Reviews - Page 55

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

The Sparks Brothers Review: Siblings’ Sweet Songs

Edgar Wright deserves kudos for making his first documentary feature about Sparks, a band that is simultaneously quirky and anonymous, capable of performing in genres ranging from bubblegum to glam and from disco to art rock. Wright’s pop gods are perfect subjects for his method, which is to send up everything from gangster films (Baby Driver) to zombie horror flicks (Shaun of the Dead). With The Sparks Brothers, he’s given us a couple of unique filmic characters, Ron and Russell Mael, genuine siblings who have been making music professionally for over 50 years. The two would be ideal for a

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Entangled Review: The Fight to Save Right Whales

Entangled: The Race to Save Right Whales from Extinction (USA, 75 min.) Dir. David Abel   The fight to protect the whales is at the heart of several environmental movements. From the Save the Whales campaign with Greenpeace and much earlier anti-whaling legislation in the USA, these large marine mammals have become symbols for humankind’s devastating impact on the natural world. Entangled looks at a new chapter in the plight of the world’s whale population: that of entanglement, which happens when whales become caught in the fishing lines strewn about the ocean. The consequences of entanglement, at best, lead to

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Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation Review: A Way with Words

Truman & Tennessee features one of the most engaging conversations that never happened. This warm documentary offers a two-hander of sorts by bringing together the voices of literary icons Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams. Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland (Love, Cecil Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict) couples the work of the two great writers through their own words and stories. The two wordsmiths have much in common beyond their knack for compelling prose and rich characters. The film draws the audience into the inner worlds of Capote and Williams to explore how their experiences as gay men in a time when society

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Gunda Review: Some Pig

In my corner of the filmmaking world, mostly filled with arty narratives, documentaries, and animation, Viktor Kossakovsky (Aquarela) is a big deal. He’s been winning awards since the early ‘90s for edgy docs, which use genre bending techniques to force audiences to become truly engaged with his subjects. In one film, he shot footage out of his window in St. Petersburg for over a year, turning viewers into the equivalent of neighbours, who become used to the sidewalk, the street, the buildings, odd people on the block and unnerving situations with road repair that seem to go on endlessly. In

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Sisterhood Review: Questioning the Need to Be a Nun

Can a movement survive the death of its leaders? Director Maxime Faure addresses this question in his first feature Sisterhood. At its peak, Quebec’s chapter of the Society of Helpers of the Holy Spirit, an order of nuns engaged in social and political activism, had 35 members. At the time of filming, only eight remained. Though the nuns have never shied away from a struggle, they have chosen not to keep their community afloat beyond their lifetime, as they question their relevance in an increasingly secular society. Faure captures these remarkable women, now all in their eighties, as they prepare

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Alone Together Review: A Mother to All

Alone Together follows the life of Ravit Raichman, a part-time professional baby-cradler. A “first hug” volunteer, she donates the much-needed physical touch needed to keep abandoned newborn babies alive at a Tel Aviv hospital. The doc is a revealing look at how selfless acts of care can be life-saving for both parties involved. The subject of the documentary is pushing 50 and longing for a sense of connectedness and kinship. Single, retired, and with a condition that robbed her of motherhood, Raichman oozes a maternal love with no place to go. She pours it into volunteering, both at the hospital

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Marry Me However Review: What is Marriage Without Love?

“Either I marry now, or let the world be destroyed,” explains Yarden Naor, a gay Orthodox Jewish man recounting his feelings upon the day he married a woman. Mordechai Vardi’s documentary Marry Me However tells the stories of several gay and lesbian people raised in observant Jewish communities throughout Israel. Due to their religious obligations, those who appeared in the film had decided to enter into a heterosexual marriage to fulfill the Jewish commandment of having a family. However, as years passed, they all came to terms with their identities and realized they must live authentically, even if that meant

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Kate Nash: Underestimate the Girl Review – The Power of an Authentic Voice

From MySpace to Kickstarter, Kate Nash has harnessed the power of the people to revitalise the music scene. Kate Nash: Underestimate the Girl charts the rocky journey of the English singer who refuses to conform to convenient labels. Even the catchall “female artist” tag doesn’t rock her world, as she boldly noted when accepting the prize for Best Female Artists at the Brit Awards. “Female is not a genre,” she challenged the industry. This doc by Amy Goldstein shares the price that Nash paid for defying the mould, but also the rewards she found by staying true to her artistic

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The Kings Review: Rumble in the Archival Jungle

“Boxing, for me, was a way of making a political statement,” says Sugar Ray Leonard in The Kings. Leonard is one of four boxing champions at the heart of The Kings, an engrossing documentary mini-series that explores the sport’s final golden age. Leonard explains how boxing was a chance to prove his worth to the world at a moment when Black lives were dismissed and devalued in America’s economic system. By fighting in the ring, Leonard says he could change the narrative that saw Black Americans primarily through the lenses of crime stories on the evening news. Unfolding during the

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Sumodo – Successors of Samurai Review: Demystifing Japan’s National Sport

If you have never felt your chest vibrate with the booming cheers that erupt in a Japanese arena during a sumo match, this doc could be the next closest thing. Sumodo – Successors of Samurai, which has its Canadian premiere at the Toronto Japanese Film Festival, immerses you in the energy of the fight and demystifies Japan’s national sport. Director Eiji Sakata follows the lives and work of a handful of rikishi (sumo wrestlers), oyakata (their coaches), and the rikishi’s wives in a film that reveals the blood, sweat, and tears that go into this athletic art form. While many

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