The following review is written by our friend and fellow documentary lover Joe from Mechanical Forest Sound, check out his blog for Hot Doc reviews, exceptional live recording and probably a helluva lot more thought out writings
“Mother Nature, let the herd be ever well.” It’s no surprise that the Chukchi people’s prayers might be reindeer-centric — in the blank, treeless tundra of northeastern Siberia, there’s not a lot else to sustain life. Taking a largely hands-off observational approach, this film takes us into the world of an extended family of reindeer herders, eking out a living in the unforgiving arctic. It’s certainly not all grim — the adorably ewok-like children have lots of time for play before falling into the busy life of their parents.
Cajoling, shouting and bringing in wayward individualists looking for some alone time, patriarch Vukvukai doesn’t always come off as a likeable guy. He watches and treats his extended family just like his herd — as something needing to be ordered around and watched constantly. Vukvukai is our focal point, but by dwelling on him, we don’t get any other sharply-drawn characters, which is one of the film’s biggest flaws.
And it’s interesting, of course, to consider what the film does and doesn’t show us — just as there are no guns and no predators in sight threatening the herd, besides a tractor and a plane passing by overhead, there are very few signs of modernity, which makes me curious as to whether the director was trying to present a sort of airbrushed anthropological view of the Chukchi. The whimsical chapter titles feed into that a bit as well.
It’s only at the end, when Vukvukai is fretting over the children being herded into a helicopter to be taken away to school that we feel any tension between modern Russian and ancient Chukchi ways. (And here in Canada, the sight of the words “residential school” tends to send a chill down the spine.)
That this isn’t the most interesting documentary I’ve seen about nomadic herders probably says more about my film-watching habits than about this doc’s intrinsic value. There’s some nice — if intensely snow-bright — scenery to behold, and I don’t mind the languid, observational pace. Those with short attention spans might want to give this a miss, however.
Hot Docs Link
Screens: Sun, Apr 29, 6:00 PM @ TIFF Lightbox 4; Tue, May 1, 1:00 PM @ TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
The following review is written by our friend and fellow documentary lover Joe from Mechanical Forest Sound, check out his blog for Hot Doc reviews, exceptional live recording and probably a helluva lot more thought out writings
A talking heads documentary about people in masks may not be a compelling recipe for an engaging feature. And, indeed, at the outset, I was dubious that I was going to enjoy — or learn anything — from this film. Static interviews alternating with a lot of fast-cutting montages, at first I thought this was going to just be like an extended Nightline feature. It manages in the end to mostly transcend that as the momentum of its story builds up.
Getting swept up in the moment it’s capturing, We Are Legion is definitely sympathetic towards the hacktivists it portrays. The trade-off of close access to some key players in the story comes, to some extent, at the expense of asking some hard questions. (Though with respect to the latter, McGill professor Gabriella Coleman comes off as articulate and cogent while keeping an eye on the larger issues.)
The film-makers, meanwhile, seem content with D&D-esque explanations that the amorphous “movement” can be seen as more chaotic than inherently good or bad, while not calling to task the elements that are willing to cause all sorts of trouble (to individuals, and not the corporations they claim to detest) in the name of “lulz” (or, as we called them back in my day, “kicks”). And in the end, there’s probably more to be said about how the Anonymous phenomenon is feeding into larger social uprisings (such as Occupy), and, ultimately, how this fits into the broader historical anti-capitalist struggle.
Zeitgeist-y and worth seeing, though this isn’t the sort of thing I’d necessarily recommend going out of one’s way to see on the big screen during Hot Docs. It would look better seen on TV — or, perhaps appropriately, in a window on one’s computer screen nestled in amongst all the other data flowing through your life.
Screens: Tue, May 1 6:15 PM @ Bloor; Thu, May 3, 3:00 PM @ TIFF Lightbox 1; Sat, May 5, 7:00 PM @ TIFF Lightbox 1)
Fellipe Gamarano Barbosa’s latest documentary is about Laura, an aging socialite from South America who spends most of her time trapezing around the outer circles of the rich and famous, going from parties to parties attempting to get noticed. Laura herself is neither rich or famous and lives in a lower class apartment complex which houses among other things, mountains of memorabilia taken from these parties.
The film provides little background as to why Laura chooses this lifestyle, how she really made the connections that allow her to go to these parties and what her goal really is. The Filmmakers originally opted for a fly on the wall approach but as the film progresses, the filmmakers become more and more apart of the documentary itself. What seemingly start offs as a film about a socialite and perhaps a look at the emptiness that is the pursuit of fame quickly descends into an odd piece that starts to intertwine Laura and the filmmakers. I have rarely seen a filmmaker unwillingly get as involved in the documentary as this one so it was interesting to see how the relationship between Laura and the film makers progresses over the course of the film. It’s a reasonably enjoyable documentary and the twist halfway through the film makes it pretty unique.
SCREENINGS
Sun, Apr 29 7:00 PM, The ROM Theatre
Tue, May 1 4:00 PM, The ROM Theatre
Sat, May 5 4:00 PM, Cumberland 2
Baltimore – Honestly. If I were in Toronto, you lot would be reading reviews to kingdom-come in the coming week. Alas I am not. Still, driven by an insatiable thirst for movies/documentaries, I will tell you what caught my eyes in this year’s listing at Hotdocs while sitting miles (oops, I mean kilometers) away from Toronto. You probably knew what Hotdocs (Canadian International Documentary Festival) is – but did you know that Hotdocs.ca lags behind an automated document generating company in Utah when it comes to Google search? I have noticed this for a few years now… perhaps we should start a movement to improve that status. And we can film a meta-documentary. And then promote it during Hotdocs 2013. And then I won’t have any other complaints and your urge of instant gratification will be satisfied 3 sentences sooner. Follow the link on each film’s title to find out about screening time.
Indie game the movie
There are certainly worse obsessions, but games can etch your life away in a very real way, and unfortunately it’s a spreading phenomenon as gaming replaces sports for many people. In this era where EA dictates your gaming tastes as completely as Apple rules your gadget designs, is making an independent game just an express route to internet fame and financial independence? Or is it another orthodox expression of brilliant introverts that only differs, by the size of your bank accounts, from being employed by Google? The trailer seems to hint at the fermentation of several Vincent van Gogh’s… who struggle to find themselves, to challenge as well as explain themselves artistically, to retrive the hundreds of hours spent on one’s own dream and inevitably stop being financially-challenged. If I sound un-impressed, don’t forget that I can’t control the flow and tone of these words as if I was designing a game. I think this will be something cool. Plus, if you have ever played Braid, or Super Meat Boy, or Limbo, or Machinarium, or any number of these deceptively beautiful indie games, you know that most of them are also full of pain and sorrow, and sad stories alway make good films.
There are hobbies, and then there are fetishes. The first category you share with others, and the latter you stow away in your deposit boxes, your basements, or your underwear hoping that it will one day become “cool”. A sex doll will probably become cool only when you stop… OK, let’s try another sentence with the subject in another position… dammit. I don’t know if I have just perfectly demonstrated the stereotypes that filmmaker Allison de Fren had when she began the project, but a few reviews of the film have surprisingly described the fresh perspectives that her film brings to the subject. Here at PM, we’re all about fresh point-of-views. I think this is worth your time.
This movie, probably not by coincidence, shares its name with a 1930s Broadway play and an erotic novel, neither of which I look forward to ever revisit during internet searches. Introspective and autobiographical documentaries typically invoke the inner narcissist, often losing their connection with the audience (me) in minutes – and that’s what YouTube is for. But with multiple voices and personalities, a ventriloquist’s autobiography is something that might overcome the barrier. British comedian Nina Conti utilizes the puppets bequeathed to her by late mentor and lover Ken Campbell to both mourn the loss, and reinvent her self-confidence. But by the end of the last sentence I’m already wondering if this is a mockumentary.
Two years ago, I went to see Enemy of the People. It was the kind of hard-hitting documentary that you must include in any complete visit of Hotdocs – how do you create contrast without the ugly things in life? Jai bhim Comrade, as I understand it, documents the suffering of the Dalits – the untouchables in the Indian caste system. The “lowest of the low” since the ancient times, these are people who were supposed to have been given an equalized opportunity to survive in the modern era. Of course, this film would scarcely be identified as a type of magnum opus if it was a celebration of their triumph over high society and peaceful reintegration. Prepare for 198 minutes of class warfare, bigotry from all directions, blood/gore and not a few tears.
While we’re at it, let’s continue the dark streak. Here’s an assignment: go see both of these films and piece together which side has the more human story. These are both films about the West Bank occupation. One is the culmination of 6 years of work by a Palestinian farmer who lives by the separation wall, another is the collected interviews of the legal brain trust within the Occupied Territories in the Gaza strip. On one hand, you can experience the devastation within a West bank neighborhood first-hand, and in the other you can pass silent judgement on the lawmakers themselves and test your political mettle. Since it behooves neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis to back down in the dead-locked situation, it is your duty as a world citizen to hear both sides of the story. Both of these are award-winning documentaries at Sundance and other festivals.
You probably can’t tell by looking at an X-ray of me, but I was a skater kid. Our bunch disbanded after a friend smashed his skull on a slab of smooth concrete just before yours truly was to embark on the same tests of Newtonian physics. After that I took to skateluge and finally got nowhere. Unlike me, guys like Mike McGill and Tony Hawk did get somewhere with their skateboarding, and they are in this film as well as the skate team it showcases. If the rise of a pop culture lifestyle is not your cup of tea, you will at least be able to appreciate the athleticism involved. As I learned long ago, not every kid with 4 urethane wheels can skip over a manhole cover without eating dirt.
We all know the feeling that the modern world is somehow more sick than the one from which it arose. If there’s a disease, there must be a cure. If nothing, the modern world is at least much more medicated than the old one. Pharmaceutical companies can walk on two rails, 1) the next wonder drug for an existing disease, or 2) the next debilitating disease that can be controlled by orphaned chemicals from the massive effort in 1). If the second option sounds vaguely evil, just think about the plethora of DIY projects – you already have the pieces necessary, why not take advantage of it? It’s the same train-of-thought; the big difference is that while you mess up your interior fashion with failed DIY projects, pharmaceutical companies could mess people up. I mean, they do it in the traditional, drug-addict method instead of the underground, shadowy assassin route. This promises to be an interesting peek into the minds and lives of the heavily medicated.
There are bound to be other gems more interesting than these during the festival. As I recall, one year Ricky’s favorite film was about a parking lot, and mine involved a Danish guy in Brazil. So, go out there and heat up some seats!
