Reviews - Page 107

Giving you our points of view on the latest docs in release and on the circuit.

Review: ‘Next of Kin’

Next of Kin (Canada, 44 min.) Dir. Nadine Pequeneza Witness some astonishing sleuthing in Next of Kin. This CBC Docs POV work from director Nadine Pequeneza (The Invisible Heart) goes to the front lines of family services as two social workers play Sherlock Holmes. Next of Kin follows Jackie Winger and Amanda Elam, two employees of the non-profit organization RAFT (Resource Association For Teens) in St. Catharines, Ontario as they use creative thinking and expert problem solving with hopes of reuniting families. They aren’t cracking crimes or chasing down bad guys: they’re digging through archives and following clues to save lives. Pequeneza packs a lot of information into 44

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Review: ‘Dolphin Man’

Dolphin Man (Canada/Greece, 77 min.) Dir. Lefteris Charitos “I am like an animal,” says Jacques Mayol. “I live intensely in the moment.” Late free diver Jacques Mayol was hardly the first person to compare himself to an animal, and he will not be the last. Mayol’s story is one of the sea, a journey through the depths of human endeavour as director Lefteris Charitos portrays the diver’s intense love for the ocean. Many characters in Dolphin Man refer to Mayol as “the French Dolphin” and few people share such close affinity with non-human animals. Mayol’s only equals might be Jane Goodall with

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Review: ‘The Raft’

The Raft (Denmark/Sweden/USA, 97 min.) Dir. Marcus Lindeen Would the world be a better place if we just put all the men on a raft and sent them off to sea? Maybe, although The Raft makes a fair case that sending certain men seaward might afford them some necessary perspective. This unique documentary by Marcus Lindeen, which won the top prize at CPH:DOX earlier this year, offers a fascinating study in the dynamics of power and control, particularly as they pertain to gender. The film reflects upon a controversial 1973 experiment by Spanish-Mexican anthropologist Santiago Genovés in which five men and six women

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Review: ‘Science Fair’

Science Fair (USA, 90 min.) Dir. Christina Costantini, Darren Foster Science Fair is cute, fun, and inspiring, but let’s not kid ourselves: we’ve seen this documentary a million times before. It’s Spellbound with the periodic table instead of the alphabet. It’s Step without the dancing. It’s Bee Nation without the awkwardness of cheering on Indigenous kids as they master the colonial tongue. Directors Christina Costantini and Darren Foster have clearly studied and understood the successful formula set by their predecessors. They’ve devised a crowd-pleasing doc that comes to theatres after winning a boatload of audience awards from festivals like Sundance and SXSW. It’s exactly the kind of safe

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Review: ‘Becoming Animal’

Becoming Animal (Switzerland, 79 min.) Dir. Peter Mettler, Emma Davie The catastrophic impacts of human exploitation of the planet are becoming more and more apparent. The compounding effects, too depressing to enumerate, press on multiple fronts. Scientists offer evidence, environmentalists give names – habitat loss, species extinction – and photographers and filmmakers provide images of the damage. Yet, the problem worsens; our capitulating and capitalising governments fail to regulate industries that are causing environmental abuse. Becoming Animal, the new essay film by documentarians Emma Davie and Peter Mettler, focuses on this dire situation at a more fundamental level. They prove the

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Review: ‘Regarding Gravity’

Regarding Gravity (Qu’importe la gravité) (Canada, 79 min.) Dir. Matthieu Brouillard There are moments that make people feel like they can fly. These episodes are sometimes called sparks of inspiration. In other cases, they might be known as manic episodes. Either way, people aren’t alone if they sometimes wish they could be like Superman and fly high above the sky. In Regarding Gravity, director Matthieu Brouillard meets two subjects whose shared dream to touch the sky is more than a passing fancy. 63-year-old Christian has visual impairment due to a rare genetic condition while his 71-year-old friend Bruce is deaf and bipolar.

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Review: ‘Restoring Tomorrow’

Restoring Tomorrow (USA, 82 min.) Dir. Aaron Wolf Director Aaron Wolf takes his camera along a spiritual and cinematic pilgrimage in Restoring Tomorrow. The director explores the USA’s crisis of faith by chronicling the restoration of his childhood place of worship, Los Angeles’s Wilshire Boulevard Temple. Upset by the degradation of his childhood synagogue, the indefatigably earnest Wolf follows his grandmother’s advice and shows that if there’s a will, there’s a way. Wolf’s earnestness sometimes gets the better of the film, and some viewers might be put off by the element of conservatism that underlies the doc, but the film’s heart

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Review: ‘The Song and the Sorrow’

The Song and the Sorrow (Canada, 43 min.) Dir. Millefiore Clarkes Anne Murray’s “Snowbird” is a buoyant and breezy ray of sunshine that helped put Canadian music on the map. Listen closely to the words, though, and this song is actually one of great sadness. As penned by the late singer-songwriter Gene MacLellan, “Songbird” conveys great sorrow as it expresses a hunger to escape and fly freely. It takes MacLellan’s daughter Catherine to recognize the heartache in the song that many people find so sweet. Catherine continues her father’s legacy as a musician, but she also inherited his struggles with

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Review: ‘Belle- Île-en-Mer’

Belle- Île-en-Mer (Canada, 26 min.) Dir. Phil Comeau The Acadians in the Maritimes have a rich culture and legacy, but one wouldn’t know it from the way we discuss Canadian history. Director Phil Comeau (Ron Turcotte, jockey légendaire, Le secret de Jérôme) offers a touching and personal portrait of the oft-overlooked Acadian culture that charts back long before Canada’s confederation and endures today. Screening at Toronto’s Cinéfranco, the doc will be of special interest to Hot Docs audiences who savoured the slice of Acadiana in Samara Chadwick’s 1999. While 1999 focuses on a contemporary tragedy, Comeau’s film offers a heartfelt excavation of the rich

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Review: ‘Matangi/Maya/M.I.A.’

Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. (USA/UK, 96 min.) Dir. Steve Loveridge Who knew M.I.A. originally wanted to be a documentary filmmaker? Thank goodness the British-Sri Lankan rapper (née Mathangi Arulpragasam) had a fascination with video cameras, since she fortuitously chronicled her rise to fame. The tapes of M.I.A.’s childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood are meticulously chronicled on a range of home movies in the documentary Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. It’s a fun and revealing portrait told with M.I.A.’s countercultural voice and peppy energy. M.I.A. apparently isn’t happy with this documentary, but audiences should be. Early reports from Sundance indicate that the rapper gave director Steve Loveridge oodles of tapes

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