Snakes In The Ball Pit => How I choose to spend my time => Movies => Topic started by: Tiny Prancer on April 09, 2014, 07:29:13 pm
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Tiny Prancer on April 09, 2014, 07:29:13 pm
I like putting on documentaries while I do work, and since there didn't seem to be a thread about documentaries specifically, I thought making one might be a good idea.
here's some I've watched and enjoyed:
The Price of Gold: Remember when figure skating was big in the 90s? And then the thing with Tanya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan happened? I don't, but I was an actual baby when it happened. But if you have any interest in the story behind it and the life Tanya Harding lived and how it led to Nancy Kerrigan's attack, this is a good doc to watch. It also points out some interesting things about the class war elements that were tied into the debacle and the kind of intense environment and lifelong devotion that competitive skating has.
The Queen of Versailles: for those of you outside of the US who have ever wondered "what the fuck is up with rich people in America", this is a good doc to watch. Follow the exciting life of Jacqueline and David Siegel and their many children as they live in luxury and make plans to construct the largest mansion in the united states! Except then the housing bubble collapses, and they try to adjust to the concept of actually having a budget and not being able to pay for things and having only two or three people to do housekeeping and childcare. Pretty much everything about this is an excellent look into the kind of mindset that allowed for such an economic crisis to happen in the first place.
Guys and Dolls: this is probably one that most people on here have seen, but I think it's worth mentioning anyway. A British documentary about RealDoll owners and the kind of desperation and entitlement that drives them to want a sex doll. It's fascinating just for how quickly several of them switch from genuinely sad "I've given up on ever finding someone this is the only way I will ever feel loved" to a frightening level of "ALL WOMEN ARE STUPID CUNTS THOSE FUCKING BITCHES DON'T APPRECIATE ME AT LEAST MY DOLLS CAN NEVER LEAVE ME", often in the same sentence.
I Think We're Alone Now: Does anyone remember pop sensation Tiffany? Not really, but there certainly people who have a frighteningly intense obsession with her. Follow Jeff, an autistic man who's convinced that Tiffany is in love with him and proudly shows off the restraining order he received, and Kelly, an intersex woman whose obsession ties heavily into a near-death experience as a teenager and is probably the only thing keeping her from the brink of suicide. There's a huge amount of secondhand embarrassment to watching this, as both of them are intensely sad people, but on the bright side, things seem to get better for Kelly at the end of it, and she seems to be able to move on with her life. The same can't be said for Jeff, though.
Inside Nature's Giants: this is actually a series, but it's worth tracking down the different episodes if you're interested in biology. Follows different biologists as they dissect animals such as a great white shark, a giant squid, and a hippo, and treats the information involved in a fairly informative and unglamorized way (there's a moment in the shark episode where a small child asks a scientist about the shark's sexual organs, and she explains them straightforwardly, which really stood out to me as something you would never see in an American documentary series). The downside to this series is that it keeps trotting out richard dawkins as its celebrity scientist talkpiece and he's easily the worst part of the entire thing.
All of these should be available online, either on netflix or youtube, and there's a specific site called snagfilms that I watched I Think We're Alone Now on that may or may not still have it (it's likely just that my javascript blockers giving me trouble again and not letting me see it)
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Lemon on April 09, 2014, 08:16:37 pm
Louis Theroux just finished a new documentary series for the BBC. The topics are mistreated dogs, old people about to die, and sex offenders. So cheery subject matter overall.
If you've never seen any Louis Theroux documentaries, see Louis Theroux documentaries. Of particular interest are
The Most Hated Family In America (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Most_Hated_Family_in_America). Louis hangs out with the Phelps family for longer than most people could stomach
Weird Weekends (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weird_Weekends) s01e03: Porn. Louis auditions to become a male porn actor and socializes with people in the industry about how great their lives are. He did another special (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Theroux%27s_BBC_Two_specials) in 2012 called Twilight of the Porn Stars where he caught up with some of the previous subjects (I haven't seen this one yet)
Louis and The Nazis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_and_the_Nazis). Every assumption you had about Prussian Blue's mother is correct.
Weird Weekends (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weird_Weekends) s03e06: Rap. In case you're looking for less weighty subject matter, the rap episode contains this rap battle (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSLQbafBipw).
Oh! Oh oh oh! I almost forgot Weird Weekends s03e01: Self-Fulfillment. It was the first time I'd ever heard anything about neuro-linguistic programming. The episode goes in a couple directions, but the sexual hypnotists are amazing.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: chai tea latte on April 09, 2014, 08:38:30 pm
I'll echo your recommendation for The Price of Gold. What an incredible movie. More suggestions:
The Man Who Skied Down Everest: This movie is great all the way through, but the full footage of Yuichiro Mura's descent is shown in what is honestly the most captivating 140 seconds of cinema I've ever seen. Watch this movie.
Jiro Dreams of Sushi: Lots of people have seen this one, but if you haven't, you should remedy that. It's an incredibly Japanese movie, about Jiro Ono, perhaps the greatest living sushi chef, and his family and restaurant. Also very, very, good.
The Act of Killing: This movie will fucking wreck you. It's about the anti-communist death squads in Indonesia after the overthrow of Sukarno, and is a particularly intense profile of two men who lead the killings. It's still very worth watching.
A Band Called Death: A profile of the first black punk band. The soundtrack is incredible.
The Cove: An undercover group of activists secretly film an exposé of the Japanese capture and slaughter of dolphins at a cove near Taiji. Doesn't shy away from describing the atrocity of what we do to cetaceans.
Also, everything Louis Theroux has done, especially - though I defer to Lemon's recommendations (Twilight of the Porn Stars is good but not as good as the first special).
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Ansemaru on April 10, 2014, 01:43:35 am
The Queen of Versailles is a documentary that prompted me to finally sit down and marathon the entirety of Arrested Development last year, so it has that going for it among many other things.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Tiny Prancer on April 10, 2014, 11:35:23 am
I have actually not seen it, but I have sources that say that Eat The Sun is a very good doc to check out about if you want to learn about the levels of fucked up the inedia/breatharianism movement is (basically people who insist that not eating is not only reasonable but something you should do because you can totally live on sun and air! Indian Mysticism totally says so! Also one of the leading figues of it insists that double-quarter pounders with cheese and diet coke don't count as breaking the rules because of "vibrational frequency" or some shit) It starts out looking like it's in support of it, but gets fucking amazing as it goes on, and even catches on-camera one of the leading figures of the movement at a buffet, and confronts him in front of his followers about it.
Also, I didn't realize until after I made the thread, but I meant to put it in the "How I choose to spend my time" section and somehow started it here instead. Should it get moved or is it okay here?
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Moriarty on April 10, 2014, 03:12:25 pm
If you've never seen any Louis Theroux documentaries, see Louis Theroux documentaries. Of particular interest are
The Most Hated Family In America (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Most_Hated_Family_in_America). Louis hangs out with the Phelps family for longer than most people could stomach
He also revisited the Phelps family a few years later in America's Most Hated Family in Crisis. Several of the family members he talks to in the first documentary actually left or were kicked out of the church during that time, so you get to see kind of an interesting before and after if you watch them both together. Also, you get to see Phelps clan members performing Phelps gospel versions of Lady Gaga songs.
I'm kind of hoping he'll go back again some day to get an update on what's happening post-Phelps' death.
For my own contribution to the topic, I'd like to recommend The Imposter (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Imposter_%282012_film%29), which is about an actual twenty-something French guy who impersonated a missing 13-year-old boy from Texas in 1997. He got sent back to live with the boy's family. And yet, he isn't even necessarily the creepiest person in the story.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Goose Goose Honk At Me Now on April 10, 2014, 05:39:06 pm
Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles is, as the title says, a mystery, and a weirdly compelling one.
For reference, this is what a Toynbee Tile looks like: (http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-O_vQJApKYog/TtOIFbZqCQI/AAAAAAAAAMw/neZdn6zQzMQ/s1600/Whole-Tile-Close-Up.gif)
They've been found all over the world, and in at least one case in the middle of a highway. Who creates them and why, and what do the messages mean? It's a fascinating story, as are the stories of the filmmakers themselves, and you end up with this great thing about art as communication and knowing when to let a passion project go.
Wordplay is about competitive crossword puzzle-solving. I like it a lot but I am very biased because I love crosswords and also I know a dude who won the competition featured a couple of times. (We used to volunteer for the same organization.)
The movie theater two blocks down from me is currently showing The Unknown Known, which is about Donald Rumsfeld, and Particle Fever, which is about scientists trying to destroy the universe with their hardons. I will be seeing one of them next week and it's not going to be the Rumsfeld one.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Isfahan on April 10, 2014, 06:00:57 pm
Particle Fever, which is about scientists trying to destroy the universe with their hardons.CuddlePLEASE MAKE IT STOP SNOWING, April 10, 2014, 05:39:06 pm
I wonder what the person responsible for thinking up porno titles and plots does when the original film already has a porny title and plot.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Goose Goose Honk At Me Now on April 10, 2014, 08:22:41 pm
Particle Fever, which is about scientists trying to destroy the universe with their hardons.CuddlePLEASE MAKE IT STOP SNOWING, April 10, 2014, 05:39:06 pm
I wonder what the person responsible for thinking up porno titles and plots does when the original film already has a porny title and plot. Isfahan, April 10, 2014, 06:00:57 pm
Cocaine. That's what the person responsible does. And that's what they do until the disappointment goes away.
(spoiler alert: the disappointment that someone's already taken your porno title and plot never goes away)
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Lemon on April 10, 2014, 09:17:20 pm
I wonder what the person responsible for thinking up porno titles and plots does when the original film already has a porny title and plot. Isfahan, April 10, 2014, 06:00:57 pm
(http://i.imgur.com/Ss6tlrx.jpg)
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Lemon on April 20, 2014, 11:15:12 am
(Twilight of the Porn Stars is good but not as good as the first special). kal-elk, April 09, 2014, 08:38:30 pm
I just watched Twilight of the Porn Stars last night, and I wanna share the two best bits:
There's a central focus to the movie that Louis is asking people about Jon Dough, a subject of the previous film who hung himself in 2006. He asks the owner of a talent agency (and worst liar in the film) about why Jon Dough might have killed himself, and he reflects that it was an industry-wide decrease in DVD sales.
But much more amazing than that is the life of one of the terribly named Kagney Linn Karter, a porn actress who has a boyfriend that introduces himself as "her live-in assistant". These two people have one of the most poisonous relationship I've ever seen filmed. She's just agreed (against the advice of her agent) to be in a scene where five dudes jizz on her face, and the boyfriend voices a meek protest, at which point she unleashes on him what a sponge he is. Later, Kagney is back from the bukake scene and is quite pleased with the results. So pleased in fact that she mentally walks through how perfectly wonderful her life would be like if (god forbid, but if) she didn't have a boyfriend. She's basically a less-violent Charles Bukowski.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: CormansInferno on May 19, 2014, 08:43:13 pm
The Pervert's Guide to Idealogy: Slazoj Zizek is the leftist cultural critic that roughly 80% of Tumblr wishes it was. Using a smashtape of his favorite (or most despised) scenes from cinema history, he lays out the case of how to free ourselves from the trap of horseshit rhetoric. Anybody who can tie thier philosophical theories to John Carpenter gets a thumbs up from me ("You got two options - put on those sunglasses or start eating outta that garbage can!" "Ah! But I am already eating from the garbage can all the time. And the name of the garbage can is ideology.") I found the full thing (http://youtu.be/YRQRbFz22Tk) on YouTube, but if it gets yanked off there it's on Netflix Streaming.
The Final Member (http://thefinalmember.com/): (NSFWish trailer/site) Probably the most moving documentary ever made about human penises. It follows Siggy, the founder of the Icelandic Pahllological Society, a museum on the edge of the Artic Circle whose collection has penises from every mammal on Earth, with one crucial exception:
The documentary covers the race for penal immortality between the legendary Icelandic adventurer/lothario who originally promised to make a postmortem donation to the hospital and his American rival, who vowed in 2001 to give the museum his penis BEFORE he died. This is some Errol Morris-level filmmaking, where they find a few surreally intriguing people and let them explain the inside of their heads.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: KingKalamari on May 19, 2014, 10:14:16 pm
Comic Book Confidential: It's probably one of my favourite films. Period. It's one of the things that really got me into comics in the first place.\
It's a documentary about the history and development of the comic book medium throughout the 20th century with a particular focus on alternative and independent stuff. It's filled with interviews with big name artists (Robert Crumb, Harvey Pekar, Los Bros Hernandez, Jack Kirby) and it's all linked together by these weird motion graphics.
But the most interesting part, for me at least, are the sections where creators narrate pages of their own work:
There's also a really good one where Jaime Hernandez reads one of his Locas stories from Love and Rockets but I could not find a clip.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: NutshellGulag on May 23, 2014, 02:05:27 am
Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles is, as the title says, a mystery, and a weirdly compelling one.
For reference, this is what a Toynbee Tile looks like: (http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-O_vQJApKYog/TtOIFbZqCQI/AAAAAAAAAMw/neZdn6zQzMQ/s1600/Whole-Tile-Close-Up.gif)
They've been found all over the world, and in at least one case in the middle of a highway. Who creates them and why, and what do the messages mean? It's a fascinating story, as are the stories of the filmmakers themselves, and you end up with this great thing about art as communication and knowing when to let a passion project go.
Wordplay is about competitive crossword puzzle-solving. I like it a lot but I am very biased because I love crosswords and also I know a dude who won the competition featured a couple of times. (We used to volunteer for the same organization.)
The movie theater two blocks down from me is currently showing The Unknown Known, which is about Donald Rumsfeld, and Particle Fever, which is about scientists trying to destroy the universe with their hardons. I will be seeing one of them next week and it's not going to be the Rumsfeld one. CuddlePLEASE MAKE IT STOP RAINING, April 10, 2014, 05:39:06 pm
Ooh! We have a Toynbee tile here. I've got to watch that.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: chai tea latte on May 23, 2014, 04:05:17 am
It's a pretty good movie.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: goombapolice on September 02, 2014, 09:29:51 am
My Fake Baby: Basically emotional realdolls for sad broken women. These people are very, very crazy. They walk around with realistic looking baby dolls and treat them as if they were real. It's all the attention you get walking around with a baby, without having to deal with the responsibilities of babies!
This also led me to a treasure trove of Newborn doll roleplay videos that are super weird and pathetic and kind of hard to watch. Will probably post a couple of those in the video thread.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Schumin Capote on September 03, 2014, 04:36:35 am
Quest for the Holy Foreskin :: For centuries, the relic of the Holy Foreskin was considered by believers to be the only piece of Jesus’ flesh to remain on earth after he ascended to heaven, and thus was among the most sacred relics in Christendom. Then, on New Year’s Day 1983, in a tiny village in the Italian countryside, Father Don Dario announced to his expectant flock that their beloved relic had been stolen. New York Times writer David Farley goes on a quest to unravel the story of this mysterious crime.
My Granny the Escort :: A frank and intimate portrait of three mature British women who sell sex. How does their profession affect their family lives, and what motivates men to pay for sex with older women?
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Myrmeleo on September 05, 2014, 04:12:58 pm
The Supersizers: Comedienne Sue Perkins and restaurant critic Giles Coren spend a week living in a period house, eating period food, and generally living a period lifestyle for various times in British history. It excellently combines education and entertainment. There should be a word for that... Anyway, the whole series is on YouTube, so enjoy!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Sherlockian on September 05, 2014, 07:07:31 pm
Hell House: A look at the "Hell House" performed annually in October by the youth members of Trinity Church (Assemblies of God) in Cedar Hill, Texas (a Dallas suburb) - seen by over 10,000 visitors each year. We see the organization and planning of the event - including auditions, construction, scripting and rehearsals - largely through the involvement of one family: a single father with 4 children (one of whom suffers from cerebral palsy) including his daughter, a cast member.
I like documentaries about crazy religious bullshit.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Lemon on September 05, 2014, 11:01:33 pm
Hell House is really good.
Jesus Camp is also really well done, although it is fucking terrifying.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: cyclopeantrash on September 05, 2014, 11:14:05 pm
God Loves Uganda is the extended Jesus Camp experience.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Locclo on September 05, 2014, 11:32:33 pm
I don't watch too many documentaries, but I figure I'll share a few interesting science ones that I've seen.
Aftermath: Population Zero and Life After People
Both of these share the same premise, but were aired on two different channels (National Geographic and History, interestingly enough). Both of them are speculative looks at what would happen to Earth if humanity were to simply vanish without a trace, all at once. What's really fascinating to me is that for all the time that it's taken us to leave our mark on the environment through various types of industries, nature would virtually undo everything we did in a matter of a few centuries.
Cosmos: A Personal Voyage and Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey
These two are pretty popular, but I figure I'll post 'em anyway. Basically, they're sort of mile-wide, inch-deep looks at a wide variety of topics about life and the universe with an emphasis on making them more accessible to the general population, keeping the actual math and science relatively simple and focusing more on what it all means. Both of them were put together by some of the most brilliant minds of their times - Carl Sagan for the original, and Neil deGrasse Tyson for the more recent, modern rendition. Regardless, they're both great shows if you have even a passing interest in astronomy and the science of the universe.
Prophets of Science Fiction
This one is a series that examines the written works of science fiction authors, such as Mary Shelley and Isaac Asimov, and shows how many of the things that they wrote about as fiction wound up becoming reality when technology caught up to them. It's not the greatest show (some of the links between author and technology are sort of tenuous), but it's still a neat show if you're into sci-fi.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: 🍆 on September 06, 2014, 02:15:02 am
On the off chance that anyone here hasn't seen Crumb, please please do so.
Anything Errol Morris is great, too. My favorite is the Fog of War although Mr. Death is a pretty close follow up. His TV show First Person is also worth checking out - each episode focuses on a person with their own eccentric life story, whether it's a cryogenic freezing activist or a mobster lawyer. What I wouldn't give to see it rebooted.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Fatty Bo Batty on September 09, 2014, 04:47:16 am
This is a recommendation of a more absurd, "F Plus-y" variety.
The Hidden Hand: Alien Contact and the Government Cover-Up is one of the funniest things I've seen. It's a lovely mix of crazy old men talking about alien hierarchies, people talking about their alien babies, and conspiracy theories. I watched it solely because of this image showing up on my Netflix feed:
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Caroline on September 09, 2014, 06:18:53 am
Anything Errol Morris is great, too. My favorite is the Fog of War although Mr. Death is a pretty close follow up. His TV show First Person is also worth checking out - each episode focuses on a person with their own eccentric life story, whether it's a cryogenic freezing activist or a mobster lawyer. What I wouldn't give to see it rebooted. 🍆, September 06, 2014, 02:15:02 am
First Person was a brilliant show. I got a little bit obsessed with it for a while, actually. I think 'I Dismember Mama' might be my favourite, because that guy is just so very, very earnest.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Isfahan on September 09, 2014, 06:28:44 am
What's really fascinating to me is that for all the time that it's taken us to leave our mark on the environment through various types of industries, nature would virtually undo everything we did in a matter of a few centuries.Locclo, September 05, 2014, 11:32:33 pm
Yeah, but it only took us one century to do all that, so we win again, Nature.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: nigeline on September 09, 2014, 05:27:13 pm
This is a recommendation of a more absurd, "F Plus-y" variety.
The Hidden Hand: Alien Contact and the Government Cover-Up is one of the funniest things I've seen. It's a lovely mix of crazy old men talking about alien hierarchies, people talking about their alien babies, and conspiracy theories. I watched it solely because of this image showing up on my Netflix feed:
(http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTQyNzI2NDM5MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMTY2NTA2MDE@._V1_SX640_SY720_.jpg) FattyBoBatty, September 09, 2014, 04:47:16 am
Oh man, now I have to watch this. I love all sorts of documentaries, but being fascinated with conspiracy theories makes the nusto one seem all the more appealing. In a similar vein, 9-11: In Plane Sight is chock full of terrible science, bad graphics, and alarmist warnings of impending new world order government takeovers. It's fantastic.
On a more serious note, everyone should watch The Most Hated Family in America, the BBC2/Louis Theroux documentary about the Westboro Baptist Church and the Phelps that run it. Theroux spent three weeks in Topeka interviewing them, following them to events they were picketing, etc.. It's an utterly disgusting and entirely captivating examination of how one can simultaneously be intelligent, rational, and completely deranged.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Isfahan on September 09, 2014, 09:27:27 pm
Would recommending The King of Kong be too mainstream? If it is, fuck you, I'm recommending it anyway.
It's a documentary on competitive arcade gaming, focusing largely on the classic games from the 80s and Donkey Kong in particular. The documentary follows the exploits of a Washington state science teacher and his efforts to get the new world-record high score in Donkey Kong. There's even the successful hotshot (mulleted) rival who seems to enjoy every advantage. It's also an interesting look at the Twin Galaxies score- and record-keeping authority and how they verify and regulate submissions for competition.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Mister Smalls on September 09, 2014, 10:36:15 pm
The King of Kong is an amazing documentary because it perfectly illustrates, through the example of Billy Mitchell, that no amount of fame and power is too little to bloat a person's head.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Caroline on September 10, 2014, 04:28:57 am
Grizzly Man is pretty mainstream too, but I'm still going to recommend it, just in case anybody hasn't seen it. It's excellent, and Werner Herzog's usual craziness is slightly muted.
Like everybody else in this thread, I think pretty much anything Louis Theroux makes is worth watching. Can't say the same for Marcel Theroux, although the BBC inexplicably keeps asking him to do documentaries. This one is particularly awkward: http://www.keofilms.com/production/in-search-of-wabi-sabi-with-marcel-theroux/
The first bit's here:
He looks like the hamster version of his brother, and the documentary is mostly just scenes of him confusing Buddhist monks.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: CormansInferno on September 13, 2014, 09:43:42 pm
Los Angeles Plays Itself is about to come out on DVD. It's a pretty interesting dissection of L.A.'s depictions of itself and visiting European directors' fascination with it, but holy shit you are going to need a snack or bathroom break during it because it's nearly 3 hours long. And the guy he got to narrate it is no Slazov Zizek.
I think I sang its praises in the other movie thread but when Jodorowsky's Dune is available, make that appontment viewing. The greatest and most heartbreaking celebration of Jodorowsky's surrealist visionary brain (and it sorta pains me to say it, but I think I enjoyed it more than The Dance of Reality) plus an accidental eulogy to H.R. Giger. And according to one of the doc's producers, apparently they're trying to wrestle the Dune copyright away from the Herbert family long enough to make an animated miniseries out of Moebius' storyboards (Moebius and Jodorowsky plotted and "shot" the entire 14-20 hour movie) .
Led Zeppelin Played Here is the feature debut of Jeff Krulik, the public access warrior behind Heavy Metal Parking Lot. It weaves through a shaggy dog story in his hometown of Wheaton, Maryland that claims Led Zeppelin played a high school auditorium the night after their first official show in the US. As always, Krulik is the king of finding rock n' roll-obsessed weirdos.
Not a valid vimeo URL
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Tiny Prancer on September 14, 2014, 03:29:13 am
I don't care much for dune (as a series) but I'd LOVE if they did manage to make that miniseries because those storyboards and designs were stunning.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Sion on September 15, 2014, 02:09:45 am
I dunno if Ancient Aliens Debunked counts, but...
What? Stop laughing. Really. Really!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Mister Smalls on November 13, 2014, 09:23:04 pm
"My Child is a Monkey."
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Nikaer Drekin on November 25, 2014, 04:41:54 pm
Anything Errol Morris is great, too. My favorite is the Fog of War although Mr. Death is a pretty close follow up. His TV show First Person is also worth checking out - each episode focuses on a person with their own eccentric life story, whether it's a cryogenic freezing activist or a mobster lawyer. What I wouldn't give to see it rebooted. 🍆, September 06, 2014, 02:15:02 am
I'll agree here- Errol Morris is great, The Thin Blue Line is one of my favorite films ever, documentary or not.
Also, for something more in the vein of The King of Kong, check out American Movie. It's the story of an incompetent midwestern dude trying to make a horror movie, and it's completely hilarious. I can't imagine anyone who likes The F Plus wouldn't love it.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Old_Zircon on April 21, 2015, 09:55:44 am
One of the better documentaries I've seen.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: cyclopeantrash on April 21, 2015, 03:52:29 pm
Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies (http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/cancer-emperor-of-all-maladies/home/) is a fucking excellent 3 part, six hour documentary about cancer.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Geremy Tibbles on April 21, 2015, 04:00:04 pm
First Kill is probably the most chilling and sincere documentary on war I've ever seen. Incredibly well shot and edited and addresses far more than the politics of the Vietnam War.
Just a little warning: The opening title shot features a pig head being shot in slow motion, but aside from that the only thing graphic are the descriptions.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Digital Walnut on April 29, 2015, 02:51:29 pm
True, but be prepared to sit there and really hate Donald Rumsfeld for a while if you watch The Unknown Known.
Most Adam Curtis docs are worth watching, too. I especially recommend The Century of the Self for anyone who hasn't seen it. For natural history fans, An Original Duckumentary from last year's run of PBS Nature was probably the most beautifully shot film I've seen that didn't get a theatrical release.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: chai tea latte on April 29, 2015, 02:58:08 pm
Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies (http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/cancer-emperor-of-all-maladies/home/) is a fucking excellent 3 part, six hour documentary about cancer. MISANDRY CANNON, April 21, 2015, 03:52:29 pm
Seconded vehemently.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Lemon on May 10, 2015, 01:33:00 am
I just finished watching Print The Legend, which I enjoyed way more than I expected to (the expectation being that it would be boring enough to put me to sleep, which is what I was hoping for).
It's a documentary about the 3D printing industry, specifically MakerBot and FormLabs, predominently MakerBot, and more specifically MakerBot CEO Bre Pettits (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/Bre_Pettis_26C3_2.jpg). Rather than being a insubstantial pontification about the magical reality of technology in the not-too-distant future, it's actually a story about ethics, and what happens when being ethical and being successful are at odds with each other.
Nobody comes out of the movie looking good, except for a couple of fired people, plus it gives some insight into the actual technology itself.
It's a Netflix original, so it's available there. I liked it enough to want to write about it immediately afterwards, but now I should probably sleep.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: goombapolice on May 11, 2015, 06:32:42 am
That looks really good. Thanks for cluing me to it!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: chai tea latte on May 13, 2015, 01:17:58 am
Just finished watching The World Before Her.
The World Before Her is a tale of two Indias. In one, Ruhi Singh is a small-town girl competing in Bombay to win the Miss India pageant — a ticket to stardom in a country wild about beauty contests. In the other India, Prachi Trivedi is the young, militant leader of a fundamentalist Hindu camp for girls, where she preaches violent resistance to Western culture, Christianity and Islam. Moving between these divergent realities, the film creates a lively, provocative portrait of the world's largest democracy at a critical transitional moment — and of two women who hope to shape its future.Quote from
That's a pretty tame overview. This film will probably make you very, very angry. It focuses heavily on the Hindutva reactionary group Durga Vahini (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durga_Vahini), and is the first time a documentary crew were granted access to their young women's indoctrination camps. In a really striking scene, Prachi (who's 24, and has gone to these camps since she was 3) denies that she runs a terrorist training camp - the idea is ridiculous to her. She jokes that they don't even teach how to make bombs - it's so easy, you'd just need sulfuric acid and some household cleaners. How can we be a terrorist training camp if we don't even learn to make bombs, she asks.
The Miss India segments are also really good, and the message that India's girls have no options but to be subsumed is quietly beaten home. None of these martyrs believe, and they lose their identities in the process.
You can watch it online through the Knowledge Network (https://www.knowledge.ca/program/world-her) (which, oh my god, i love) until June 12th. It's also on the PBS rotation, I'm not sure if Knowledge is accessible outside of Canada. Check your local listings (http://www.pbs.org/pov/worldbeforeher/).
(content warnings: footage of violence against women, discussion of child abuse and infanticide)
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Blandest on May 13, 2015, 02:34:13 am
I recently watched a documentary called I Am an Adult Baby. I'm not sure where you'd be able to find it but I watched it on ABC's iview here http://iview.abc.net.au/programs/i-am-an-adult-baby/ZX9653A001S00.
It holds some relevance but they shy away from the sexual thing, only touching on it briefly a couple of times. Highlights include the 27 year old lady who wants to be 6, but her "father" wants her to be 2, and the man who hasn't "come out" to his family yet and doesn't want to yet appears on a TV programme with his face completely clear.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: A Meat on May 13, 2015, 10:50:45 am
Just finished watching The World Before Her.
The World Before Her is a tale of two Indias. In one, Ruhi Singh is a small-town girl competing in Bombay to win the Miss India pageant — a ticket to stardom in a country wild about beauty contests. In the other India, Prachi Trivedi is the young, militant leader of a fundamentalist Hindu camp for girls, where she preaches violent resistance to Western culture, Christianity and Islam. Moving between these divergent realities, the film creates a lively, provocative portrait of the world's largest democracy at a critical transitional moment — and of two women who hope to shape its future.Quote from
That's a pretty tame overview. This film will probably make you very, very angry. It focuses heavily on the Hindutva reactionary group Durga Vahini (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durga_Vahini), and is the first time a documentary crew were granted access to their young women's indoctrination camps. In a really striking scene, Prachi (who's 24, and has gone to these camps since she was 3) denies that she runs a terrorist training camp - the idea is ridiculous to her. She jokes that they don't even teach how to make bombs - it's so easy, you'd just need sulfuric acid and some household cleaners. How can we be a terrorist training camp if we don't even learn to make bombs, she asks.
The Miss India segments are also really good, and the message that India's girls have no options but to be subsumed is quietly beaten home. None of these martyrs believe, and they lose their identities in the process.
You can watch it online through the Knowledge Network (https://www.knowledge.ca/program/world-her) (which, oh my god, i love) until June 12th. It's also on the PBS rotation, I'm not sure if Knowledge is accessible outside of Canada. Check your local listings (http://www.pbs.org/pov/worldbeforeher/).
(content warnings: footage of violence against women, discussion of child abuse and infanticide) chai tea latte, May 13, 2015, 01:17:58 am
Thanks for the recommend, now I'm kind of depressed. I had basically known what to expect about the terrorist camp, but seeing it in motion is always disheartening.
The Miss India sections are almost as crazy as the terrorist camp, with the poor models seeming like okay people just being reduced to utter sexual objects with no other hope of social advancement and liberation other than giving up their dignity.
Does anyone know of a good documentary about the Japanese/Korean 'idol' business? It sounds about the same as the modeling business.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Sun Smasher on August 19, 2015, 06:49:00 am
Does anyone have anymore suggestions along the same lines as the previously mentioned Toynbee Tile documentary? I an genuinely interested in the strange and weird, things that just have no real explanation. Please no "omg aliens" documentaries though, the aliens ones are just... eeegh.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Blandest on August 19, 2015, 10:39:13 pm
Does anyone have anymore suggestions along the same lines as the previously mentioned Toynbee Tile documentary? I an genuinely interested in the strange and weird, things that just have no real explanation. Please no "omg aliens" documentaries though, the aliens ones are just... eeegh. Sun Smasher, August 19, 2015, 06:49:00 am
Someone suggested it in the podcast thread but the thinking sideways podcast is pretty good. I personally like the unsolved murders the most, but they talk about a bunch of other mysteries as well.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Sun Smasher on August 21, 2015, 10:26:21 am
Does anyone have anymore suggestions along the same lines as the previously mentioned Toynbee Tile documentary? I an genuinely interested in the strange and weird, things that just have no real explanation. Please no "omg aliens" documentaries though, the aliens ones are just... eeegh. Sun Smasher, August 19, 2015, 06:49:00 am
Someone suggested it in the podcast thread but the thinking sideways podcast is pretty good. I personally like the unsolved murders the most, but they talk about a bunch of other mysteries as well. Blandest, August 19, 2015, 10:39:13 pm
Yeah, they are great. I'm actually the one who mentioned them. It's hard to find more good things along those lines though.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Blandest on August 21, 2015, 04:04:03 pm
Does anyone have anymore suggestions along the same lines as the previously mentioned Toynbee Tile documentary? I an genuinely interested in the strange and weird, things that just have no real explanation. Please no "omg aliens" documentaries though, the aliens ones are just... eeegh. Sun Smasher, August 19, 2015, 06:49:00 am
Someone suggested it in the podcast thread but the thinking sideways podcast is pretty good. I personally like the unsolved murders the most, but they talk about a bunch of other mysteries as well. Blandest, August 19, 2015, 10:39:13 pm
Yeah, they are great. I'm actually the one who mentioned them. It's hard to find more good things along those lines though. Sun Smasher, August 21, 2015, 10:26:21 am
Well then egg and my face are in alignment. I guess you can take that as encouragement that someone liked your suggestion.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Sun Smasher on August 22, 2015, 06:39:26 am
Does anyone have anymore suggestions along the same lines as the previously mentioned Toynbee Tile documentary? I an genuinely interested in the strange and weird, things that just have no real explanation. Please no "omg aliens" documentaries though, the aliens ones are just... eeegh. Sun Smasher, August 19, 2015, 06:49:00 am
Someone suggested it in the podcast thread but the thinking sideways podcast is pretty good. I personally like the unsolved murders the most, but they talk about a bunch of other mysteries as well. Blandest, August 19, 2015, 10:39:13 pm
Yeah, they are great. I'm actually the one who mentioned them. It's hard to find more good things along those lines though. Sun Smasher, August 21, 2015, 10:26:21 am
Well then egg and my face are in alignment. I guess you can take that as encouragement that someone liked your suggestion. Blandest, August 21, 2015, 04:04:03 pm
haha quite! It's a really good show, I hope it gets more love from supporters.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Tiny Prancer on August 22, 2015, 03:36:52 pm
so I am almost done watching Overnight, a documentary about the rise and crash of Troy Duffy, the writer/director of Boondock Saints. It's definitely a schadenfreude documentary, because it spends a lot of time showing Duffy acting like the biggest piece of work and how it results in doors being slammed in his face in every personal and professional relationship he has. I've never watched Boondock Saints but the friend who clued me in on this doc is a big fan and she said that even though she still enjoys the film, seeing what a horrible shitlord its creator is is definitely sobering. You can watch it on youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2Ujf9Qp66M)!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Spoop on August 23, 2015, 11:12:25 am
I love documentaries. Here are a few suggestions I haven't seen made in the thread yet:
The Pruitt-Igoe Myth- a 2011 documentary film detailing the history of the Pruitt–Igoe public housing complex in St. Louis, Missouri, and the eventual decision to implode the entire complex in 1976. Really interesting.
Cobra Gypsies- stunning piece of work; beautifully-filmed. Filmmaker Raphael Treza traveled to northern India and lived among an ancient tribe known as the Kalbeliya for three months.
The Woman Who Wasn't There- This woman actually faked being in one of the twin towers in 9/11. Batshit crazy.
I Think We're Alone Now- People who stalk the singer Tiffany. Also file under 'batshit crazy'.
Black Tar Heroin- "An extraordinary look at two years in the lives of five young heroin addicts, Black Tar Heroin offers a rare and intimate portrait of how heroin devastates young lives." Filmed in the 90s, I think. Pretty interesting.
Thin- a documentary about an eating disorder clinic and the patients who go there. The film mostly revolves around four women with anorexia nervosa and/or bulimia and their struggles for recovery. Kind of sad. :(
The Interrupters- Members of the activist group CeaseFire work to curb violence in their Chicago neighborhoods by intervening in street fights and showing youths a better way to resolve conflicts.
Life 2.0- All about the magic that is Second Life.
Town of Runners- About kids from Ethiopia who want to run in the Olympics, and the difficulties they face.
Cropsey- SPOOKY! about child abductions in Staten Island, and the mental institution that used to be there.
just watched tonight: Web Junkie Chinese kids get sent to boot camp to overcome their internet addiction.
Some of these are on Netflix, some on Youtube, and the rest you can find on the documentary sites on Google.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: a gross spider on August 23, 2015, 01:09:01 pm
I Think We're Alone Now- People who stalk the singer Tiffany. Also file under 'batshit crazy'. Spoop, August 23, 2015, 11:12:25 am
I saw this when it was on tour at the local warehouse-turned hipster theater. I was fucking great and then it turned out that the filmmakers had actually brought mr stalker dude with them and he answered questions from the audience and signed posters and weirdly hit on the friend I was there with.
Also I'm sure someone's mentioned it by now but I just watched The Search For General Tso and it's really good. Goes into the history of Chinese-American food but also the specific origins of America's favorite candied fried chicken.
EDIT: wait a goddamn second. Four pages in and nobody's mentioned In the Realms of the Unreal (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRlvDKcDvsI)? Really? Honestly everybody needs to stop what they're doing right now and watch this. It's about a shut-in who spent his entire life writing a 15000-page novel about magical girls and would basically be the best F+ exhibit ever if he had lived long enough to see the internet.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: goombapolice on August 23, 2015, 03:37:10 pm
Cropsey- SPOOKY! about child abductions in Staten Island, and the mental institution that used to be there.
Couldn't say whether or not Rand did it, but I'm leaning towards "did it"
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Spoop on August 24, 2015, 04:30:39 am
I Think We're Alone Now- People who stalk the singer Tiffany. Also file under 'batshit crazy'. Spoop, August 23, 2015, 11:12:25 am
I saw this when it was on tour at the local warehouse-turned hipster theater. I was fucking great and then it turned out that the filmmakers had actually brought mr stalker dude with them and he answered questions from the audience and signed posters and weirdly hit on the friend I was there with.
Couldn't say whether or not Rand did it, but I'm leaning towards "did it" goombapolice, August 23, 2015, 03:37:10 pm
I think I'm leaning towards "did it" too. But wasn't there discussion that he may not have acted alone? I haven't watched it in a few months... perhaps another showing is needed!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Schumin Capote on November 24, 2015, 12:34:46 am
I watched "Orion: The Man Who Would Be King (http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b06pyw3w/storyville-20152016-8-orion-the-man-who-would-be-king)" last night. I don't want to spoil too much about this, but it is about a singer who would neither confirm nor deny that he was Elvis returning after faking his own death. I'm really surprised I hadn't heard of this before and it would make an amazing Dollop.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Ambious on November 24, 2015, 01:01:44 am
I know that voice - a documentary about voice actors in cartoons and video games. A fun watch, with some cool people. James Randi: An Honest Liar - about famous magician and skeptic James Randi, who set it as a life goal to expose frauds and pseudoscience perpetrators.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Digital Walnut on November 24, 2015, 11:18:21 pm
I've really been enjoying BBC's The Hunt (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0342d1x) so far. In case you need another excuse to watch a David Attenborough series, the cinematography is amazing.
Some of my own camerawork will be featured on the BBC and PBS in January. It's airing in England as The World's Sneakiest Animals and on PBS as Natural Born Hustlers (http://www.thirteen.org/13pressroom/press-release/nature-season-34-natural-born-hustlers/). I shot the segment on Steller's Jays imitating Red-shouldered Hawks to scare off competition for food (which I think will air on the 20th) as well as some of the narration around the redwoods, beaches and bluffs.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Digital Walnut on February 18, 2016, 03:25:28 pm
I just watched PBS's The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution (http://www.pbs.org/video/2365657009), a fairly comprehensive history of the organization. Most of what I knew about the Black Panthers I learned piecemeal while growing up in Oakland, so I enjoyed seeing a lot of the key events in chronological order.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: MythosSanta on August 26, 2016, 12:06:08 am
On the off chance that anyone here hasn't seen Crumb, please please do so.
I second this. I got the movie on Criterion DVD from Barnes and Nobles and it's fast become one of my favorite movies. It feels like someone decided to chase down an Fplus subject and do a full length film on them. As someone whose read a bit of Crumb's work, it adds another layer to it. That said, the misogyny he exhibits kinda ruins some of his work for me.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: lazzer grardaion? on August 26, 2016, 04:04:18 pm
If I could throw another suggestion in here, I'd recommend Marwencol, a documentary about a dude who suffered severe brain damage after being beaten up by five or so guys outside of a bar, and who had to re-learn basically everything, up to how to walk and feed himself. As part of his efforts to start re-training himself, he made this little dollhouse-sized bar, and populated it with G.I. Joes and Barbies, and this eventually grew to an entire WWII-era town full of buildings and people. The detailing and customization he was doing was to build hand-eye coordination, but he also started using the town to tell stories about its inhabitants, and cope with his own personal traumatic experiences.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: CormansInferno on September 09, 2016, 12:40:46 pm
My local arthouse has recently gone very doc-heavy (among other things they're doing a four-part, four-year retrospective of Frederick Wiseman's complete filmography). They also had a fantastic mini-festival of avant-garde docs. A few choice selections:
The Killing of America: A bleak, terrifying, essential piece of American filmmaking. After Taxi Driver indirectly caused Reagan's near-assassination, Paul Schrader's brother Leon became obsessed with how and why violence was so prevalent in America. Leon happened to be fluent in Japanese and ran into manga artist turned producer Mataichiro Yamamoto, who was looking to capitalize on the success of Faces of Death in the Japanese video market. Sheldon Renan was hired to direct, and added cherry-picked future Oscar winners from UCLA's filmmaking program to his production team (who made the American dubs of Shogun Assassin and later, Akira). The final result is more of a stark Werner Herzog type meditation on the increase of violent crime in America instead of straight-up mondo schocksploitation, which its producers were not happy about. But it's accompanied with the most tragic and horrific film of the 20th Century, including the murder of JFK, live footage of the Nguyen Van Lem execution, and late 70s' LAPD gunfights that the doc's production team filmed themselves. It goes from the most high-profile assassinations of the 60s' into the political violence at home and abroad through the late 60's and 70's before hitting the serial killer boom of the 80's (including a horrific interview with an obscure serial killer). It's such a bracing slap of reality that it was never distributed in the US,not even on home video. But in Europe, Asia, South America, and Australia it was a box office hit (it was the #7 highest grossing movie at the Japanese box office in 1982). It's currently being restored for a Blu-Ray release.
Not a valid vimeo URL
Dead Slow Ahead: Mauro Herce's first feature, a horror movie about late capitalism, a version of Alien where the massive clanking emptiness of the spaceship is the monster. Filmed with almost no dialogue from the POV of a commercial freighter as it makes its way from one dystopian seaport to another, barely connected to land by a faulty satellite phone line. Sometimes the crew is shot in close profiles as they maintain the ship or relax in an impromptu karaoke room, but most of the time they are tiny figures outlined against a bleak and inhuman space. I saw it on a Sunday afternoon and that pretty much the perfect time for it, as it works best when the viewer relaxes and lets the endless roar of the sea and industrial freight roll over them completely.
Cameraperson: Kirsten Johnson has worked as a cinematographer on documentaries for most of her life (including Fahrenheit 9/11 and Citizenfour) but in the middle of making her first feature, one of the main characters of the documentary asked to be removed for reasons of personal safety. Forced to reconfigure her footage, Johnson accidentally hit upon how much of herself she had documented on camera. That sent her on an archival search through raw footage from over 120 projects she'd worked on to create a nonchronological memoir of a live lived in dozens of countries; including postwar Sarajevo, full War on Terror era Afghanistan, and a resource-strained maternity clinic in Nigeria, as well as autobiographical snippets from her own life (including her mother's sad descent into Alzheimer's).
Not a valid vimeo URL
Helmut Berger, Actor: This is less a documentary than a Mexican standoff with a resentful German manbaby that descends into a real-life Lars Von Trier or Gaspar Noe movie. Helmut Berger was the one-time lover and muse of Austrian director Tony Visconti. When Visconti died in 1976, Berger tried committing suicide, fearing he'd never work as an actor again. Afterwards Berger became a recluse, famously swearing off interviews about his work with Visconti or his attempted suicide. Though he'd agreed to do a documentary, he still wouldn't talk about any of these subjects to director Andreas Horvath. The only person willing to talk about Berger's past is his maid, who's dutifully maintained Berger's run-down two-room apartment for decades. Horvath won't stop asking and Berger starts having full blown freakouts at him both in his decaying apartment and over voicemail. And then things get even weirder.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Agent (gobble, gobble) Coop on September 09, 2016, 12:49:52 pm
My local arthouse has recently gone very doc-heavy (among other things they're doing a four-part, four-year retrospective of Frederick Wiseman's complete filmography). They also had a fantastic mini-festival of avant-garde docs. A few choice selections:
The Killing of America: A bleak, terrifying, essential piece of American filmmaking. After Taxi Driver indirectly caused Reagan's near-assassination, Paul Schrader's brother Leon became obsessed with how and why violence was so prevalent in America. Leon happened to be fluent in Japanese and ran into manga artist turned producer Mataichiro Yamamoto, who was looking to capitalize on the success of Faces of Death in the Japanese video market. Sheldon Renan was hired to direct, and added cherry-picked future Oscar winners from UCLA's filmmaking program to his production team (who made the American dubs of Shogun Assassin and later, Akira). The final result is more of a stark Werner Herzog type meditation on the increase of violent crime in America instead of straight-up mondo schocksploitation, which its producers were not happy about. But it's accompanied with the most tragic and horrific film of the 20th Century, including the murder of JFK, live footage of the Nguyen Van Lem execution, and late 70s' LAPD gunfights that the doc's production team filmed themselves. It goes from the most high-profile assassinations of the 60s' into the political violence at home and abroad through the late 60's and 70's before hitting the serial killer boom of the 80's (including a horrific interview with an obscure serial killer). It's such a bracing slap of reality that it was never distributed in the US,not even on home video. But in Europe, Asia, South America, and Australia it was a box office hit (it was the #7 highest grossing movie at the Japanese box office in 1982). It's currently being restored for a Blu-Ray release.
Not a valid vimeo URL
Dead Slow Ahead: Mauro Herce's first feature, a horror movie about late capitalism, a version of Alien where the massive clanking emptiness of the spaceship is the monster. Filmed with almost no dialogue from the POV of a commercial freighter as it makes its way from one dystopian seaport to another, barely connected to land by a faulty satellite phone line. Sometimes the crew is shot in close profiles as they maintain the ship or relax in an impromptu karaoke room, but most of the time they are tiny figures outlined against a bleak and inhuman space. I saw it on a Sunday afternoon and that pretty much the perfect time for it, as it works best when the viewer relaxes and lets the endless roar of the sea and industrial freight roll over them completely.
Cameraperson: Kirsten Johnson has worked as a cinematographer on documentaries for most of her life (including Fahrenheit 9/11 and Citizenfour) but in the middle of making her first feature, one of the main characters of the documentary asked to be removed for reasons of personal safety. Forced to reconfigure her footage, Johnson accidentally hit upon how much of herself she had documented on camera. That sent her on an archival search through raw footage from over 120 projects she'd worked on to create a nonchronological memoir of a live lived in dozens of countries; including postwar Sarajevo, full War on Terror era Afghanistan, and a resource-strained maternity clinic in Nigeria, as well as autobiographical snippets from her own life (including her mother's sad descent into Alzheimer's).
Not a valid vimeo URL
Helmut Berger, Actor: This is less a documentary than a Mexican standoff with a resentful German manbaby that descends into a real-life Lars Von Trier or Gaspar Noe movie. Helmut Berger was the one-time lover and muse of Austrian director Tony Visconti. When Visconti died in 1976, Berger tried committing suicide, fearing he'd never work as an actor again. Afterwards Berger became a recluse, famously swearing off interviews about his work with Visconti or his attempted suicide. Though he'd agreed to do a documentary, he still wouldn't talk about any of these subjects to director Andreas Horvath. The only person willing to talk about Berger's past is his maid, who's dutifully maintained Berger's run-down two-room apartment for decades. Horvath won't stop asking and Berger starts having full blown freakouts at him both in his decaying apartment and over voicemail. And then things get even weirder.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: MythosSanta on September 09, 2016, 05:48:11 pm
Not certain if this is the best place to put this but here goes nothing. Recently, a friend alerted me to a documentary on yaoi he has only seen the trailer for called "Fragile Heart of Moe":
From the trailer, it looks pretty excellent, if a little cringy and low budget. So of course, I tried to find it online...
I got just about nothing. Nothing illegal nor legal, and believe me I'd be happy to pay good cash for such a weird piece of work. The only thing I was able to find was a foreign language copy on some sort of Asian youtube look-a-like.
I have considered the fact that their may not be an English language version of this at all. However I find this doubtful as I've seen a few blogposts saying that there are Eng version around and that this documentary was even shown at a convention. Regardless I have somewhat become obsessed. If you know anything about this film or are willing to help me do some leg work I'd be delighted. I'll also be asking around the IRL film circles I know of.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: cyclopeantrash on September 27, 2016, 11:21:20 pm
I don't know if it's actually worth watching. But this VICE documentary struck home with me.
Ghost Mall (https://www.viceland.com/en_us/video/ghost-mall/57bddb2fa39540ed4498faec). It's under VICE's Abandoned series and it's about the Rolling Acres Mall in my town. It really is surreal seeing it like this. The host is kind of obnoxious in the way that hosts in VICE docs are wont to be.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: A Meat on September 27, 2016, 11:23:48 pm
Mission: Blue was interesting, what an amazing woman
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: chai tea latte on September 27, 2016, 11:32:44 pm
I don't know if it's actually worth watching. But this VICE documentary struck home with me.
Ghost Mall (https://www.viceland.com/en_us/video/ghost-mall/57bddb2fa39540ed4498faec). It's under VICE's Abandoned series and it's about the Rolling Acres Mall in my town. It really is surreal seeing it like this. The host is kind of obnoxious in the way that hosts in VICE docs are wont to be. MISANDRY CANNON, September 27, 2016, 11:21:20 pm
Neat! I tend to like the Viceland stuff. This is my favourite VICE documentary, worth watching imo:
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: BARK RANGER on October 30, 2016, 09:52:50 pm
The Town that Was (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhOeyWlrSEw) (2006) is about the last guy that lived in Centralia Pennsylvania, the site of an anthracite coal mine fire has been burning since 1962. Gives lots of history on the local mining industry, details on the buyout and relocation efforts, and perspective on why communities develop anti-government sentiment after enduring situations like this.
Ghost Bird (2009) is about the mid-to-late 2000s sightings of the extinct critically endangered* Ivory-Billed Woodpecker, and some researchers' quest to rediscover it. They didn't. But the circumstances surrounding the search itself and the academic shitstorm over the "evidence" made this a really interesting take on what is usually a dry subject.
Finders Keepers (2015) might still be on Netflix. It's about the grill leg guy (http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/20/movies/finders-keepers-the-story-of-a-gnarled-leg-and-the-lives-it-altered.html).
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: cashmir sweaters on December 17, 2016, 01:36:10 pm
Killers In Eden. For over 100 years a family of orcas and a family of (human) whalers practiced cooperative hunting in Eden, Australia until their relationship fell apart due to humans being human.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Dad Noises on June 11, 2017, 03:51:51 am
Rodney Ascher's documentaries definitely deserve a shout-out here for how good they are at just letting people air their neuroses with minimal interference, Room 237 covering people's crazy interpretations of The Shining was really fun and his documentary about sleep paralalysis does a great job getting in their headspace. His shorter works like The S From Hell are good too.
Not a valid vimeo URL
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Spacebat on June 16, 2017, 06:03:36 pm
I haven't watched this yet, but I think it's in our wheelhouse.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Bunnybread on September 22, 2017, 09:49:19 am
If I could throw another suggestion in here, I'd recommend Marwencol, a documentary about a dude who suffered severe brain damage after being beaten up by five or so guys outside of a bar, and who had to re-learn basically everything, up to how to walk and feed himself. As part of his efforts to start re-training himself, he made this little dollhouse-sized bar, and populated it with G.I. Joes and Barbies, and this eventually grew to an entire WWII-era town full of buildings and people. The detailing and customization he was doing was to build hand-eye coordination, but he also started using the town to tell stories about its inhabitants, and cope with his own personal traumatic experiences. LancashireMcGee, August 26, 2016, 04:04:18 pm
It's been a while since I saw this but I recall it being quite interesting. He also put the GI Joes in jeeps and dragged them behind himself to practice walking, I think.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Emperor Jack Chick on October 03, 2017, 12:31:50 am
someone made a documentary about the technoviking (https://thump.vice.com/en_us/article/ae8v5a/someone-finally-made-a-documentary-about-the-infamous-techno-viking)
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Caroline on October 09, 2017, 02:37:25 pm
Watching the Tickled documentary right now, and those tickling videos are so much weirder in real life than I could possibly have imagined. What the actual fuck.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: I Liked That Joke on May 07, 2019, 01:52:51 pm
Hey it me the necro man
Behind the Curve is a documentary about flat earthers that's on Netflix. I enjoy it, but every now and then they break up the flat-earth action with some stupid little cartoons making fun of flat earthers, it makes me feel like they don't trust me enough to realize that these people are dumb on my own. Also, the main dude has a huge unrequited crush on a female conspiracy theorist and it's really uncomfortable to watch.
It's a fascinating and not too depressing dive into the thought processes of textbook F Plus subjects. I recommend it! I feel that it humanizes them without agreeing with them. I'm only two thirds through it but so far it's really enjoyable!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Ambious on May 08, 2019, 02:39:21 am
Apollo 11 is stunning and exciting! Watch it!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: ikaribattousai on May 10, 2019, 12:16:27 pm
I was impressed by just how good a lot of that file footage from 1969 looked. They did a great job cleaning it up.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Ambious on May 11, 2019, 08:54:41 am
I was impressed by just how good a lot of that file footage from 1969 looked. They did a great job cleaning it up. ikaribattousai, May 10, 2019, 12:16:27 pm
The stills were especially impressive. Also apparently they "cheated" a bit and some of the footage was from different Apollo missions, but it's still impressive as all hell!
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: Salubrious Rex on December 16, 2019, 06:52:14 pm
Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation! is about Australian cinema in the 70's and 80's and is an enjoyable watch for anyone interested in Australian cinema or B-movies in general. It gets commentaries from a diverse range of people including the creators of some of these films. Highly recommend it though I'm not currently sure where you could watch it. I watched it on the Australian streaming service Stan, but it's no longer on there.
No it's just a guy that comes around to your house and let's you watch his videos. I guess Rex's guy is called Stan. Blandest, December 17, 2019, 06:13:08 am
He doesn't have the widest selection but he has the finest Theroux you can get.
Title: Documentaries worth watching
Post by: VerifiedFailure on January 26, 2021, 11:39:09 pm
Has anyone seen Who is Arthur Chu? It's not super mind blowing but it's a good study of an arrogant internet personality who lacks the self awareness to understand how much of a douche they come across as. It's impossible not to root for Chu's long suffering wife.