The following is a list of documentaries I've compiled, complete with informational links I exhaustively attached to each one. Please research the titles on this list, decide which one you'd like to see, and email me with your choice.I will provide details about the exact nature of the assignment based on your chosen doc in class this coming Monday.
Take some time and enjoy the process. There are some really great films here!
I Am Cuba
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Hoop Dreams
Twist of Faith
Roger & Me
American Dream
The Emperer's Naked Army Marches On
Escape from Suburbia
White Light, Black Rain
Paradise Lost - The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Hoop Dreams
Twist of Faith
Roger & Me
American Dream
The Emperer's Naked Army Marches On
Escape from Suburbia
White Light, Black Rain
Paradise Lost - The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills
Lake of Fire
Standard Operating Procedure
Extreme Private Eros: Love Song 1974
Night and Fog
The Gleaners and I
Standard Operating Procedure
Extreme Private Eros: Love Song 1974
Night and Fog
The Gleaners and I
High School
Salesman
Manufacturing Consent
Control Room
Triumph of the Will
The Murder of Fred Hampton
General Idi Amin Dada
Stevie
Darwin’s Nightmare
The Sorrow and the Pity
Bus 174
God Grew Tired of Us
Don't Look Back
This Film is Not Yet Rated
The Children of Leningradsky
The Brandon Teena Story
Life and Debt
4 Little Girls
Burden of Dreams
The War Tapes
Salesman
Manufacturing Consent
Control Room
Triumph of the Will
The Murder of Fred Hampton
General Idi Amin Dada
Stevie
Darwin’s Nightmare
The Sorrow and the Pity
Bus 174
God Grew Tired of Us
Don't Look Back
This Film is Not Yet Rated
The Children of Leningradsky
The Brandon Teena Story
Life and Debt
4 Little Girls
Burden of Dreams
The War Tapes
12 comments:
I only briefly scanned the list before clicking a few of the links and eventually landing on 'Stevie.' I guess the title stood out a bit from the others because it consisted of just a first name, which made me assume it was a character-based doc. I think personal stories can be so powerful and can relate to so many people on different levels. I just wanted to watch a documentary with a character I could get invested in. When I clicked the link and saw "From the director of Hoop Dreams..." I was sold. I loved Hoop Dreams because it did an excellent job of getting to the bottom of its central characters. It kept me curious and emotional and really wanting them to succeed. I figured this would be a good bet.
When selecting the doc I was going to watch I really had no idea where to start. Being new to docs, as both a viewer and-somewhat-critic I decided to let the title do the talking. The first link I went to was was that of God Grew Tired of Us and thought "What a powerful title." After reading a bit about the Lost Boys of Sudan and their (mostly on foot) thousand mile journey to the States i was hooked. In a way I can relate to their process of assimilation, but their circumstances of moving to the States were drastically different than mine. It's really your classic underdog story, and quite frankly, I'm a huge sucker for the underdog film. I can't help but feel for stories like these and the Dinka tribe simply fascinates me. After a view of the trailer it was easy to make my decision, even without consideration of the other films on the list. Plus, an Aussie narrates the film.
Chris Marker is a pretty amazing guy from what I hear and see of his work. It was tough for me not to pick Sans Soleil, a film I have not seen, but Orson Welles won over in the end.
I am willing to take my pretend-I-have-seen-everything hat off that I run into so much in art school and admit that not only had I never seen this film, but had never heard of it as well. I also liked what Jon Rosenbaum had to say in the link. that's about it. I hope the film weaves magic and trickery into the structure and aesthetic as well as the plot, and really give it a full bodied feel, an experience. Either way next time I'm hanging around a bunch of ironic mustaches holding PBR's, I'll have something to schmooze about.
There are so many of those docs that look appealing so I am not too crushed that I didn't get my first choice... or my second. First I chose Dark Days because the description fit what to me would be the ideal documentary, that the director related to his subjects so well that he considers the subjects the makers of the film. Its a film about a group of homeless people, and its such a delicate topic that its hard to imagine a non exploitative angle... But it was stolen, so then I chose Escape from Suburbia, which is another really appealing topic to me, but that too was stolen. Then i chose The Revolution will not be Televised because of Aesop Rock's lyric "If the Revolution isn't televised, then I'll probably miss it." I think this is my reality. Or at least if its not in the redeye. What can i say, I buy books for their covers and watch films for their titles.
There were a lot of films on this list that I have previously seen before. But the film "This Film is not Yet Rated" really got my attention becasue it was recommend to me by tutor last semester and my high school film teacher mentioned it to me also. So I have heard of it, but never actually watched any part of it. When it was presented to me on the list and my apartment building was showing it, I thought this was my chance to finally watch it. Overall, I thought the film was pretty good. It got both sides of the rating system but it's main objective was to show how wrong the system is. I wasn't a big fan of the ending, but I did get their point and I better understand why certain movies get certain ratings.
After looking over the list of the Doc’s I didn’t know where to begin, I clicked on a few and read their descriptions but one caught my eye a little more than others.
“American Dream” was filmed in my home state of Minnesota, so immediately I felt an instant connection. I started reading the summary and felt that millions of Americans are in the same situation today that these Butchers were in almost 30 years ago.
When I scrolled the list of Docs, "Don't Look Back" immediately caught my attention. I had seen clips from it before in my other film classes but I had never seen it in its entirety. "Don't Look Back" follows Bob Dylan through his 1965 tour of England. I am not a huge Bob Dylan fan but I know what a big influence he had on the social climate of the 60s. This film serves as a transition point in Bob Dylan's career when he goes from a singer to a superstar. You must watch this film if you are a true Dylan fan, or if you want to watch a good doc about the rise of counterculture in the mid 60s.
I was familiar with most of the films on this list. There were a few that are on my que list on Netflix but in the 200 range. Which I try not mess with because I won't get anywhere.(Did you know there is 500 title limit?) So it was between moving up Dark Days, Sans Soleil, or Lake of Fire. I went with Dark Days because of the conversation about responsibility towards our subject we had in class. Once I read the article about what went into making this film I knew I was going to see something special. So I claimed it fair and square.
I think after the narrative film 'Milk' did so well in the theaters(even though Slumdog wept the Oscars) it would be a good idea to watch the documentary version, 'The Life and Times of Harvey Milk.' I always like seeing how stories transfer from one medium to another, although it's usually book to film, not film to film. This could be an interesting twist.
I choose "Escape from Suburbia" after watching another Gregory Greene documentary before, "The End of Suburbia." I was interesting in his documentary techniques, and thought that it was an interesting subject matter: the problem with suburbs, and the coming of peak oil.
I chose Paris Is Burning by Jennie Livingston. The main reason i chose it was because of subject choice. I think interesting and unique subjects for a documentary help express deeper and more pressing issues, then say covering those issues head on. PIB to me expressed the pursuit of the American Dream to one of the most extreme lengths. You can be what you want to be in America, even if you happen to have been born a male and want to be female. One of the first quotes from the move stuck with me. Jennie was interviewing a young black male who happened to be gay, and this guy was talking about his father. He said that when his dad found out he was gay he told him....."Son, I've always seen my life with two obstacles.... one I'm poor and two I'm black. But your poor black and gay, your going to have one hell of a fucking time in this country. Your going to have be stronger then you ever thought possible."
Crumb had been on my long list of films to see for a long time but I had just never really gotten arround to it. I knew a little bit about Robert Crumb and had seen some of his comics before seeing the film and was very interested in him, and how strange he and the people arround him are. On top of my interest in Robert Crumb, I also wanted to see Crumb because I knew that Terry Zwigoff directed it. I just skimmed over the list and when I saw Crumb decided that was it.
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