September 5 (2024) opens Friday

This is the story of the people of ABC Sports who stepped up to bring the world the story of the terrorist attack on the 1972 Olympics. It is only the story of what happened during the short time before the attack happened until it ended.

Let me repeat that- this is only the story of how the men and women of ABC Sports covered the terrorist kidnapping. We largely only see what the people in the control room see, nothing else. We also are only focused on those hours. I mention this again because if you are looking for the lives of Roone Arledge or Peter Jennings or  Geoffrey Mason you'll have to look else where. Indeed the film doesn't even tell us anything related to them in the two end slides. 

I am saying that because I suspect that some people are going to want to know things that are outside of the events on screen. I am also saying it because there was a moment when I briefly broke with the film. I wanted to know more. I thought I needed to see or know more. I was wrong. Shortly after breaking with the film I suddenly reconnected with the film when I realized that the film, in it's simplicity, was infinitely more complex than it seems.

What this film is a look at how we get our news. It's a film that looks at how the decisions of what we see are made. It's a film that makes you wonder about the news and about the people who report. We watch the men as they wrestle with what are they going to do if they start to kill people... and in a shattering moment they are forced to ponder if they are helping or hurting when they discover that the terrorists can see their reports.

This film rocked me to the core. I was on the edge of my seat, shifting my position every few minutes. I say that as an expression about how great this film is- I knew what happened and how, having read the accounts, seen documentaries, and yet I watched and had no clue as to what was happening. I wanted to see how it all played out. Any film that can make you forget what happened, especially if it was something that you watch happen live on TV (which I did, because I am that old) is a great film.

Not to mince words SEPTEMBER 5 is one of the best films of 2024. This is one of the most entertaining films of the year. It's also, despite seeming simple, one of the most thoughtful films.

Highly recommended.

Death By Numbers (2024) DOC NYC 2024

Sam Fuentes prepares to face the school shooter who shot her in the leg and who killed 17 of her classmates with bullets and 3 by suicide after the fact.

Mediation on the rash of school shootings and the carnage they leave behind via the word of one of the survivors who has kept an accounting of the damage caused. It's a bracing look at something that has become all too common over the last few years.

Worth a look.

DOC NYC Capsule Reviews: The Crimes of Putin Edition: THE BASEMENT and AFTER THE RAIN: PUTIN’S STOLEN CHILDREN COME HOME

THE BASEMENT
400 residents of the Ukrainian village Yahidne we round up and forced to stay in a basement for a month. as the Dead were stacked up in a corner like wood, the residents waited to find out their ultimate fate. Freed they tell their story for the camera as we listen to the words from a diary written during captivity with the expectation it would be found after everyone was dead. A slap in the face film, this is a you are their document of war crimes committed by Russian Soldiers. It is also a moving look at how people can survive terrible things and come out on the otherside.
Recommended.

AFTER THE RAIN: PUTIN’S STOLEN CHILDREN COME HOME
The children of Ukrainian parents stolen by the Russian army and rescued are sent to a farm in the country in order to decompress and begin the healing process. Low key doc  about the trauma of war quietly sneaks up on you and hits you over the head. While things seem largely okay at the start we quickly realize that isn't the case and we watch as the healing begins. This is a small gem of a film.

Brief thoughts on NATURE OF THE CRIME (2024) DOC NYC 2024

Three men sent to prison decades ago have to deal with the parole system in prison and show how they changed and have remorse for the crimes committed when they were teenagers.

Another home run from HBO. A Deeply thoughtful and moving film about how our system of justice is broken in that it creates impossible hoops for the people it is suppose to rehabilitating (work with me in regard to that term) so they can get out of prison. It's a film that makes it clear that we really don't know how to treat those we lock up.

I was moved.

Honestly I can't wait to see it again away from the festival where I can give the film the full attention it deserves and not have it be something that I have to rush pondering before I move on to the next thing.

Recommended.

Plunderer(2024) Doc NYC 2024

This is a portrait of Bruno Lohse who was Herman Goering’s art expert and responsible for some of the plundering of art during the second world war. We are told Lohse‘s story by Jonathan Petropoulos​, who became his friend in order to find out the secrets of where the art went.

This is an excellent look at  a part of the war that we all are aware of but which hasn’t been explored. What happened to the great art treasures of the conquered nations. This film will tell you. It will also explain how these art plunderers managed to survive after the war (the plundering was seen as the least of the crimes committed).

As a history junkie I was in heaven. There was so much here that I hadn’t known or considered. My eyes were opened up to a great deal.

Additionally and most importantly, this is a hell of a story that is going to grab you and pull you  along.  I loved this film a great deal.

Go get some popcorn and see this.

Fox Chase Boy (2024) DOC NYC 2024

FOX CHASE BOY is a short film based on Gerard Ageros' monologue about his life growing up in Phillie in the 1980's during which time he was molested by a priest. 

However don't think that's what the film is about, it is about something else entirely, life and the human spirit. Ageros's film isn't a all about the bad things. Instead it's about the way people come together and community. It's also about his family and how they can help the healing.

This is a deeply personal and deeply moving film that is going to make you wish it was longer than just 30 minutes.

Bring tissues because by the end you'll be crying good tears. 

OUT OF PLAIN SIGHT (2024) DOC NYC 2024

One of the best films of DOC NYC and of 2024 OUT OF PLAIN SIGHT is a look at how thousands of drums of DDT were dropped into the ocean ten miles from Los Angeles.  The drums are decaying, polluting the ocean and causing an epidemic of cancer in the sea life.  Most frighteningly it is putting our lives at risk because the chemicals are now in the fish and crustaceans we consume.

This film blew me away. A meaty investigation that is the cinematic equivalent to reading a big book on the subject. This film is going to tell you everything you need to know to scare the snot out of you. If you need to know how bad it is we see what the effects of the DDT on seals who are coming ashore in such bad condition that they only thing we can do is euthanize them

I was moved.

I can’t explain  how great this film is. Just see it.

Highly recommended.

Liz Whittemore on MISSING FROM FIRE TRAIL ROAD (2024)

This originally appeared at Liz's home REEL NEWS DAILY

Sabrina Van Tassel‘s TRIBECA 2024 documentary MISSING FROM FIRE TRAIL ROAD speaks for those without a voice. Indigenous women are in crisis. Why aren’t we talking about the statistics of missing native women? The number is vastly higher than any other group in the United States.

The film focuses on the story of Mary Ellen Johnson Davis, missing since 2020, as her family tries to piece together all the information they can, while also showing up for those in their community with similar circumstances. There are far too many unexplained disappearances and deaths for one community not to call it an epidemic.

The reservation has its own justice system, under which not a single white man has been prosecuted in connection to a disappearance. Families must rely on the Feds to intervene. They never do. It is endless, lawless mayhem.

Story after story, family after family, one thread connects them all. That is abuse from white outsiders. You can’t tell this story without delving into the trauma of native children stolen from their families and physically and emotionally tormented in boarding schools. MISSING FROM FIRE TRAIL ROAD delivers the horrific truth through the words of survivors.

A quote from a manual given to households when children the government was ripping from their homes reads, “The goal is not to make scientists, or doctors or lawyers out of these citizens. The goal is to make domestic housewives and farmers and laborers.” Keeping the population suppressed remains the goal. It’s cyclical genocide. It is the continuation of colonization, plain and simple.

The question remains. How many of these documentaries need to be made to get the message across? Tribeca 2024 audiences can share the native plight and, perhaps, move the dial toward justice. Do something.

Artifact War (2024) Austin Film Festival

Jump to see ARTIFACT WAR. This under the radar gem is one you’ll want to see repeatedly.

The film is the story of a group archaeologists and academics who, even before the war in Syria, took steps to chart the antiquities and museum artifacts in case anything happened. Once the war started and the factions inside the country either sought to steal the work or destroy it, they took steps to either rescue the material or provide a trail so that if anything ended up in the markets it could be identified as plundered.

A collection of talking heads, archival footage and recreations (because somethings were too dangerous to go shoot) this film pulls us in and drags us along. It tells a story that probably none of us have heard before, but which, thanks to films like the Indian Jones films we have more than a passing interest in.

I loved this film a great deal. I did not expect to get sucked into. I never looked at my watch, I just watched and waited for the next twist or turn.

What a delight.

And know that my saying that isn’t lessening the story being told, but rather it is a way of saying that because the story of trying to protect our heritage is told so compellingly people might be more willing to do something to help prevent this from happening again or at least be aware when something appears in museum or somewhere else to realize that it might have been looted.

Recommended.

Black Box Diaries (2024)

Shiori Ito‘s BLACK BOX DIARIES begins with a warning. It is Ito explaining how to handle what is going to be some inevitable triggers for some viewers. There is genuine love and caring radiating from this that helps make the difficult times that  follow easier to take.

The film is Ito charting the course of her decision to go public with the fact that she was raped by the head of a Japanese media company. Because there was “ no evidence” (the man was connected to the Prime Minister), the Japanese police wouldn’t pursue charges. Ito decides to go public and it opens up all sorts of doors, including a discussion to the antiquated notions of rape and male female relationships (the age of consent is 13 and until recently kiddie porn was legal). The film also shows the course of her case and the cost to her (she had to move out of her apartment to be safe)

This is a tough film. A slowly building tale, BLACK BOX DIARIES quietly lays out its tale and then punches you in the face with some of the turns. It’s a film that sneaks up on you and makes you gasp. I thought I was prepared for this tale, and apparently I was not so even I found the opening suggestion of how to handle the story helpful.

This film is amazing. It’s a gut punch of a film that lays bare sexual violence not only in Japan but elsewhere – many men have a shitty attitude toward women.

This is one of the best documentaries I’ve seen in 2024 and one of the best on sexual violence I've ever seen.

Highly recommended, just be aware that this is tough film

Shadowland (2024) Beyond Fest

Looking like one of Richard Stanley’s documentaries, the film begins as a portrait of the filmmaker as refugee from the film world while staying in a small town in France. He’d fallen in with a group of mystical believers and seemed to have become a leader. As things go on the charges against Stanley for domestic abuse raise their head and things begin to change as the group has to ponder what the charges mean for them.

This is a heady film that twists and turns as it goes. Even knowing what happened, I wasn’t certain how the turns were going to come. (that’s a rave)

What I like about the film is that this isn’t Stanley’s story. This is the story of the community he became part of and which had to come to terms with a man who ended up not being who they thought. It’s the story of how a group of people moved away from “modern society” to heal themselves and then had to use what they learned to survive something they never expected to have to deal with.

There is a magic in this film fueled by the human spirit and like the best mystical journeys it’s one that isn’t easy and isn’t as expected.

You will forgive the lack of details in this film, I am still processing. Yes there is a narrative arc that is easy to discuss but this film is more than the narrative. This is a film about belief, and community, and the search for self and the darkness in the real world. It’s a film that has a great deal to say and in the days since I sat down to watch it I find that I have been pondering it, waiting and waiting for  the words to come to me so that I can really discuss it and really show you the wonders contained. The trouble is the words haven’t come and all I’ve been left with is a deadline.

Make no mistake, this film is a stunner, it’s a film that will fill you with thoughts and feelings and make you ponder it. This is the best sort of filmmaking.

I can’t wait to see it again.

Highly recommended.

NO OTHER LAND (2024) NYFF 2024

HARUN (a qudraplegic man crippled by an Israeli bullet): Is anyone coming?
HARUN's MOTHER: No, no one is coming

Exchange in a tent between parent and child after they are left alone for the night

As people move to close down this year's NYFF because of the financial support from Israeli sources, they seem to be completely unaware that NO OTHER LAND is playing the festival  and that with in it's crushing 95 minutes is an emotional bomb that is going to change hearts and minds in ways that protests will never manage.

The film a record of the systematic destruction of an West Bank community from 2019 until 2023. It's a document of how the Israeli government is using the military and the settlers to drive out the Palestinians so that they can claim the land.

Finished literally days before the October 7 attack, the film is a blistering explanation of where the anger that spawned that attack came from. It's a film that broke the audience of writers at NYFF and was the first in 10 films screened to get long applause from most of audience.

The filmmakers make clear that the people in the village have been there for generations with some families living there since 1830. This is not a reclaiming of land the Palestinians took for a new settlement but the removal of a people who had been there since the beginning of time.

My attitude toward the film as a film was, for a certain amount of time, that the film was a solid retelling of Israeli human rights violations and then the story of Harun takes center stage an the film drops the gloves and it makes clear, in no uncertain terms, that the treatment of the Palestinians is nothing short that genocide. My heart, and the hearts of those around me were crushed.

Harun was shot for defending his home and then left for dead. He survived but as a quadriplegic who had to be cared for my his mother, because there is no medical help for him and literally moved around in a cart. It's no wonder seeing things like this day after day that the light in director Bael Adra's eyes dims and fades over the course of the film.

Let me make clear that is not a statement directed at all Israelis but the government under Netanyahu, they are criminals. 

Many will call this a political film, but it is not. It is made by a group of directors and reporters who are both Israeli and Palestinian. There is no side. Frankly it is simply a document of a great wrong against humanity. The only politics in the film is that it's Israelis with guns and heavy machinery against Palestinians with cameras.

A week before I saw this film I saw the film WE WILL DANCE AGAIN, about the October 7 attack and was shocked at the brutality of what happened, and then I saw NO OTHER LAND and my single thought was of course the October 7 attack happened...but why didn't it happen sooner?

This film is an absolute must see.

Easily one of the best and most important films of not only the festival but 2024 as well.

We Will Dance Again (2024)

A look at the October 6 attack in Israel told by the survivors and the footage that was shot that day.

First up I’m not going to get into the politics of this. The sheer loss of life and the brutality of the attack trump any thought of the amorphous and intellectual notions of the Israel/Palestine conflict. By the standard of any living and breathing human with any shred of moral decency it was an horrific sequence of events that simply proves that too many people think violence will solve problems.

As a film documenting the events that played out one morning in October this film is a punch in the face. It doesn’t matter which side you are on, or think you’re on, the film will make you truly consider the cost of violence. Made up of footage shot by the victims as well as by the attackers, WE WILL DANCE AGAIN never looks away. We see it all, from the end of the over night rave which stopped when the missiles were seen in the sky, to the attacks where few were left alive onward to the aftermath. It’s all here and I’m certain you will look away.

Yes the footage is choppy at times. Considering how it was shot, it’s amazing that any of it survives. The images will burn into your brain. Strangely the most problematic is the footage from Hamas which was shot via body cams and so is very unsteady. That’s probably a good thing since we don’t need to see all the death and destruction.

While not for all audiences those wanting to know what happened that day will end up well informed. 

Homicide: Los Angeles (2024)

Season two of the Netflix show about real detective returns and we are better for it.

Moving season 2 to Los Angeles allows for some high profile cases and some not so high profile cases. It's a series that perfectly continues the wonderful one set in New York.

If you saw the first season then you know what to expect. It's more of the same but set in a different city. It's the same quality filmmaking.

If there is any problem with the series it's that the first three episodes are better than the last two. The first three are high profile celebrity cases and the last two, while they were covered on the news, are more low key and less exciting. 

Regardless of the poor ordering of episodes the series rocks and is recommended.

THE GOLDMAN CASE (2023) NYJFF 2024 opens Friday

I saw this film in January as part of the New York Jewish Film Festival and told not to review the film until the film was released. With the film being released Friday here is my review.

Recreation of the retrial of Pierre Goldman, the son of Polish Jews who was a political activist, convicted of several robberies, which he admitted to, and to two murders which he denied. Sent to prison on several consecutive life sentences, wrote a book and was granted a new trial.

I'm going to keep this short and sweet, This is a very well made film that is going to mean absolutely nothing to you if you don't know the Goldman case or it's context with in French history. Focusing on the retrial and only the retrial (we are only fleetingly outside of the courtroom) there is no context given of any sort. There is no indication as to why the case was big news or why Goldman mattered.  There are references to the book being a big seller but outside of him attacking the establishment we don't know what the big deal is.  Even the end crawl left me still wondering who Goldman was and why I should care. (My reading of his Wikipedia page filled in the details but not the reason why he was so important)

While not a bad film, I was curious enough to stay to see how it played out, it is not a film that is going to to mean anything to you unless you go in knowing who Goldman was.

Untold: The Murder Of Air McNair (2024)

 First of three new episodes of the Netflix Untold series focuses on the death of quarterback Steve McNair.

This is a look at the death of the well liked McNair who was supposed to have been killed by his girl friend. However there are a lot of questions. It a film that covers both the life of McNair and his death.

To be honest this is probably the least episode of the Untold series. I stumbled on the series last years some time and I fell in love with it's exploration of the dark side of sports. WHile some episodes were better than others, all were satisfying. This film on the other hand is not.

Rambling through the events of McNairs life and death things don't feel focused. Why are we seeing this? It's not really clear. Things kind of collapse at the end when the film begins to discuss questions in the police investigation ... and the end credits roll. 

I was disappointed.

A miss.

Lost in the Shuffle (2024)

After years master magician  Shawn Farquhar had been plying the trade he started to look into the history of playing cards and he discovered that hidden in plain sight was the story of a murder specifically of  the King of Hearts (King Charles).

Bright breezy and a great deal of fun, LOST IN THE SHUFFLE is a film that is going to make you wonder what else is hiding in plain site and you never recognized.  The whole thing is set in motion when Farquhar is told some facts about the design of playing cards that he never knew. The fact that he didn’t know about the history of playing cards and their designs despite spending his whole life manipulating them came as a shock to him and it sends him scurrying down the rabbit hole to know more. And based on the interviews in the film, many magicians didn’t know the history of cards either. (Honestly I think probably the only magicians I’ve ever run across who would know the history would be Teller and Ricky Jay)

While the journey through the history of cards is good, what sets the film apart from other films is the presentation. Farquhar is constantly performing tricks as we go and it makes us lean in farther than we would have had this been a “typical” doc.  Additionally his patter about the history and the tricks is first rate and I’m glad he’s a good guy because he could probably sell us tanker trucks of snake oil and make up happy about it.

While this may not be the heaviest documentary you’ll see this year, it just may be the the most entertaining.

Highly recommended

Liz Whittemore on Missing From Fire Trail Road (2024) Tribeca 2024

This originally appeared at Liz's home REEL NEWS DAILY

Sabrina Van Tassel‘s TRIBECA 2024 documentary MISSING FROM FIRE TRAIL ROAD speaks for those without a voice. Indigenous women are in crisis. Why aren’t we talking about the statistics of missing native women? The number is vastly higher than any other group in the United States.

The film focuses on the story of Mary Ellen Johnson Davis, missing since 2020, as her family tries to piece together all the information they can, while also showing up for those in their community with similar circumstances. There are far too many unexplained disappearances and deaths for one community not to call it an epidemic.

The reservation has its own justice system, under which not a single white man has been prosecuted in connection to a disappearance. Families must rely on the Feds to intervene. They never do. It is endless, lawless mayhem.

Story after story, family after family, one thread connects them all. That is abuse from white outsiders. You can’t tell this story without delving into the trauma of native children stolen from their families and physically and emotionally tormented in boarding schools. MISSING FROM FIRE TRAIL ROAD delivers the horrific truth through the words of survivors.

A quote from a manual given to households when children the government was ripping from their homes reads, “The goal is not to make scientists, or doctors or lawyers out of these citizens. The goal is to make domestic housewives and farmers and laborers.” Keeping the population suppressed remains the goal. It’s cyclical genocide. It is the continuation of colonization, plain and simple.

The question remains. How many of these documentaries need to be made to get the message across? Tribeca 2024 audiences can share the native plight and, perhaps, move the dial toward justice. Do something.

Sorry Not Sorry (2023) opens Friday

This is a film based on the  New York Times article that outed  Louis CK's sexual harassment of women that paused his career briefly. 

Looking at the women who were brave enough to speak up, the film is a damning look at the state of comedy  and society. It's a frequently funny film, it is a  film that deals with comedians after all, that is also bruising portrait that will leave you feeling sad about the state of comedy and society.  

I should state that I was never fan of CK's. I don't know why but he never clicked with me. When he fell from grace it barely made a dent in my existence. My friends were beside themselves. Watching the clips of CK after several years I still am left to wonder why he ever clicked.

Charting  Ck's career from rise to fall and rise again the film also charts the lives of three of the women who told the truth. We know what they said was true because CK said it was before he slunk away. The fact that he admitted it right at the start is the reason that many people are welcoming him back with open arms. While we should forgive, I'm not so sure we should completely forget since what he did wasn't  a willing sex act but a one where some one could help your career wants you to do them a favor or else. It kills me that because CK cultivated a shlumfy persona many people think he didn't mean it... yea he did. His shlumpiness is why he is still standing and other shits who were more authoritative (Harvey Weinstein or Matt Lauer) are still pariahs. 

Watching the film I was saddened listening to hear so many comedians defending CK if not out right but by saying they didn't know with big smirks on their faces.   I was troubled seeing other predators talking to (Charlie Rose) or about (Matt Lauer) CK when they themselves were doing the same thing. But I am most saddened by how the fans really never paused to question what he did. It was as if nothing had happened. (Don't get me started on Dave Chappelle)

There is much to unpack about the film and the situation it discusses. It is a film that requires careful consideration. It is a film very much for our time and the issues raised are important.

You must see this film.

( And if you look at various review sites for more info, consider that low audience scores seem to be due to CK's fans working to to get the algorithms to tank the film by posting low grades without seeing it) 

Bad Actor: A Hollywood Ponzi Scheme (2024) Tribeca 2024

 

Zachary Horowitz went from barely on screen actor to running a 700 miliion dollar ponzi scheme. By forging documents and knowing the right thing to say he was living the good life until covid and chance encounter brought it all down.

This is a very good look at a very good con man. Horowitz conned everyone and destroyed countless lives and was unrepentant to the end , he told the judge his victims were at fault for being stupid enough to believe him. It's a wild ride that very clearly answers the question as to whether we could possibly be dumb enough to fall into such a scheme.

This film will blow your mind.

Recommended.