Documentaries

[cheerypeabrain]

This evening we watched Super Telescope: Mission to the Edge of the Universe on BBC2, about the making of the James Webb telescope and getting it into position. Very interesting.

At the moment Jeff is watching a documentary Jimi Hendrix Experience : Music, Money, Madness in Maui...I'm only half watching it...I liked the idea of Hendrix but I wasn't a huge fan of his more way out music. Jeff is only 5 years older than me but that's a big gap when you're young! When he was listening to Hendrix I was still listening to the Beatles

[bixaorellana]

No surprise -- this is sad and upsetting. Note that it is from three years ago. You can google "children in turkish prisons" for more up to date information, such as this, from mid-November this year: stockholmcf.org/conditions-for-inmates-at-turkish-prison-much-better-than-home-govt-broadcaster-claims/

[onlyMark]

My mind wandered when I was reading another thread and it stopped when I tried to think of the best documentary series I'd ever seen.
I plumped for The World at War from 1973 -

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_at_War

[mickthecactus]

I could go with that.

[onlyMark]

I had it all on DVD many years ago.

[bixaorellana]

surprise Brett Kavanaugh documentary premieres at Sundance

Covertly-made Justice, from director Doug Liman, shows to sold-out audience and shines new light on allegations of sexual assault

The fact that this documentary had to be made in secrecy speaks volumes about the whole shabby business of Tr*mp's disgusting little nominee for the highest court in the land and the subsequent squelching of any real investigation.

[bjd]

I just watched this interesting film about Cuba by DW. I'm sure Bixa and Kerouac in particular will be interested. I do wish people hadn't mostly been wearing masks -- I found it hard at times to understand them. But there are subtitles in English where needed.

[casimira]

That sounds interesting BJD. Thanks for posting this.

Last night I watched a brilliant biopic. HALLELUJAH! 


It's a treatise on the evolution of the Leonard Cohen song of the same name. Footage that covers a span of decades all the way up until his death. (It's almost 2 hours long). Well worth viewing.

Available on NETFLIX. 

[lugg]

Absolutely fantastic documentary - "Inside Our Autistic Minds"


www.digitalspy.com/tv/a43003435/chris-packham-inside-our-autistic-minds-praise/

[bixaorellana]

Oh, that does look like crucial viewing -- thanks!

[kerouac2]

I went to see the French documentary Last Dance about New Orleans drag performer Lady Vinsantos, the founder of the New Orleans Drag Workshop. At age 50, he feels that his career has run its course, but he wants to go out with a bang and put on a final drag show in Paris, the city of his dreams. I feel pretty much the same about drag queens as I feel about clowns or any other scary person in a weird disguise, but I wanted to see this because of New Orleans. I don't regret it.

[bixaorellana]

I'd probably be compelled to see it for the same reason, i.e., New Orleans, but also because the subject is so weirdly mainstream now. I guess "female impersonation" -- although a voice in the trailer calls it celebrating women -- are no odder than the spectacle of young gender-specific women parading their very made-up beauty to win a prize.

[kerouac2]

I don't know if the term really exists, but there are also sis female drag queens, and they were called "biological queens" in the movie.

[Kimby]

Watched COLECTIVE (Collective) about a health care scandal that erupted in Romania after injured victims of a nightclub fire that should have survived began dying in Romanian hospitals that were mismanaged and under political pressure to cut corners, for example by buying disinfectants diluted to 1/10 the strength they needed to be.

A new minister of health is appointed to turn things around, and he begins to, but an election looms.

Well done.

www.imdb.com/title/tt10706602/

[bixaorellana]

Feb 25, 2023 15:40:08 GMT kerouac2 said:

there are also sis female drag queens

I think we've all encountered some of those, although they were just living their lives & not on stage.

[Kimby]

Off topic, but Montana’s Republican legislature is about to pass a law that would prohibit children under 18 from attending “drag shows” (which to them has a very wide definition, including “topless”) and it doesn’t seem to allow for parental discretion, either.

[Kimby]

Watched the 5-part National Geographic documentary called CITY SO REAL, the story of the mayoral primary and general election that put Lori Lightfoot in office as Chicago’s first black lesbian mayor.

Afterwards I googled “Is Lori Lightfoot a good mayor? and found out that we watched her get elected on the very day that she LOST her primary, so won’t be re-elected.

[Kimby]

AQUARELA, awesome imagery of water and ice from around the world. Some odd editorial choices, especiallly the opening sequences.

www.imdb.com/title/tt4920360/

[kerouac2]

All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is an amazing documentary that takes you places you never expected to go. It is about the photographer Nan Goldin, but it is really about her? For anybody unfamiliar with her, she has been taking pictures of the New York counterculture for the last 40 years, the addicts, the sexual minorities, countless crazies, punk music, recreational drugs, all of the people dying of AIDS... and herself and her family. Her sister committed suicide in the loony bin; that was already an interesting start at age 11.

By age 16 she was living with drag queens and having sex with both men and women. People died around her, but she is a survivor. She needed a taxi driver to carry a crate for her. He didn't want to, so she gave him a blow job and he did it. She is a very pragmatic woman.

But is this documentary really about Nan Goldin? Not really. It is about the combat against the pharmaceutical giant peddling legal opioids that have killed more than 500,000 people in the United States and the Sackler family billionaires who have showered money on the museums of the world as long as they get their names displayed everywhere.

And guess what? Nan Goldin won. The Met, the Guggenheim, the National Gallery, the Louvre, the Pompidou and dozens of other museums have cut their ties with the Sacklers and removed their names.

This documentary won the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival in 2022.

[mickthecactus]

Now that sounds interesting.

[bixaorellana]

Wow, it sure does!

One of the things that struck me is how powerful, focused, and non-destructive the protests shown were. What a contrast from bratty green activists throwing paint in a museum. The protests shown in in Goldin's documentary starkly and specifically target the wrongdoer, thus were ultimately successful.

[lugg]

I am now going to see if I can view that ...thanks K2

[kerouac2]

Sur l'Adamant (On the Adamant) is an observational documentary (no voiceover narration) about a psychiatric barge moored on the Seine in Paris. It receives patients from central Paris every day and provides activities and workshops, counseling and a positive non judgemental atmosphere to assist them in getting better. It won the Golden Bear at the last Berlin Film Festival, beating quite a few prestigious works of fiction.

[htmb]

Sounds very interesting. Did you see it in the theatre?

[kerouac2]

Yes, it's in the cinemas at the moment.

[Kimby]

THE REAL CHARLIE CHAPLIN is a well-made documentary of a well-known but sadly mis-understood man. In his (first?) talkie, The Great Dictator, he made a speech that I liked very much, and so did FDR, who had him give the same speech at his inauguration.

www.imdb.com/title/tt10193752/

[Kimby]

Here’s the speech.


More about the film The Great Dictator:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Dictator

[kerouac2]

I watched a very sad Russian documentary on the Frenco-German channel Arte. It's from 2019 so before covid and before Ukraine. It's about a very young adult couple, Artem and Eva Elfie (pseudonyms) who were law students but who drifted into pornography, because it was easy and fun. At first, everything looks totally fine, if you can accept their lifestyle. They only do it with each other, but since they are quite appealing, they're invited to the PornHub awards in Los Angeles. They go to California and have a great time and then they go to Las Vegas and get married, because it makes visa applications easier.

Slowly but surely, things go downhill. Artem doesn't enjoy this as much anymore, and he has more and more performance problems, needing to take the pharmaceutical products to counteract his difficulties. Eva still seems to be having a great time. She doesn't want to screw other men but sees no problem moving into lesbian porn.

They bicker more and more, return to Russia, have meals with their families who are not aware of their new professions. It starts getting creepy. It is pretty amazing that it was possible to make this documentary without spilling the beans.

Since the documentary was released, they have left Russia, one reason being for Artem to avoid military service in the current context. They have drifted around Europe, but mostly in Paris and on the Côte d'Azur. The documentary is not at all prurient, even though it shows a bit of nudity and some sex toys but never any real pornography.

I would be very interested in seeing a follow-up in 5 or 10 years.



The whole docomentary is available on www.arte.tv and yes, I confess that I checked out one or two short videos on www.pornhub.com , mostly because it was hard to imagine such sweet kids doing that stuff.

[Kimby]

Feb 2, 2023 14:03:58 GMT casimira said:

Last night I watched a brilliant biopic. HALLELUJAH! 


It's a treatise on the evolution of the Leonard Cohen song of the same name. Footage that covers a span of decades all the way up until his death. (It's almost 2 hours long). Well worth viewing.

Available on NETFLIX. 

The Kimby’s borrowed the DVD from the library and watched it tonight. Wow. I was always aware of Leonard Cohen, and even sang his Suzanne when I was in high school, but this documentary gave me a new appreciation for him. Not only as a poet and musician, but also as a human being.

[kerouac2]

Caiti Blues is not your usual documentary. It is about Caiti Lord, a young woman from New York who has been living in Madrid, New Mexico for the last 5 or 6 years. She works as a bartender and a radio station DJ but she would like to have a singing career, and she does have a nice voice. Life appears not to be bad in Madrid, but it is clearly not a hotspot of culture or activity. The movie just follows her around, interspersed with video archives of her childhood. Considering the subject, it is amazingly fascinating.