advanced the programmes on which I worked. It seems unlikely that we could’ve put together a better festival then we did with this past Hot Docs...

Few, if any, international film festivals have enjoyed more growth then Hot Docs since 2005. Having just announced another record event, with over 150,000 admissions and a 24 per cent increase in earned revenues, the Festival has more then tripled its audience over the past six years. With that, Hot Docs is now a close second to IDFA as the world’s largest documentary film festival. The Festival has become one of Toronto’s most significant and beloved cultural events."

Although Farnel is departing, he is not exiting the scene.  This week he'll serve as a juror at the Silverdocs Film Festival (which kicks off tonight).