Tim's Vermeer

Tim's Vermeer (2014), documentary. Produced and directed by Penn and Teller. Tim Jenison, an inventor and old friend of producer Penn Jillette, had a theory that Johannes Vermeer, the 17th-century Dutch painter, may have used technological means to achieve the photorealistic effects in his paintings. Jenison, as documented in this film, went on to demonstrate just how this might have been done, and he is certainly very convincing. He actually built an optical device that allowed him, avowedly not a painter, to re-create a painting by Vermeer in phenomenal detail. The film is fascinating, although at times it moves a bit slowly. At 80 minutes, it is certainly not overlong. (English subtitles for the hearing-impaired are available, and are highly legible.) Grade: B

Don't Look Back

Don't Look Back (1967) starring Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Donovan. Documentary about Dylan's 1965 tour of England, starting in London. Features lots of backstage footage of Dylan interacting with various people, also some limited concert performances. Dylan performs "The Times They Are a Changin'," "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right," "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue." Strictly for Dylan fans. (Subtitles in English are provided.) Grade: B- 

Anne Frank Remembered

Anne Frank Remembered (1995) Documentary. Directed by Jon Blair. Narrated by Kenneth Branagh. Diary read by Glenn Close. This movie tells the moving story of the young Jewish girl who, with her family, hid from the Nazis for two years in a house in Holland, and who famously kept a diary of her thoughts while in hiding. The film tells the story from the start through the time Anne and her family spent in concentration camps after being discovered. Remarkably, Anne's father, Otto, survived the camps and lived until 1979. Anne, her sister Margot, and her mother all perished in the camps. The movie tells its story in German, Dutch and English, with highly legible English subtitles. Grade: A-  

The Sorrow and the Pity

The Sorrow and the Pity (1970) Documentary. Directed by Marcel Ophuls. This movie looks at life in occupied France during World War II, largely through interviews with those who lived through it. At four hours, it's a long movie, but it needs to be this long to cover the subject thoroughly. Among those interviewed are members of the Resistance, collaborators, Germans who were in France during the war, and innocent bystanders. Also shown are scenes of the repercussions after the war for those who cooperated with their German occupiers. Some suffered severe consequences, others got off lightly. The movie is divided into two main parts: Part 1, the Collapse, and Part 2, The Choice. Part 1 deals with the ease with which the Germans were able to conquer France, and Part 2 deals with the choice Frenchmen had to make between resistance and cooperation. There are many gradations of distinction among people who made different choices, and the film explores them all in depth. Some might find this movie dry, but I was very interested, even though my mind occasionally wandered. The film is mostly in French, with highly legible English subtitles. Grade: B 

Love, Marilyn

Love, Marilyn (2012), Documentary. Using a newly discovered cache of writings by Marilyn Monroe, this movie uses various celebrity presenters, who read Monroe's words for the camera. Also seen: loads and loads of footage of Monroe, either in acting assignments or being interviewed by the press. What emerges is a new portrait of Marilyn, seen from a slightly different angle than ever before, and thus, in my opinion, worth seeing. This is not great art, but it is great pop culture, and I found it thoroughly absorbing. (Subtitles are not offered on the disc, but closed captions are available.) Grade: B 

American Dream

American Dream (1989) Documentary. Directed by Barbara Kopple. In the 1980s, a Hormel meat-packing plant in the small town of Austin, Minnesota decided to unilaterally lower the wages of its unionized workers from $10.69 an hour to $8.50 an hour. The union went out on strike, but in the anti-union atmosphere of the Reagan '80s, they stood little chance against the power of management. This movie documents their struggle, and how the management of Hormel slowly wore them down by refusing to negotiate. It's a sad story, and in many ways it's the story of America in the post-Reagan era. Reagan fired all the air-traffic controllers when they went out on strike, and that set the tone for the rest of his presidency. In effect, he broke the unions. Foreign competition may have done the job anyway, but this film shows the agonizing death throes of one union, Local P-9 of the meatpackers' union,  in painful detail. The movie won an Oscar as Best Documentary. (Subtitles in English are available, as well as closed captions.) Grade: B 

Stories We Tell

Stories We Tell (2012) Documentary. Directed by Sarah Polley. The stories in question are Polley's family stories, the stories told by her siblings and her father about her late mother. The big reveal in this movie is that Polley's father Michael was not her biological father; she discovered in her 20s that her biological father was a man whom her mother had met while acting in a play in Montreal (the family lived in Toronto).  I found this movie mildly interesting, but hardly earthshaking. To Polley it must seem like a big deal that her father was not her biological father, but in today's society it seems like a commonplace. The film is well produced and clearly plotted, so it is something of a pleasure to watch. (Subtitles in English are available, as well as closed captions.) Grade: B

No Place on Earth

No Place on Earth (2012) Documentary. A true story of survival dating back to World War II, when 38 Jews managed to survive the Nazi occupation of Ukraine by hiding in a cave for 18 months. It's a rather well made film, mixing current action (five of the people who were in the cave still survive, and tell their story for the camera) with reenactment of what life in the cave was like. Those who survived the war in the cave now have 125 descendants, mostly in Canada and the United States. I found the movie to be moving and uplifting. (Subtitles in English for the hearing-impaired are available on the disc.) Grade: B+ 

Woodstock

Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace and Music (1970) Documentary. Performers featured in the film include Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, Canned Heat, Country Joe McDonald, Ten Years After, Santana, John Sebastian, The Who, Janis Joplin, and Crosby, Stills and Nash. The music aside, the filmmakers interviewed young concert-goers as well as inhabitants of the surrounding area to get a balanced picture of what the experience was like. No movie can really hope to capture what it was like to be there, but this one comes as close as can be expected. Woodstock won the Academy Award for best documentary the year it was released. (Subtitles in English are included, and the songs are, blessedly, subtitled.) Grade: B+

Hitler's Children

Hitler's Children (2012) Documentary. Descendants of Himmler, Hans Frank (governor general of occupied Poland), Hermann Goering (founder of the Gestapo), Amon Goeth (commandant of Plaszow concentration camp), and Rudolf Hoess (of Auschwitz) come forward and are interviewed about what it is like to carry such a heavy heritage. It turns out that it is not an easy thing, in fact can be very painful. The descendants of these Nazi monsters feel, largely, a profound sense of guilt, even though it was not they who carried out the evil acts of their fathers or grandfathers. This is an effective, though brief, documentary which has the power to make you cry. (Subtitles in English, as well as closed captions, are available.) Grade: A-

The Flat

The Flat (2011) by Arnon Goldfinger. After his grandmother dies in Israel, filmmaker Goldfinger takes part in the task of sorting her possessions. Among the many things she has saved he finds a relic of his grandmother's life in Germany before World War II. She and her husband were good friends with a Nazi official named von Mildenstein who, during the war, worked for Goebbels' propaganda ministry. Incredibly, the Tuchlers and the von Mildensteins renewed their friendship after the war. Goldfinger is puzzled by this, and troubled. How could his Jewish grandparents have been friends with a Nazi official? In this film he tries to answer the question, but at the end he is not able to get anyone in von Mildenstein's family to confirm that he was a pretty high-ranking Nazi. This is certainly an interesting movie, though it will prove somewhat sedate for many tastes. It's in a variety of languages with good English subtitles. Grade: B

When We Were Kings

When We Were Kings (1996) starring Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, Don King, Norman Mailer, George Plimpton. Documentary about the "Rumble in the Jungle" in 1974 between Ali and Foreman. The fight was held in Zaire, the former Belgian Congo, and much is made about the black fighters returning to clash in Africa.  More than anything, the movie is a tribute to Muhammad Ali, who used the "Rope-a-Dope" strategy to defeat Foreman and reclaim the heavyweight title. Although many thought Ali was over the hill and would retire after the Rumble in the Jungle, the film reveals that he would go on to fight 22 more professional fights, damaging himself in the process. This is a very entertaining movie, and it shows enough of the actual fight to leave the viewer satisfied. (Closed captions are available on the disc.) Grade: B+  

Wattstax

Wattstax (1973) starring Isaac Hayes, The Staple Singers, Luther Ingram, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Richard Pryor. Marking the anniversary of the 1965 Watts riots, a great gathering of black people shows up in Los Angeles to hear music and celebrate the African-American spirit. Interspersed with the music are interviews with various blacks, talking about life, love and whitey. Some of the funniest bits are those with Richard Pryor. There's lots of music, culminating in an appearance by Isaac Hayes. All in all, I would recommend this movie to black people; some whites will enjoy it, but I think they would be in the minority. (Closed captions make the dialogue understandable -- even the songs are captioned.) Grade: B

Food, Inc.

Food, Inc. (2008) directed by Robert Kenner. The food production system in the U.S. has gotten more and more industrialized, with only a few giant corporations controlling most of the growing, marketing and selling of food in our country. As a result, it is harder and harder (and more expensive) to get good-tasting, nutritious food. We all know fast food is bad for us, but we eat it anyway because it is easy, cheap and tasty. The result is an obesity and diabetes epidemic (which is really not discussed much in this movie), along with increasing instances of E coli and salmonella poisoning around the nation. This documentary explores the different facets of our flawed food production system, and should be enough to raise alarms in even the most carefree of us. We've got to do something before it's too late! Start by seeing this movie, available on DVD from Netflix. (Closed captions are available for the hearing-impaired.) Grade: A

Waking Sleeping Beauty

Waking Sleeping Beauty (2010) -- Documentary. Directed by Don Hahn. Disney veteran Hahn takes a look at the studio's revival, from its nadir in the 1970s, through the '80s and '90s, during which were produced such animation successes as The Little Mermaid, Aladdin,  Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King. This documentary takes a look behind the scene, showing such honchos as Roy Disney, Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg as they struggled behind the scenes to control the direction the studio would go -- and who would get credit for the successes. For Disney fans who are curious about the nuts and bolts of animated film making, it's a great movie to see. (Subtitles in English are available, as well as closed captions.) Grade: B 

Visions of Light

Visions of Light: The Art of Cinematography (1993); documentary. Cinematographers discuss the art of shooting film for motion pictures, and many films are sampled to show examples of different kinds of cinematography. This is a tantalizing movie, because it shows so many brief clips from so many great films, and I wanted to see all the films discussed. Visions of Light got me all jazzed again about motion pictures, and I found it tremendously stimulating. On the other hand, it's a bare-bones production, with no Extras, and no subtitles or closed captions. I'd like to see a movie like this done really well, with more and longer clips from even more great films. Grade: B+     

Vincent: The Life and Death of Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent: The Life and Death of Vincent Van Gogh (1988); documentary. I found this documentary of Van Gogh's life rather disappointing. The filmmakers used images of nature, and pictures of Van Gogh's works, as illustration, and over these images the actor John Hurt read some  of Vincent's letters to his brother Theo. If you don't already know Van Gogh's life story, it may prove difficult to get anything out of the movie. Even Vincent's suicide is illustrated with footage of a country lane, and no explanatory text. Plus, the DVD lacks any sort of subtitles for the hearing-impaired. Although in this case Hurt's reading of the letters was clear and understandable, there might be some viewers who would profit from subtitles or closed captions. The sole redeeming feature of this film for me were the shots of Van Gogh's artistic works, some of which are just astonishing. Grade: B

An Unreasonable Man

An Unreasonable Man (Ralph Nader) (2007) Documentary. Ralph Nader's lifelong battle to protect consumers is chronicled, along with his controversial decision to run for president in 2000 and 2004. For those who don't remember, Nader came to prominence in the '60s with the publication of his book, Unsafe at Any Speed. The movie clearly delineates his contributions to the safety of Americans in a number of areas, including car safety, food safety and drug safety. About half of the film is devoted to the controversy surrounding his runs for the presidency in '00 and '04, which some blame for George W. Bush's election and re-election to office. I found the movie to be an important, informative document of the life of a great American. (Subtitles for the hearing-impaired are provided, but are hard to read.) Grade: A 

Triumph of the Will

Triumph of the Will (1935) directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Fascinating, yet scary, propaganda film shot by Riefenstahl on Adolf Hitler's orders in 1934. The movie is almost two hours long, and shows the gigantic Nazi party rally held in Nuremburg in that year. Riefenstahl is a masterful filmmaker, and this film really packs a wallop. I tried to imagine what it might have been like to see it in 1934, before we knew what a monster Hitler would become. It shows the Fuhrer only in the best light, and would surely have been inspiring to any patriotic German. The night rally features lighting effects designed by Hitler's architect, Albert Speer, and is truly inspired in its mania. The joy on the faces of the common German citizens who greet Hitler is enough to convince the viewer that he will be, perhaps already is, the supreme power in Germany. I couldn't help but think, if he had only not been a psychopath, how differently things would all have turned out. Hitler, of course, gets an F, but the film gets a Grade: A.

Trekkies

Trekkies (1999) hosted by Denise Crosby. Crosby, who played Tasha Yar briefly on Star Trek: The Next Generation, conducts a tour of the fan phenomenon. Some Trekkies, by the way, prefer to be called Trekkers. It's a whole controversy which a lot of fans just avoid by saying, "I'm a Star Trek fan." The depth and breadth of the Trek movement, as shown in the film, is surprisingly great. What the movie barely touches on, but what I feel to be central to the phenomenon, is that all versions of Star Trek portray a future in which hunger and poverty have been eliminated, and in which humans are treated humanely by the authorities at all times. The Trekkie movement gets an "A" from me, but not the film. (Hard-to-read subtitles are available, but the preferable closed captions are also offered.) Grade: B+