In and out of theaters in a flash, and raking in $12,000 in cold hard cash at the box office this documentary about a military simulation of Iraq looks interesting. From what I understand, its very even handed, a rare quality in documentaries dealing with the Iraq War, which is probably why it didn't have more steam at the box office.

Honestly, $12k? Heck, that's only $12,000 more than I made at the box office this year and I didn't even release anything.






Director: Tony Gerber and Jesse Moss (Rated 'R': Republicans in Hollywood)

Labels: documentary, film, movie trailer

***Thanks to Burton of BURTONIA for this interesting look at this obscure documentary.***

Should I see it?

Yes, especially for Christians.

Short Review: Elmer Gantry is a Hippy.

During the Battle of the Bulge in World War II, English-speaking German saboteurs infiltrated American lines wearing American uniforms. The effort failed miserably as quick-thinking American soldiers improvised short tests involving questions about baseball and other bits of Americana. In a similar way, Hollywood evinces some fascination with American popular religion, but is quite unable to get the details right. From Night of the Hunter to Leap of Faith, moviemakers have attempted to mine the rich intersection of greed and revivalist religion. To someone like me, who grew up in this milieu, they come across as ridiculous as a German soldier trying to act like an American G.I.

Hollywood's fictions make Marjoe that much more astonishing. In the early '70's, a former child evangelist, Marjoe Gortner, decides to quit the revival preaching circuit in a spectacular way. He hooks up with a documentary film crew and takes them along as he preaches in tents and churches in California, Texas, and Michigan. The power of the film comes in the harsh contrast between his passionate performances in front of the faithful and his cynicism, greed, and unbelief when the meetings are over.

The movie begins with a short explication of Marjoe's history. His parents invented his persona from birth, starting with his name, a conflation of Mary and Joseph. They made him into a preaching automaton, from the age of four. At no point does he ever seem to have believed any of it. By the time he was a teenager, he was bitter and alienated, and broke with his parents. He wound up a flower child, and only returned to preaching to solve his money "hang-ups".

What makes a thirty-five year old documentary fresh today is how good Gortner was at what he did. He had obviously been a keen observer of the words, mannerisms, and body language of the southern Pentecostal preachers. Even his hand-on-hip strut, which he freely admits copying from Mick Jagger, is completely natural. He perfectly employs every verbal tic in the repertoire. And his talent is chameleon-like. When he appears in front of black Pentecostals, Marjoe effortlessly slips into the sing-song delivery beloved of African American preachers. He fools them all, from the least to the greatest. In one devastating clip, we see him having lunch with another pastor, and Marjoe is tut-tutting over all the con-men preachers taking advantage of the gullible.

This is a pre-Ken Burns, pre-Michael Moore documentary; it lacks structure and an agenda – and the film is better for it. The only narration is from Marjoe himself. We observe, without distracting commentary, his antics in church, juxtaposed against him counting the take on a hotel room bed, and mocking the simple church-goers in front of his groovy, shaggy friends. If the film has a weakness it is that the filmmakers are clearly distracted by the Pentecostalists' bizarre behavior. There are long shots of people "slain in the spirit", writing on the floor, shaking uncontrollably, and speaking in tongues. These become tedious. Curiously, none of the people in the pews are interviewed. In the end, we want to see and hear more from Marjoe himself.

Marjoe muses throughout that all this Jesus stuff is not so bad, and is compatible with his new-found Aquarian make-love-not-war-give-peace-a-chance philosophy. It's just that all the threats of sin and hell he has to use to pump up the offerings are such a drag, man. If only Marjoe had been born just ten years later, he could have joined a new generation of Christian syncretists who successfully combined pop-psych sloganeering, new age success secrets, and a theologically gutted Christianity. Gortner could have been richer than he dreamed possible.


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Labels: Christian culture, documentary, film, Marjoe Gortner, movie review

Centering around Kenneth Branagh reading from Josef Goebbels’s personal diaries, this documentary about Hitler’s master propagandist is a fascinating look into Germany’s Nazi Party. We follow the mousy marketer from his initial idealistic impressions of Adolf Hitler to his eventual disillusionment and subsequent murder/suicide in the bunker with his family. For any student of World War II this is a must see film. Be warned there are some gruesome images like an unedited view of Goebbels’ naked and burned corpse.


Reviews:
The Los Angeles Times
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Labels: Adolf Hitler, documentary, film, Josef Goebbels, Kenneth Branagh, movie review, Nazis, World War II

Not only is this far from the best music documentary ever made, it isn't even the best documentary about THE ROLLING STONES ever made. If you're looking for that, check out Gimme Shelter (1970)... a documentary about the difficulty and logistics of setting up a large
scale concert. Gimme Shelter also shows a guy getting stabbed at the concert (something, ironically, you'd expect from Scorsese's movie). To be fair, Shine A Light is also a "concert" film, but it isn't even the best Rolling Stones concert film ever made. For that, check out the concert DVD Four Flix or the IMAX version of the Steel Wheels tour in '89.

Why is it so terrible? First... camera perspective. The whole point of a concert film is to show the grandeur of the event with wide and medium shots. Scorsese chose lots of shots that were tight shots from below, giving you claustrophobia in New York's grand and historic Beacon Theater (a beautiful and spacious place). Additionally, for the first half of the film, you are inundated with bright flashing lights and quick camera POV changes. Combined with the tight screen shots of Mick Jagger's face, I wasn't sure if I was watching a concert film or a trailer for Hellboy 3. The jerky camera shots slow down halfway through, but I had reached the point of irritation long before then. Second is audio. Normally, a live show would have the audio from the "whole mix" of what everyone is playing for maximum sound enjoyment. Scorsese didn't do this. Maybe it was intentional along with the frequent up close shots to capture an on-stage perspective, but I don't want to hear Keith Richards playing rhythm when Ron Wood is playing lead (and these days I'm not sure I want to SEE either of them doing anything). Add in some guest appearances by county-fair caliber musicians, and you've got your masterpiece. If that weren't enough, I was forced to deal with the blatant distraction of Marty's crazy eyebrows and horn-rimmed glasses; I thought I was looking at a Groucho Marx novelty disguise.

Never has a greater discrepancy between a movie and the real thing been so prevalent. I've seen The Rolling Stones live.... and "Senator Scorsese, you're no Rolling Stones documenter."


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Labels: documentary, film, guest review, Keith Richards, Martin Scorsese, Mick Jagger, movie review, music

I find this compelling. Philippe Petit walked a tightrope strung between the World Trade Center towers in 1974. This documentary looks at this feat and the criminal enterprise that brought it to life. I'm not big on the references to this guy being an "artist". Seems to me he's just a daredevil with an accent. This aside, the trailer does a good job laying out the film I have to admit I'm looking forward to seeing it. It is directed by James Marsh who's previous film Wisconsin Death Trip was a funny and enthralling documentary on the horrible string of events that cursed a small town in 19th Century Wisconsin. Hopefully, this documentary will match the wit of that smaller film.

Labels: documentary, film, movie trailer

The title comes from the name of the Arab death sqauds in Darfur, "Janjaweed," which means "devil on horseback. The Janjaweed have committed genocide while the world sits on its hands. Former marine turned photo journalist Brian Steidle was there and had incredible access because of his role as military observer. Disturbed by the horrors playing out in front of him and the utter lack of action on behalf of the international community to do anything to stop the killing, Steidle tells the story of this genocide.

This is a stunning documentary that will surely devastate most viewers. It is gut wrenching to even conceive these types of atrocities happen in this world. This is not a film for the weak stomached to be sure. It is a striking film and I highly recommend it.


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Labels: documentary, film, movie review

Director: Werner Herzog (Aguirre: The Wraith of God)

Labels: documentary, movie trailer, Werner Herzog

Screenwriter: Alex Gibney (The Trials of Henry Kissinger)
Director: Alex Gibney (Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room)
Actors: Hunter S. Thompson, Pat Buchanan, and Johnny Depp (Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest)

Labels: documentary, film, Johnny Depp, movie trailer

Labels: documentary, film, movie review

Leftist filmmakers have been churning out polemical documentaries like Fahrenheit 9/11, Supersize Me, Outfoxed, and Who Killed the Electric Car? for some time. The right is just getting started (Mine Your Own Business, IndoctrinateU), but I'm not sure it's a trend worth joining. The movie "Expelled" with Ben Stein as narrator, gives the Intelligent Design controversy the Michael Moore treatment, and suffers for it. All movies in this category are dishonest at some level. For example, Expelled makes a half-hearted attempt to employ the tired trope that the narrator is investigating something. We need a whole new term for the genre. Something like "argumentary" or "propagamentary." Something with mentary at the end.

In a misguided attempt to lighten up a serious topic, the filmmakers constantly splice black and white stock footage into the narrative. For instance, if someone is describing an argument between two parties, we are treated to a shot from some '30's screwball comedy with two guys slapping each other. It's as dumb and annoying as it sounds. The repetition of this juvenile technique significantly detracts from the film's message. The movie also overuses newsreel images of the Berlin Wall to reinforce the metaphor of a barrier that has been put up in Academia to keep discussion of Intelligent Design out. There is so much of it that at times I wondered whether the topic was the Cold War rather than Darwinism.

In terms of content, "Expelled" concentrates on the wrong things. Instead of making the straightforward argument that detecting design in nature is a legitimate line of scientific inquiry, the movie takes a great deal of time to complain of persecution and to draw a link between Darwinism and Hitler. Even for someone like me, who is sympathetic to the charges, the evidence for harassment and suppression seemed scant and the alarmism surrounding it was unnecessary.

While I believe the guilt-by-association ploy with respect to Nazism was both irrelevant to the film's purpose and partially wrong (contra David Berlinski, Darwinism was neither a necessary nor sufficient cause of the Holocaust), Darwinists should not take much comfort. First, their claim that the Nazis misunderstood Darwinism invites some uncomfortable questions about exactly how they got it wrong that would be worth a documentary in and of itself. Second, this defense can be read as hypocritical. They retort, "Don't blame us if some crazies use our theories to do dumb stuff." But they use the same flawed reasoning they rightly criticize to dismiss Intelligent Design ("We can't entertain I.D. because the crazy fundamentalists will use it to implement theocracy!").

The best parts of the movie are the interviews with the atheist Darwinists. The movie would have done much better to let these guys talk more. The moments with William Provine and his honest nihilism were haunting. Dawkins was marvelous as always. His frustration with Stein's laborious and ridiculous ticking off of Dawkin's disbelief in the entire catalog of potential deities was very understandable, and the segment's inclusion in the film was inexcusable. Dawkins gave the whole game away, however, in one unguarded moment when he allowed that super-intelligent aliens may have seeded the earth with biotic material. He allowed that science might be able to detect the "fingerprint" of such activity. His caveat that the aliens themselves would have had to have evolved via a Darwinism rang hollow. He admitted that we can employ scientific principles to perceive design in biology. These ten seconds of dialog nearly redeem the entire project.

A movie enjoying this much attention is a major opportunity to education and persuade. Expelled's failures are disappointing, especially in light of far superior predecessors such as The Privileged Planet. Fortunately, truth is immune to the vicissitudes of its defenders, and we can hope a better case is made in the future.

Labels: Ben Stein, conservative, documentary

How's that for moral confusion? I first say the film is tilted to the benefit of one party and then dismiss this as if it weren't a big deal. That's so two-faced, maybe I should be the one running for office.

The fact is that there is enough genuine moments of note in this piece to make it worth seeing. The brutal confrontations and tricks many identify with national campaigns can be found in this simple local election. This film paints a disturbing portrait of American politics.


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The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (2003)
The Goebbels Experiment (2005)


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Labels: documentary, election, film, movie review, politics, President Bill Clinton, Spike Lee

Short Review: What's more pathetic than a bunch of goofballs wasting their lives playing Donkey Kong? A bigger one writing a review about them wasting their lives playing Donkey Kong.


In many ways, this is one of the better documentaries I've seen in recent years. I know its strange to say that about a movie about geeks fighting for the world record score in Donkey Kong. Many may consider this to be a frivolous movie about frivolous people. In some ways this is true, again, at it's core its just about losers attaching their self identity to their ability to score fantastically high scores on a 1980's arcade game. The arguments, conniving and shed tears in this piece are anchored in human stupidity - then again so are most things we strive after.

What did I find so wonderful about this film? First off, it is hilarious to see geeks in their natural habitat and completely unfiltered. Their awkwardness that comes from the odd mix of high intelligence/low social skill is on full display. Grown up and amongst their own, these geeks revel in their foolish pastime with glee. This peek at geeks is a superficial benefit of the film, a little deeper is where the movie takes shape.

The film follows perpetual loser Steve Wiebe as he attempts to break the world record for Donkey Kong. Amazingly, this is no easy task, not because the game is so hard (it is) but because of the competitive nature of the current champ Billy Mitchell. Mitchell has no intention of relinquishing his crown easily and manipulates the 80's arcade playing society (yes, there is one) against Wiebe. The level of deceit and competition that is shown in this movie is truly surprising.

Documentarian Seth Gordon has a perfect sympathetic hero in Wiebe and couldn't ask for a better villain than Mitchell. Gordon lays out a brilliant competition that almost seems scripted in many spots. The odd human drama in this movie plays like nerd Shakespeare and this is where the movie gets its depth. The display of our ability to squabble and actually hurt one another over things so massively trivial is striking to see. The fact that it is being played out by geeks is just the cherry on the sundae.

The natural reaction for most people is to ignore this documentary. It is about Donkey Kong after all. I'd suggest you give this one a second look. If there is any part of you that is intrigued, I'd recommend you pick it up. At the worst, you have ninety minutes of some serious nerd viewing to enjoy.



Worldview: Regardless of the ridiculous pastime of these men, they are caught up in an ethical drama. The followers of Mitchell want nothing more than their hero to succeed over the usurper Wiebe. Mitchell pathetically plots to destroy his foe and his starstruck geek minions are more than happy to cheer him on. Wiebe, a perfect Everyman, has spent his life getting the short end of the stick and even in a world of nerds, he cannot find a break.

Mitchell for all of his winning and perceived glory is chasing a meaningless end. He boldly talks about "making history" and likens his achievements to the Red Baron of World War I (he's given to egotism). He seems utterly blind to the foolishness of his efforts, the meaninglessness of his goals. It is interesting that Mitchell's own parents casually explain that he is a manipulative guy who will do what he has to do to win. As I watched him scheme to keep his fragile identity intact, I kept thinking of a verse:


In the end, Mitchell is protecting an empty title, a meaningless concept maintained by men who should be doing better things with their lives. Having the best Donkey Kong score isn't inspirational (actually, Wiebe almost makes it so) and it doesn't improve things. Seeing Mitchell's willingness to be cutthroat over something so petty can be a reminder to the rest of us. What do we hold dear and protect too strongly? Is your identity invested in empty fleeting moments of glory, titles or things or is it in the only thing that actually lasts - God? A person who submits to the Lord is spared from having to cherish the frivolous. See, you can get all of that from a bunch of nerds playing games.

Cautions: I don't recall any cursing and this thing is brimming with nerds, so there's no nudity or sex (just like in real life with these guys). This isn't for the whole family since I can't imagine younger viewers getting into it. Overall, it is a safe flick for those sensitive over content.


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Labels: documentary, film, movie review

Labels: documentary, film, geeks, movie review