A Dozen Docs from Flix

 

 

 

Taking a month away from cable TV made more time for Netflix streaming. Since my existing queue was uninspiring an open minded browsing for documentaries produced some interesting and diverse prospects. Here are twelve of them. 

The Dark Matter of Love – 2012 (3.1). With a teenage daughter and several subsequent miscarriages, a Wisconsin couple tries to fulfill their dream of having four children by adopting three more from Russia, a girl age 11 and twin boys age 5. Two psychologists are engaged to assist and advise in this very challenging endeavor and the progress is documented over the first couple years in this film. Historical documentary footage about psychological tests involving emotional detachment is incorporated and often corrected by the two psychologists helping the family. The educational components of the movie are interesting but the real impact is seeing what a tough challenge this was for the three Americans and the three Russians to get to know, trust and love each other as a family.

 

The Loving Story -2011 (3.1). The case that led to the 1967 US Supreme Court decision overturning state laws barring interracial marriage is well known, but the actual married couple named in the challenge is not. The ACLU did not seek out a highly educated interracial couple in Virginia to use as a test case; instead Richard Loving and Mildred Jeter from a small rural county in that state wrote to US Attorney General Robert Kennedy who referred them to the ACLU. Richard, a white man, was a quiet brick mason who made friends with people regardless of race and Mildred was an endearing young woman of mixed Indian and Negro race. After being married in Washington DC, the couple returned home to Virginia where the local Sheriff broke into their home in the middle of the night and arrested them for living as a married interracial couple. They were prosecuted, convicted and sentenced to prison, with suspension given if they moved out of state. This documentary effectively blends footage from the time of the litigation with interviews from many years later with the daughter of the couple, their two attorneys and others who were involved.

 

Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia – 2013 (2.9). Gore Vidal was a prolific American author and public intellectual holding stage for over 50 years. His criticisms of the United States for its cultural deficiencies and for its imperialistic foreign policy are well presented in this documentary, using archival footage, interviews with friends and family and extended on screen conversation with the man himself. We get a little of his background, more of his philosophy and a lot of his very accurate analysis of American mistakes.

 Charles Bradley: Soul of America – 2012 (2.9). At 62, a black man in NYC made the Rolling Stone top 50 with his first album of soul songs. He had been performing is small local clubs as a James Brown impersonator, but had lots of soul of his own based on the hard life he has led as shown in this documentary. Brief dramatic reconstructions infill the interviews with family members and the people involved in putting out his album. But the man himself, followed extensively in his rehearsals, performances and his daily activities is literally the soul of the movie. He creates very personal songs based on his feelings and delivers them with strong passion and love. In fact, Charles Bradley may be one of the most loving men we will ever meet.

 

Codebreaker – 2014 (2.9). Alan Turing was a brilliant English mathematician and genius original thinker who was the person primarily responsible for breaking the Nazi code in WWII and who was a pioneer in conceptualizing digital computing. He was also a homosexual and a very honest man, a combination which led to his criminal prosecution and resultant downfall, all of which is covered for this documentary by use of dramatic reconstruction and interviews with experts and people who knew him. Originally broadcast in the UK in 2011, Netflix seems to have a somewhat expanded version dated a few years later.

 

Two: The Story of Roman & Nyro – 2013 (2.8). Gay dads use a friend as a surrogate mother so they can have a child and end up with the twins named in the documentary title. But the movie is more about the dads than the kids, using old family movies of the time the men were growing up to explain their background and home movie footage of their years together to show their strong bond. Interviews with the dads, kids, surrogate and various relatives are combined with professional documentary footage to produce a celebratory film showing yet another version of a happy family.

 

Gotta Dance – 2008 (2.8). Senior citizens turn out for open auditions for an oldsters dance group to perform and cheer at a few New Jersey Nets basketball games and a dozen or so are chosen, including some who never expected it. This fun documentary quickly gets through the auditions and then follows the dancers as they learn they will be dancing to hip hop. Rehearsals are shown and there are interviews with several of the dancers and scenes of their intermingling and getting to know each other, and finally we get to see them perform at some games, including a performance with a troupe of kids.

 

The Improv: 50 Years Behind the Brick Wall – 2013 (2.7). Put a camera in a room and interview several comedians about their memories of working in the early years of the celebrated comedy club, throw is some archival footage of performers, add a dash of interview with the club founder and you have a one hour documentary. It is not rocket science, but there are some laughs.

 Jiro Dreams of Sushi – 2011 (2.7). Octogenarian Jiro is the acknowledged king of the Tokyo Sushi chefs, having dedicated has life to his culinary career since he was cast out on his own at age 9. Documented in this movie is his passionate devotion to his work, but what seems to be missing is more about the man himself. However, there may not be much more to him than what the film shows, a man whose entire life has been his dedication to being the best at what he does for a living.

 

Andrew Jenks, Room 335 – 2006 (2.7). A 19 year old filmmaker arranges a stay in an assisted living home in Florida to learn some wisdom from the senior residents. The resulting documentary at first is funny as the young fish out of water finds some residents who are humorous wisecrackers. But as the young man begins to bond with some of the residents in particular, he quickly learns the seriousness of their states of health as several are taken to the hospital and one undergoes a particularly wrenching ordeal. He is exposed to the philosophical pronouncements of the elderly residents and feels the care and attachment they can develop for each other and the pain of loss.

 I Ain't in It for MyHealth: A Film about Levon Helm – 2010 (2.6). Levon Helm was the drummer and a singer in The Band, the group that backed Bob Dylan for a time and performed at Woodstock. Filmed a couple years before his death, this documentary uses archival footage and current interviews with fellow musicians and family members, but mostly it follows Helm as he visits his doctor and hangs around his home and puts together a tour to raise money to save his home from creditors. For all the time we see Helm Talking, what is missing from the film is an actual explanation of what he did in all the years after The Band broke up and any depth of exploration of his complaint that he was cheated out of credit and royalties for the songs he claims he helped write.

 

Paul Williams: Still Alive – 2011 (2.5). In the 1970s a diminutive singer became quickly famous performing his own songs and appearing on practically every TV show being broadcast. His songs about loneliness resonated with lots of people including the maker of this documentary who had assumed Paul Williams was probably dead since he had not been heard of for so long. But in fact Paul had survived a drug and alcohol downfall and was still performing for fans with long memories. This movie was an attempt to find out more about what had happened to Paul in his life journey and how he felt about it. The expected archival footage is included but the movie primarily follows Paul and interviews him on his travels to perform. Unfortunately, Paul is a very reluctant interviewee, which makes for an awkward film.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

The Dark Matter of Love
The Loving Story

Charles Bradley: Soul of America

Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia

Codebreaker

Two: The Story of Roman & Nyro

Gotta Dance

The Improv: 50 Years Behind the Brick Wall

Jiro Dreams of Sushi

Andrew Jenks, Room 335

I Ain't in It for My Health: A Film about Levon Helm

Paul Williams: Still Alive



 

Farewell Parenthood

Eric Deggans wrote a thoughtful piece for NPR about the end of the Parenthood TV series. This type of realistic family drama is unfortunately becoming rarer these days, though Downton Abbey does present a historical British version.

 

Parenthood (SeasonFive) – 2013 (3.2). This next to last season includes 22 episodes moving the multiple story lines along in touching and believable courses that feel properly paced. We begin to sense that the family members, in spite of the three generations of age spread, are coming to times of their lives where turmoil is beginning to lead to clarification of what is important. The next season will be a final shorter season because of disagreements between the cast and NBC. Hopefully the writers will carefully bring the stories to points where viewers can be comfortable bidding farewell, wishing everyone well and still wondering how things will actually turn out after we part company.

 

Belle – 2013 (3.1). Based on a true story, this per Revolutionary War Brit drama follows the daughter of a slave woman and an English aristocrat soldier from the time she joins the family of her father in second class status, through the death of her father and her blossoming into an impressive young woman with an independent mind. As she and her beloved cousin reach marriageable age, they encounter the social pressures about which Jane Austen so notably wrote.  During this time, the patriarch of the family who is the Lord Chief Justice of England must decide a famous case about sick slaves being sent to market in America being jettisoned overboard supposedly for humanitarian reasons, but more probably in order to claim insurance benefits for their loss as cargo.

 

An Unreal Dream: The Michael Morton Story – 2013 (3.1). One might wonder how yet another story about a wrongfully convicted man finally obtaining release could be told in a new way, but this documentary is up to the challenge. Quietly told mostly by the man himself, the movie includes a reasonable dose of the requisite legal issues, but what makes the film distinctive is the concentration on the personal transition of the man himself, which he talks about and which is also discussed by fellow inmates, members of his legal team and a few others, most importantly his son who was only three years old when his father was sent to life imprisonment for the murder of his wife, the boy's mother.

 

Parenthood (Season Six) – 2014 (3.0). The shortened final season brings all the characters to decisions leading to new hopeful beginnings and we are given some quick previews of what may be in store for them on their continuing journeys. If the audience for the series had been larger, there was dramatic potential to follow these people for a few more seasons, though there would be no clear time for it to end. Dramas set in historical eras can end with a particular calendar year or historical event. Those centered on one main character can end with a significant life or death event of that character. But ensemble dramas set in contemporary times do not have such natural ending points.

 

Alive Inside – 2014 (2.9). Old people with Alzheimer's and dementia can be depressingly trapped in isolation, both literally and figuratively. This documentary follows a man with a promising idea for bringing out the still alive interior of these people. He gives them I-Pods with their favorite tunes from the past and they light up and become vibrantly happy. Doctors, scientists and musicians are interviewed about why this works and loving family members and nursing home workers are shown interfacing with the afflicted. An African musician is shown using music to heal Congolese women victims of abuse as well as Americans in nursing homes.

 

Return to the Wild:The Chris McCandless Story – 2014 (2.8).In 2007 Sean Penn released a documentary based on book telling a true story about a young man from an affluent family who traveled around alone after college, discarded all trappings of his wealth, severed connections with his family and wandered off into the wilderness of Alaska where he became stranded and starved to death. He became sort of a cult hero to young people and his sister decided it was time to revisit his story and set the record straight. The result is this new documentary telling the biography of the young man through interviews with his sister, his parents and his two half-sisters. What emerges is a sorrowful tale of an abusive bigamist father and a mother in denial, and three young women who survived what inadvertently killed their brother.

 

The Kill Team – 2013 (2.8). A young American soldier in Afghanistan finds that his platoon sergeant is involving some platoon members in murder of innocent Afghan civilians. He knows it is wrong but when his qualms are detected he is threatened with death if he tells. Through Facebook chat he explains his situation to his father who tries to help from the US by contacting military related authorities, but becomes concerned that if he stirs things up too much, his son will pay the price with his life. The soldier, his parents, some platoon members and a few others are shown in this documentary as the situation eventually plays itself out back in the US. The movie is yet another piece of evidence questioning US military forays into foreign countries to "win the hearts and minds" of the local people.

 

Like Stars on Earth – 2007 (2.8). Learning differences can be difficult for some parents and schools to recognize and the consequences of failing to do so can be devastating to a child whose brain works in a different way. This overly long drama from India stars an eight year old boy who cannot read or write or do math and who tries to disguise his difficulty in learning by acting out in delinquent ways. The young actor plays the role quite well and the heartfelt spirit of the movie and happy ending are probably reasons why Disney aided US distribution. Edited to a more reasonable length it could have been a good film to show US third graders both for the message of the film and for the experience of watching a subtitled movie [though the DVD seems to offer the option of dubbing in English].

 

Dear Mom, Love Cher – 2013 (2.7). On the 85^th birthday of her mother, Cher conducted an interview which was then expanded into this one hour TV documentary giving some biographical information on Mom and her six marriages and current long term arrangement. There are lots of holes in the story and at first Mom seems easy to dismiss, but over the hour she becomes more endearing.

 

The Missing Picture – 2013 (2.7). In this Oscar nominee for best foreign film, a Cambodian filmmaker uses archival footage and clay figures placed into panoramas to portray his experience as a boy during the terror of the Khmer Rouge in the late 1970s. His narration is written in an almost poetic style, but his low key delivery and unfamiliar accent make it seem more mundane than it had to actually have been.

 

Xmas without China – 2013 (2.5). An intriguing premise, an American family trying to go without using any products made in China, gets lost in this short documentary which also blends in the young Chinese born film maker struggling with the pull of his motherland and the allure of the United States, his home since he was eight. Add to the mix the Chinese parents, now American citizens, trying to understand how Christmas is the top holiday in America, and the movie never seems to have clear direction.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

Parenthood (Season Five)

An Unreal Dream: The Michael Morton Story

Alive Inside

The Missing Picture

My Best Watches of 2014

As usual, I am a year or two behind in watching new movies. But several of the best ones I watched in 2014 were fairly new. Here are the ones I rated best:

Bridegroom	2013	3.5
Downton Abbey (Season Three)	2013	3.5
Inequality for All	2013	3.5
Past, The	2013	3.5
Omar	2013	3.4
Island at War	2004	3.3
Mr. Selfridge (Season Two)	2014	3.3
Parenthood (Season Three)	2012	3.3
Parenthood (Season Two)	2011	3.3
Roosevelts: An Intimate History, The	2014	3.3

 

I finally saw most Oscar nominees from last time around. My highest rated were Omar [above], and another foreign film The Broken Circle Breakdown (3.1). Another foreigner was The Hunt (2.9). English language best were Captain Phillips and Philomena (both 2.9).

 

Some other good films from recent years were:

Last Tango in Halifax (Season Two)	2012	3.2
Parenthood (Season Five)	2014	3.2
Parenthood (Season Four)	2013	3.2
Parenthood (Season One)	2010	3.2
Way, The	2010	3.2
Aftershock	2010	3.1
Bottle in the Gaza Sea, A	2011	3.1
Broken Circle Breakdown, The	2012	3.1
Chasing Ice	2012	3.1
Crime after Crime	2011	3.1
Paradise, The (Season Two)	2012	3.1
West of Memphis	2012	3.1

The links at the right for My Movie Ratings Explained and for movie lists alphabetical and in ratings order have been updated through 2014 and include 3206 listings.

Careless Netflix

A while back the predicted ratings in my Netflix queue suddenly shot up to just about five stars for all movies. Calls to customer service left the clear impression Netflix does not know why this happened and could care less. They as much as admitted nobody pays attention to those stars anyway, which I sort of confirmed by doing some Google searching to see who else was having this problem. So I’ll rate Netflix streamers when I watch them, just to be able to quickly tell at their site that I have watched it, but I will ignore their predictions for me. The average user rating for a Netflix movie may be of some use, but I will also compare that to the IMDB user rating.

 

Netflix stock is riding high now but analysts are wary of its prospects, saying the overseas ventures will not pay off and it is only a matter of time before streaming from competitors eats away at Netflix revenue. From my experience there is not much reason to stay with Netflix out of loyalty once the competition offers something better.

 

Parenthood (SeasonThree) – 2011 (3.3). Except for one clinker episode about a family caravan to visit the elderly family matriarch, the series maintains the same qualities that appealed in the second season. As in our own lives, some people come and go, while others stay and grow. We recognize issues family members are facing as we have either faced them ourselves or watched our own family members or friends face them. As in real life, when we watch others we tend to empathize, criticize or both.  This series provides real families a vehicle for talking about handling very personal family matters in a less threatening way, because the characters are fictional.

 

Parenthood (SeasonFour) – 2012 (3.2). Aging of the young is so more evident than aging of the old. Each passing year brings rapid biological growth for youngsters while grownups tend to look pretty much the same from one year to the next. But young and old alike face ongoing changes in relationships and problems encountered. All of this continues to be well presented in this series, though this season seemed more hurried than last, even more than the drop in the number of episodes by three.

 

The Paradise (SeasonTwo) – 2013 (3.1). This is one of those series that gets better in the second year as the characters and plot lines develop. The early episodes are definitely worthwhile, but unfortunately the writing falls flat in the final episode where instead of a batch of realistic cliffhangers, we are given a disappointing assemblage of quick plot developments intended to bring everything to an acceptable conclusion. This abrupt ending was probably caused by the expected or realized failure to secure commitment for a third season.

 

Aftershock – 2010 (3.1). The Tangshan earthquake in China in 1976 killed hundreds of thousands of people. This Chinese drama uses special effects to portray the quick devastation followed by the rescue and recovery efforts, but that part of the story is only the lead into the main thrust of the script. The aftershock of the title is not the second quake but rather the mental trauma the survivors suffer the rest of their lives. A couple with six year old twins, a boy and a girl, are the central characters and we follow them in the immediate aftermath and then in stages over the next three decades as they cope with the terrible memories while trying to live normal livers. This film effectively delivers the pain to produce empathy.

 

Altman – 2014 (3.0). This made for TV documentary tells the story of Robert Altman’s life and career as a movie director in a straightforward way with narration by his widow and children, archival interviews with Altman himself and lots of footage from his movies and the awards shows involved. After WWII service as a B-24 pilot, Altman bluffed himself into a job making industrial films as on the job training in film making. That led to TV directing and eventually movies, where his adventurous and innovative spirit ran afoul of studio execs and turned him into essentially an independent artist. Never repeating himself, he had hits and misses, and leaves a body of work definitely worth revisiting, encouraged by this movie.

 

Cold War Roadshow – 2014 (2.9). In 1959 Nikita Khrushchev became the first Soviet leader to visit the US. Using wonderful footage of his 10 day tour of the country together with memoir style interviews from people such as his son and the granddaughter of President Eisenhower, this documentary shows Nikita as a genuine people person who was fascinated by his visit, while also being a very astute politician sensitive about his lack of formal education and lowly roots. One has to wonder what would have become of the cold war if the U-2 spy plane had not been shot down over Russia causing Nikita to cancel the planned summit with Ike. Shown on PBS American Experience.

 

Solitary Nation – 2014 (2.9). Experts now seem to agree that long term solitary confinement causes makes inmates so mentally deranged that they become even more dangerous, but as this documentary set in a Maine prison chillingly shows, even a well-meaning warden trying to integrate solitaries back into the general prison population faces an overwhelming challenge. Shown on PBS Frontline.

 

History of the Eagles – 2013 (2.9). Everybody loves their music and this two part documentary includes lots of it as we see the band’s performances through the decades and learn the inside story of how they came together and evolved over time, with hard work, creativity, hard living, congeniality and conflict. Everyone involved in all phases is interviewed and lots of archival footage is mixed with some clever reconstructions to keep this longish movie moving. The first part ends with the split up in 19890. The second part picks up with the reunion in 1994. You can’t help but sing along.

 

Muscle Shoals – 2013 (2.9). For many decades this small town in the northwest corner of Alabama has been a mecca for blues, rock and related recording artists seeking a special studio in which to record. Studio founder Rick Hall narrates the documentary story of his life and his studio and its spinoff rival, abetted by some dramatic reconstructions, many interviews with artists looking back and lots of archival footage featuring great music. So many famous artists have recorded in this small town that a shorter list might include those who haven’t.

 

Happiness – 2013 (2.8).  The King decrees it is time for electricity and television to come to the mountains of Bhutan and this documentary intimately follows one family of villagers struggling with their daily lives and going through the process of raising money, traveling to the city to buy a set and then bringing it back to the village. Central to this quiet story are the beauty of the mountain scenery and the life of a young boy whose father has died and who is now experiencing strange new prospects, such as a time in a monastery, first car trip to the city and finally the awe of being able to sit in the glow of a broadcast of American wrestling.

 

Powerless – 2013 (2.7). Woefully inadequate and derelict power infrastructure in an extremely poor city in India causes massive outages, while daring power thieves dangerously tap lines to provide power to the poor. Meanwhile the power company puts the first woman executive in charge and she pushes to criminally prosecute everyone who uses power without paying. The lines for conflict are drawn, but this documentary does not quite capture the full impact, partly because it spends more time on the personalities than on the underlying issues.

 

Who Is Dayani Cristal? – 2013 (2.6). A documentary with much interlaced reenactment, this movie tells about a body of a man found in the Arizona desert. He appears to be someone who entered the US illegally and he has a tattoo on his chest “Dayani Cristal”. The documentary shows the medical examiner and embassy people in Arizona who work on trying to identify the dead man. We learn from them that their work has increased tenfold as increased border enforcement in California and Texas has forced immigrants to use more dangerous desert routes. We also begin to meet the family of the dead man and some living people who have made the same journey. The reenactments portray what the man likely encountered on his travel. The interlacing technique is more distracting than effective.

 

Burn – 2012 (2.6). Documentary film makers followed some Detroit firefighters for a year to make this movie but he result is not particularly organized and does not seem to have any editorial intent. The helmet cam shots are exciting and the stories of the personal lives of a 30 year veteran about to retire and a younger man permanently disabled in a fire fight are engaging, but the film includes no introspective dialogues among the fire fighters themselves or with community members whom they protect. We see a new fire commissioner come in but get little feel for the context of the fire department in the politics surrounding this terribly damaged city.

 

Barbara – 2012 (2.3). East Germany in 1980 was very bleak and this German drama about a medical doctor who was banished to a hinterland clinic because she had asked to be allowed to leave the country certainly captures that bleakness. The problem is the script is also bleak and the characters fit in perfectly.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

 

Parenthood (Season Three)

Parenthood (Season Four)

Aftershock

Altman

History of the Eagles

Muscle Shoals

Who Is Dayani Cristal?

Burn

Barbara

Three Good and Three Not

 

 

 

The first three on this list are worth watching, but the last three are not recommended. The list is fairly short because it includes a miniseries and a full season each for two other series. Here is what I have watched since I posted my last list. The ratings I give are on my own number system which is explained at the link on the sidebar. Clicking on a movie title will open a new browser tab with the IMDb page for the movie.

 

Omar – 2013 (3.4). Suspension of viewer disbelief is a desired accomplishment for a dramatic movie. Too many film scripts are full of credibility holes. This Oscar nominee from Palestine manages not only to make us suspend our disbelief as we become involved with three young Arab male friends and the sister of one of them but also creates a realistic insecurity regarding trust in what we believe. As Israeli agents arrest, torture and try to turn one of the Palestinians into an informant, the relationships of the four young Arabs are seriously disrupted and trust itself becomes a major casualty.

 

The Roosevelts: AnIntimate History – 2014 (3.3). The lives of Theodore, Franklin and Eleanor are examined against the backdrop of the great historical events in which they were major players in this PBS series from Ken Burns. Familiar Burns techniques such as archival footage, talking head historians and voice over correspondence readings by actors voicing central characters are employed. The readings of very personal correspondence played against the archival footage of the individual are particularly effective as the movie exposes the inner feelings often hidden by the outside demeanor. Frictions between the TR and FDR branches of the family are interestingly explored. A personal quibble is the readings by Meryl Streep as Eleanor, whose admittedly unappealing voice and style of speaking would have been better played down rather than overemphasized [yet another example of Meryl supposedly becoming the person she plays even as we marvel as she does it what a great acting job she is doing].

 

Parenthood (SeasonTwo) – 2010 (3.3). After the two senior members of the cast tone down their own problems, the series concentrates more on their children and grandchildren, realistically presenting situations which echo some of our own past experiences. Many of the issues that arise in this extended family seem contemporary and then we realize they are actually matters that families have always faced but that have not often been portrayed so well on TV. Good writing and effective performances by the ensemble, combined with coming to know them better as characters raise the series a notch and bode well for the future.

 

Sense and Sensibility – 1995 (3.0). Directed by Ang Lee from a script by Emma Thompson, this version of the Austen story is solid and appropriately refined. The novel is copiously cited in the 2014 best seller economics book “Capital in the Twenty-First Century”, because the characters continuously use the wealth and income of people as a measure of their worthiness, particularly as prospective spouses.

 

Still Mine -2012 (2.8). Married for over 60 years, a rural New Brunswick couple, effectively played by Genevieve Bujold and James Cromwell, struggles with the coming of Alzheimer’s to the wife in this Canadian drama based on a true story.  The husband draws on his sturdy heritage to build a small house for them to live in together as long as possible, contending with unyielding building regulations and bureaucracy along with the declining condition of his wife. There is strength in the love and resoluteness of the couple, but the overall effect of the movie is not encouraging.

 

Titanic: Blood andSteel – 2012 (2.8). Ireland and Italy combined talents for this miniseries about the building of the great ship in Belfast, set against the background of political, labor and religious turmoil. We see from the inside both the shipyard management and the worker families, though the script takes some dramatic license with the facts. The subplot about trying to track down an adopted child is a bit distracting but pays off in the end. There are also some production design flaws such as the kitchen wall with missing plaster and broken lath in the apartment of immigrant Italian who happens to be a master plasterer and the fact that his daughter who works as a copyist in the shipyard somehow is able to afford such a lavish wardrobe of fashionable clothes that she never wears the same thing twice. The final episode as the people board the ship for its maiden voyage is appropriately affecting in the realization that all those who would become lost were real people who had been through much in their lives and had great hopes for better futures.

 

Dancing in Jaffa – 2012 (2.7). An international ballroom dance champion who was born in Jaffa returns to that city to start a program teaching Palestinian and Jewish children to dance together, in this earnest documentary. As usual, the children are quite appealing, particularly the ones on whom the movie concentrates. The teacher has many cultural barriers to overcome as he works with the children, their parents and other teachers. The film could have been better organized and the version being streamed on Netflix lacks subtitles for the portions that are not in English.

 

About Time – 2013 (2.6). As a fantasy concept for a movie, being able to travel back in your life to a time and place where you once were and then to change how you acted back there sounds fairly simple and potentially fun. But this film shows that the process is supposed to have some rules as to how it works in practice, and this script leaves the rules too fuzzy. It doesn’t matter that much though, because none of the characters are interesting or appealing enough to generate concern for what happens to them. Opportunities for probing the obvious deep questions about how changing one life affects the lives of others are lost in the fuzz and we are given a few trivial platitude morals at the end.

 

Homeland (SeasonThree) – 2013 (2.4). The writing has definitely become seat of the pants. The central characters wear out their welcome with repetitive acting and no nuance or character development. Some previously important characters are dropped, while new ones are invented and waste our time as does a subplot about a teenage tryst. The holes in the story and implausible security lapses become too great to ignore and the season finale rather than enticing us back for next season instead provides a convenient reason to stop watching.

 

The Secret Life ofWalter Mitty – 2013 (2.4). Ben Stiller directed and played the title character in this version of the fantasy. The look and special effects were fine, but plot of the story was jumbled and weakly connected while the script was poorly paced and uninteresting without any drama, humor or romance. Walter had more chemistry with his E-Harmony customer service guy than he did with the female lead.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

 

Omar

Parenthood (Season Two)

Titanic: Blood and Steel

Dancing in Jaffa



Twice Tango Tops

 

Once again the BBC series Last Tango in Halifax comes out on top. Also, the Oscar winner for best picture is beaten by an old TV telling of the same story. Half this list were Netflix streamed.

 

Here is what I have watched since I posted my last list. The ratings I give are on my own number system which is explained at the link on the sidebar. Clicking on a movie title will open a new browser tab with the IMDb page for the movie.

 

 

Last Tango in Halifax (Season Two) – 2013 (3.2). The uniqueness of this series understandably dissipates some in the second season, with the continual plot developments not having quite the impact they did in the first year. The central cast is still top-notch and the writing is very good, but somehow there is a slight tinge of letdown. The six episodes went really fast and left the impression that not much story progress had been made, in spite of a lot of characters always on the go, but then a look back on the episode summaries proved that quite a bit of story development had transpired. There is an urge to know more about the past of these characters, which we are slowly being told. Perhaps reflection on the past getting lost in the bustle of the present and the uncertainty of the future is what the writers intend.

 

Half the Sky – 2012 (3.0). NY Times reporter Nicholas Kristof leads a documentary film crew to points in Africa and Asia to cover stories that are part of his book on the oppression of women and young girls. The movie shows the conditions the women face and what some activist women are doing to liberate and empower the oppressed. Female celebs accompany Kristof to lend their fame to publicizing the plights. The stories about sex traffic, prostitution, female genital mutilation and lack of worthy employment and educational access are by nature depressing. Deep seated cultural failings countenance such gender oppression, but the activist women are inspiring and many of the young girls they help are equally impressive.

 

One Big Hapa Family – 2010 (3.0).  Made by a young Canadian film maker who is the son of a Japanese mother and white father, this documentary is about the Japanese immigrants to British Columbia and how attitudes have changed toward racial intermarriage. When his grandparents came over, intermarriage was unheard of, but among the generation of the grandchildren over 90% marry interracially. His movie is well made mixing live action and animation as he interviews his extended family. The largely unknown story is told about how Japanese were treated north of the border, especially during WWII. This version is the 49 minute TV version, but there is also an 85 minute theatrical version.

 

Solomon Northup’s Odyssey – 1984 (3.0). Shown on American Playhouse and directed by Gordon Parks, this version of the “12 Years a Slave” story benefits from a much better script than the 2013 movie in which the story line and characters often were confusing. The Parks version draws characters more clearly, has much more meaningful conversations between Solomon and the other slaves and includes scenes of the ongoing efforts of Solomon’s wife and Henry Northup to find and free him. The presence of violence and sex is not emphasized at the expense of having time and attention diverted from Solomon struggling to keep his own focus on obtaining his freedom while also mutually sharing feelings with slaves who have never been free. Much more clearly in this earlier version, we feel how on obtaining his release Solomon is torn between wanting to forget the 12 year nightmare as he reunites with his family and feeling obliged to do something to help the enslaved people he has left behind.

 

The Trials ofMuhammad Ali – 2013 (2.9). Emphasizing his legal fight for conscientious objection exemption from the military draft, this documentary about Ali covers familiar ground but also manages to find fresh input in the form of interviews with the last surviving member of the group of eleven Louisville businessmen who guided his early professional boxing career, his first wife, his brother and a former Clerk for a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States giving insight into how the ultimate unanimous Court decision in favor of Ali was fashioned.

 

Dorothea Lange: Grab a Hunk of Lightning – 2014 (2.8). Shown on American Masters on PBS, this documentary about the celebrated photographer was made by her granddaughter and covers her personal life as well as her career. Sterling examples of her photos are included as expected, along with archival footage and interviews with some of her descendants. There is much footage of Dorothea working in her dying months trying to pick photos for a show of her life’s work to be displayed in NYC at the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art. Missing from the movie is commentary from other photographers and critics explaining the technical aspects of her work and what they contributed to her art.

 

Big Men – 2013 (2.8). The young American woman who spent six years making this cinema verite style documentary shown on PBS P.O.V. scored some good inside access in following a Dallas oilman and a Ghanaian entrepreneur who hook up and convince an American capital firm to contract with the oil ministry of Ghana to develop an offshore oil field for the benefit of the people of Ghana. Many of the Ghanaians were educated in America and speak excellent English, but we also see aspects of the tribal cultural structure of the country. The contract gets embroiled in election politics in Ghana and the film follows this process to conclusion. As a contrast, though sometimes distracting, the film also covers turmoil over oil in Nigeria, where corruption has kept the revenues from getting to the Nigerian people and young protestors engage in sabotage of pipelines.

 

Mortified Nation – 2013 (2.8). A few years back someone got the idea that reading excerpts from personal journals and diaries written in earlier years could help self-discovery, and it could be especially cathartic if done in front of an empathetic audience. The idea was put into practice and captured in this documentary showing live performances and interviews with participants and the people behind the idea.

 

Ai Weiwei: NeverSorry – 2012 (2.8). The film maker followed the Chinese activist artist and his entourage quite closely in making this documentary, but we never got very far into understanding his artistic vision or his vision for a more open Chinese society. Instead we saw a continual Twitter user who uses his iconic status to take shots (literally and figuratively) at the Chinese government and a man who on the personal side does not seem to be very caring toward people as individuals.

 

Radio Unnameable – 2012 (2.8). This straightforward documentary tells the story of a man who has worked for fifty years broadcasting a late night show on FM radio in NYC. Interviews, archival footage and audio clips are the vehicles, set against the changing times.

 

The Scapegoat – 2012 (2.7). This slow starting drama about a rich scoundrel in early 1950s England who runs into his perfect lookalike is based on a Du Maurier story. The scoundrel takes advantage of the lookalike by tricking him into taking his place while the scoundrel disappears. As we finally get the drift of all that the man has walked into, we become interested enough to stay around and see how he handles it and how it ends.

 

12 Years a Slave – 2013 (2.6). The story of Solomon Northup being kidnapped in 1841 and held as a slave in the South is a very dramatic one. Surely his book written in 1853 was intended to aid the abolitionist movement. Judging by the script, the purpose in turning it into a movie 160 years later seems to have been limited to reaffirming the abolitionist message. Maybe there is an ongoing need to remind Americans, especially in the South, of the horrors of slavery, but the drama of the Northup story has so much more to offer than was delivered by this script. Whether in the book or not, this story cries out for so many things that were not included in the movie, like more background on Northrup and his family before the abduction, efforts made by his family and friends to find him, his more intimate communications with other slaves, and his attempts to employ his intelligence in maneuverings with slaveholders and overseers. The emphasis in the movie seems to have been more in getting the look of things right, rather than providing characters and relationships of much dimension.

 

15 to Life: Kenneth’sStory -2013 (2.6). The issue of life sentences for minors convicted of crimes other than murder is a worthwhile subject for a documentary. Unfortunately this movie about a 15 year old boy in Florida who is eleven years into serving four consecutive life sentences for accompanying an armed adult robber does not do the best job presenting the issues. The concentration is on a resentencing hearing mandated by US Supreme Court decision and we do see some of the proceeding as it took place. But we do not know what we did not see of the hearing and do not get much strategy discussion from volunteer counsel for the prisoner. There are some good interviews with the boy himself and some revealing exposure to his born again drug addict mother and a smattering of other input, but some key elements seem omitted, like any word from the public defender on the boy’s trial. Kenneth has been dealt several bad cards, including his no-show father, addicted mother, exploitation by career adult criminal; living in Florida, questionable public defender representation, marginal resentencing counsel, and unusually unsympathetic judge. This film does not do much to help his poor hand.

 

The Revisionaries – 2012 (2.6).  A partisan elected board of Texans periodically reviews and revises standards for textbooks used in that State and since it is so large, the books sold there are very likely to be the ones that the publishers sell throughout the United States. In this documentary we see the dismaying process at play as fundamentalist Christian board members narrow mindedly alter science and social studies books to reflect their personal beliefs rather than to provide the most accurate learning materials. Valiant efforts to prevent the desecration of textbooks is also shown, but the film is sometimes hard to follow and spends too much time on following two particular board members rather than exploring the issues in more depth, such as more extensive interviews with publishers and inclusion of examples of better processes used in other States.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

Half the Sky

The Trials of Muhammad Ali

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry

Radio Unnameable

Mortified Nation

The Scapegoat

The Revisionaries

A Decent Series and 3 OK Docs

The title describes the top three on this list.

 

Here is what I have watched since I posted my last list. The ratings I give are on my own number system which is explained at the link on the sidebar. Clicking on a movie title will open a new browser tab with the IMDb page for the movie.

 

Parenthood (SeasonOne) – 2010 (3.2). There may be some laughs in this series, but it is actually a pretty good and realistic drama about a couple wed 46 years, and their four children and their families. Such extended families offer multiple relationships to explore and various stages of life’s journey through the years to encounter and the scripts intelligently address some of them. After a few episodes to get to know the characters, viewer appreciation increases as we see the people become more familiar and believable. There is plenty of drama as in all families without the farfetched fabrications too many series are quick to foist on the audience.

 

Chasing Ice – 2012 (3.1). Environmental photographer James Balog leads a team tracking the recession of glaciers in Iceland, Greenland, Alaska and Montana in this eerily beautiful documentary. Time lapse photography was employed over several years to show the amazingly rapid ongoing demise of these enormous warehouses of ice. The movie shows how the team developed and deployed the cameras and how James is challenged by repeated injuries to his knees. Also included are spectacular movies of huge ice “calves breaking off and falling into the sea. There is not a lot of science or politics here, just wonderful images of glacial reality.

 

Crime after Crime – 2011 (3.1). The number of women in prison has skyrocketed in recent decades and many female inmates have been abuse victims. Sometimes an action they have taken against the abuser is what has sent them to prison. In this effective documentary, two volunteer attorneys embark on an effort to use a unique new California law to present previously inadmissible evidence of the abuse a woman suffered at the hands of the man whose killing she pleaded guilty to being involved with, in hopes of gaining her release after serving 20 years of a 25 year to life sentence. The lawyers did not know how many years they would have to work and with what frustration. The movie covers some of the legal aspects and maneuverings, but is most effective in presenting the life and personal journey of Debbie Peagler and how her attorneys and she became so personally bonded.

 

Greenwich Village:Music that Defined a Generation – 2012 (2.8). There is not much apparent organization or any particular messages in this pleasant documentary, but it contains lots of archival footage of 1960s folk singers interspersed with present day interviews of the performers. It is always fun to juxtapose now and then images and the music is still appealing.

 

Treme (Season Four) – 2013 (2.7). With only five episodes, the final season seems like maybe the plug got pulled. Feeling like an extension of the previous season, the show continues to jump around through the characters although knowing it was ending, there is a bit of story arc resolution. There is still plenty of eclectic music and lots of food and other New Orleans flavor.

 

Getting Back toAbnormal – 2012 (2.7).  In the post-Katrina years, New Orleans gets some white gentrification in this documentary which focuses on a young white city council member who is challenged by a young black minister in her re-election campaign. The central issue is whether she is a racist or a sincere friend of the racially mixed community. The only actual issue that gets attention is the tearing down of a long time black housing project and its replacement with an upscale mixed use development, but we are never given either side of the debate in any depth. The personality and character of the council woman get more attention than the City itself.

 

From Time to Time – 2009 (2.7). The actors and production values are in place in this Brit tale in which a boy visiting an ancestral property during WWII encounters ghosts of residents from the past, but the script starts too talkative, the characters whether dead or alive never seem real or hold appeal, and the story is too farfetched and predictable.

 

Mansfield Park – 1983 (2.7). Dated and theatrical in presentation, this six part miniseries from the BBC probably does justice to the Austen classic, but seems a bit too talky and drawn out.

 

Rid of Me -2011 (2.6). A mousey California girl returns to Oregon with her new husband who is re-uniting with the guys and gals he hung out with in his college days. Problem is that the mouse does not fit in and is replaced by the former college sweetheart. On the rebound, the mousse tries to reinvent herself first as a repulsive goth and then as a toned down free spirit. Sincere and somewhat fresh, this slightly amateurish indie black comedy has a few good moments and avoids what could have been some really bad ones.

 

The Book Thief – 2013 (2.4). The book on which this movie is based may be very good, with many storylines and characters interweaving around WWII Germany, but it does not come across in this movie dramatization. The script seems to pick excerpts of the stories and show snippets of them without making connections or interweaving. Whenever anything approaching real drama comes along, it quickly disappears. Characters at one time seem like they are important and then simply vanish from the movie. Relationships experience no challenges or changes that come across as real to the viewer. In spite of some obligatory scenes of mean Nazis, there is no feeling of immersive reality about anything in this film.

 

Her – 2013 (2.3). A boring nerd’s wife is dumping him and he falls in love with his new personalized computer operating system but eventually realizes the female sounding system is not actually real. It does not sound a likely subject for a movie, yet this film won the Oscar for best original screenplay. Supposedly a romantic sci-fi drama, it is best classified as a long bore. Ironic criticism and social commentary about how people are personally involved with electronic media while ignoring the real people surrounding them are proper goals for a movie, but to be effective a film has to hold attention and create empathy for the characters. As for futuristic visions, what I saw in this movie is actually what I often see around me today. Figuring it was going to be a little weird, I watched the first 15 minutes with all the sound except dialogue [an HDMI glitch] and thought this is weird and stupid and that people who paid to see this in a theater were probably stomping and hissing. After correcting the glitch and watching with dialogue, I think it was better the first way – or at least not as bad. But I did get a huge laugh at being stupid enough to think this movie was as stupid as I thought it was.

 

The movies on this list streamed via Netflix were (though some of the streaming rights may now have expired):

Parenthood

Chasing Ice

Crime after Crime

Greenwich Village: Music that Defined a Generation

From Time to Time

Mansfield Park

Rid of Me