True / False is a documentary film festival held in Columbia, MO, usually in late February or early March. I've gone the last three years. Or has it been four? Seen many good films and a few bad ones. I'm more likely to feel engaged but unsympathetic towards a good film than to find myself truly disinterested in a bad film.
My favorite films this year. (Spoilers)
Page One : A Year Inside the N.Y. Times : This documentary follows David Carr, who was hired by the Times to report on media, especially the influence the Internet has on broadcast and print journalism. Without Carr’s personality I don’t think the film would be very interesting. But I think he makes it work. Maybe that’s because I’m drawn to iconoclastic, confrontational personalities (who, by their actions tend to illuminate rather than obscure issues). Carr has a checkered past (drug use, time spent in jail) which gives him a sense of the fragility of success and a been-through-hell, not-easily-impressed attitude. He doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Some of the best moments of the film are the confrontations Carr has with “new media” hipsters (the bloggers, the content aggregators) who are quick to criticize old institutions like the N.Y. Times as out of touch, too slow, etc. These people copy the reporting of others, add some celebrity news, and call themselves journalists. A few disturbing images related to WikiLeaks war footage.
(Had a good audience for this film. The Columbia School of Journalism was right down the road from the theater. So there was a lot of interest in the film.)
Armadillo : A documentary about Danish soldiers serving in Afghanistan. A very good film that shows war from the vantage point of the GI. You see tearful goodbyes, boredom, attempts to befriend the locals, moments of intense action. There was a big controversy in the Danish press (when? not exactly sure) about the behavior of a few soldiers while serving in Afghanistan. Caused a lot of consternation in Denmark- Should our soldiers be there? Are they acting professionally? Should those involved in the incident be court marshaled? I get a sense this film is the first time the story is told from the soldiers’ point of view. Danish with subtitles. Some disturbing war footage.
Bobby Fischer Against the World : I’m not sure if this is of any interest to a general audience. It’s a biography of Fischer in three parts: 1) His childhood and early success with chess. 2) His world championship match against Boris Spassky (Rocky IV borrows its theme- the loner American battling the entire Soviet machine). And 3) His decent into paranoid, schizophrenic madness. An interesting portrait of genius- if such a word can be applied to someone who devotes his life to a game.
Project Nim
Me to sister J: I wish you could have seen this film I saw. It was about a professor who arranged for a family to raise a chimpanzee as their own child (it was the ‘70s) and teach it sign language. I have such violent reactions to movies- in terms of the strong opinions they provoke from me. In the past you’ve encouraged me to tap the brakes when I get overly anti-social with my cold, condemning opinions of other peoples’ behavior. Other times we are completely on the same page when calling “bullshit” on others. I’d be interested to know where you stand on this film.
Sister J: In general I don't like anything that tries to make animals like humans i.e. dressing them in clothes, so I'm not sure how I would feel about raising a chimp as one. I'm sure it's fascinating on some level to see if you can teach an animal to communicate with you through sign language, but something about it doesn't sit well with me. Why isn't the chimp with its mother? Not saying I'm not for learning more about an animal's capabilities, but I don't know. So did the chimp learn sign language? Did they make it wear t-shirts? Bleh. ;)
I was literally just reading through that book Stuff White People Like and the 3rd one on the list is film festivals hahahahahaha.
Me: I think we might be on the same page on this film. Near the end of the film the chimp is transferred to a medical research facility and the director of the film makes the research scientist out to be a villain. That didn’t sit well with me because the medical researcher was a very thoughtful person. And- this is what really bugged me- the researchers who took the chimp at a young age have the luxury of not having to figure out how the chimp’s life ends. At one point the language professor says “No one keeps a chimp past four years old- they don’t know their own strength.” No shit- and what happens then? In the end the medical scientist helps relocate the chimp to a ranch where it lives out the rest of its life in peace. So he’s “redeemed”- but that’s so cheap. He was doing meaningful research- yes, unpleasant- but not hippie fun and games like the language researchers.
The audience at the fest is a bohemian crowd-which I like most of the time. But their jeering at the “villain” in the film annoyed me. Think things through people, or don’t get involved in the first place. Like you said, “Why isn’t the chimp with its mother?”