The best part of the latest monograph put out by the Toronto International Film Festival Group is the last—Pierre Perrault in his own words—where the passionate, sometimes in-your-face documentarian ends up sounding dangerously close to a stuck pig. Thank goodness then for David Clanfield’s painstakingly careful and thorough 152-page examination of Perrault’s prodigious oeuvre. In
“To search for the good and make it matter: that is the real challenge for the artist. Not simply to transform ideas of revelations into matter, but to make those revelations actually matter.” – Estella Conwill Mojozo You might not expect The Take, the brave new documentary by journalists and political activists Avi Lewis and
JUDGE JUDY MEETS FREDERICK WISEMAN in French filmmaker Raymond Depardon’s compelling feature doc, 10e Chambre, Instants D’Audiences (The 10th District Court, Moments of Trials), a hit on the 2004 film festival circuit. Depardon, a world-renowned photographer and eminent director, spent seven tenacious years gaining “carte blanche” access to film inside the Paris courtroom of Madame
Theatrical cruelty, fairytale morality, dime-store surrealism; Freudian sexuality, alchemical symbology, Black Magick; four-colour Grindhouse violence and more aphorisms per minute than any given episode of Kung Fu, back when people still thought David Carradine looked Chinese. In the limited yet delirious filmography of Midnight Madness auteur Alejandro Jodorowsky (his 1971 international debut, existentialist Acid Western
ZERO THE INSIDE STORY, the latest film from Elida Schogt, deals with personal pain, the meaning of life, self-image and, not incidentally, the history of the number zero. Schogt, sitting comfortably on a patio the day after the Toronto International Film Festival has concluded, with two sold out showings of her film, is clearly pleased
If you grew up in Canada in the Sixties, Patrick Watson was as distinctive a figure as Gordon Lightfoot, Jean Beliveau and Pierre Trudeau. His acute features and dry, slightly nasal voice illuminated the most important CBC show of that era, This Hour Has Seven Days. Even today, his “bear pit” interviews with Orson Welles,
Here’s a scenario to consider: What if, instead of spending hours commuting to a job environment you didn’t like, you were just seconds away and your partner in work also happened to be your partner in life? And what if the things you most cared about were the very subjects of your films? To top
“The single most important thing for all of us is to get a better understanding of the real world. And what better way to define what a documentary is about? As you understand the real world about you, the possibilities for loving one another are all the greater.” – Albert Maysles Errol Morris is known