Currently Browsing: "Documentary"

This week, on a very special episode of Reject Radio, Brian Gibson and I break down what’s hot and what’s sweaty here at South By Southwest.

‘The Art of the Steal,’ now in limited theatrical release and available on IFC On Demand, is a documentary with unusual villains: the Pew Charitable Trusts and the City of Philadelphia.

Andy Warhol mused once that we all just want our 15-minutes of fame. This is probably true. It is also true for the city governments of hundreds of small towns across the country. To become these worthwhile highway exits, these towns sometimes get very creative in coming up with something for which they can be famous. They are the subject of the documentary World’s Largest, which looks like fun.

No, South by Southwest will not be showing movies about actual dirty pictures — those of the nude variety. This isn’t Fantastic Fest. But they will be showing a documentary about a rogue chemist who invented a bunch of mind-altering drugs. That has to be a close second to taking nude photos of attractive people, right?

The documentary filmed by Spike Jonze will find a place on DVD shelves next to that movie directed by Spike Jonze.

Expect to see more political documentaries in the near future. Also expect to see more campaign ads pretending to be documentaries in the near future.

Hopefully they’ll all happen at once. But something tells me we’ll have to experience them separately. And in movie form.

This Is It is a stunning look at something that’s both epic and personal. Beautiful. Thrilling. Revealing. This film is a great documentary that delivers a larger-than-life figure in his natural environment as both a mega-celebrity and just a man standing alone on a stage.

Heartfelt documentary released to show fans the power of a fallen artist or blatant profiteering? You be the judge!

The documentary tells the eye-opening story of a New York family living a year of zero environmental impact. That means no movies, no electricity, no disposable goods etc.

In the mid-1930s, Walt Disney put down his pens and pencils to head to South America to battle Nazis. While completely misleading, that sentence is factually accurate, and there’s a documentary coming out Friday to fill in the details. Check out the trailer inside.

It Might Get Loud is a film for the bedroom dreamers and weekend warriors, a chance to see three of guitar rock’s finest players on the same stage sharing licks, trading tips and talking about how they got to where they are.

Overture Films has released the first trailer for Capitalism: A Love Story, the latest documentary from the king of shock-docs himself, Michael Moore.

Kirby Dick’s ‘Outrage,’ a documentary that outs closeted politicians, has been one of the hot titles at the Tribeca Film Festival.

It turns out that Michael Moore is still making movies, and now he’s really teetered off by the state of the economy.

Coming just in time for the rebooting of the Friday the 13th franchise is a 2-Disc retrospective documentary that absolutely kicks ass.

Now that Sundance is over it is time to look ahead to the next major American film festival, South by Southwest. The fest will take place in FSR’s new hometown, Austin, Texas, from March 13-21. And while the full festival lineup won’t be available until next week, we already have some information on some of the films that will be playing there.

There is something so unintentionally funny, yet terrifying about the monster that is Mike Tyson. We all know him as one of the most controversial sports figures of our time, though there are many different perspectives to be had. One perspective is that of sympathy, for a troubled youth from the bad neighborhoods of Brooklyn thrust into the spotlight and driven mad by his own social withdrawn nature and the fear of the world around him. Others see Tyson as a monster, a criminal, a violent threat to society both in and out of the ring.
In his intimate documentary, Tyson’s good friend director James Tobak (Black and White, Love and Money) has chosen to paint the former champ in the most sympathetic light possible. Mixing archival footage with up close and personal interviews from Tyson’s California home, Tobak’s documentary puts a painstaking amount of effort into presenting a singular point of view on the events, both triumphant and tragic, of his life. And for moments at a time, it works. There are moments when we can connect with the pain felt by a young Mike Tyson, a boy who was raised into a life of crime by the environment in 1970s Brooklyn. We can connect with the love that Tyson felt for his mentor and trainer, the late Cus D’Amato. We can also even connect with Tyson’s struggle with his fear of other people, his issues with trust and his deviant sexual tendencies.
Unfortunately the moments of connection are fleeting as [...]

Chill out, Mainstream Media. We’ve already trademarked the word, “Barackumentary.”

The final part of our interview with the creative minds behind Zombie Girl: The Movie, a film that follows a 12-year old girl making a zombie flick.