Friday, April 26 2013
‘Kon-Tiki’s’ Adventures on the High Seas
American viewers who embrace Kon-Tiki may all feel like enthusiastic kids again.
Manning Up in ‘Pain & Gain’
The kidnappers are caught up in a mutual druggy, aspirational haze: when any one of them feels apprehensive, the nearest buddy encourages him to "get a pump", as they lose themselves in frenzy of bicep-curling and self-distraction.
‘Triggering Wounds’: Interrupting Gun Violence in Harlem
Triggering Wounds expands from one teenager's experience -- as a shooter and a survivor -- to consider other experiences as well, those of parents, paramedics, an undertaker and a morgue attendant.
Thursday, April 25 2013
‘30 for 30: Elway to Marino’: Remembering NFL Draft Day 1983
The film shows that the men who are involved in this business, those sold or sold and those who sell or buy, all have more at stake than they might imagine on that one day.
Tribeca Film Festival 2013: ‘The Project’ + ‘Big Men’
Mercenaries stumble in creating an anti-pirate militia in Puntland, while American wildcatters confront pitfalls aplenty in Ghana and Nigeria, in two documentaries examining crises in Africa.
Wednesday, April 24 2013
Tribeca Film Festival: ‘Let the Fire Burn’ + ‘The Kill Team’
Two documentary autopsies of violent tragedies, the first in Philadelphia and the second in Kandahar, show the results of systematic dehumanization.
Tuesday, April 23 2013
‘Which Way is the Frontline From Here? The Life and Time of Tim Hetherington’
Best known as a war zone correspondent, photographer Tim Hetherington was dedicated, thoughtful, and very good at what he did.
Monday, April 22 2013
Pills and Pain at the Tribeca Film Festival 2013: ‘Oxyana’ & ‘Bottled Up’
A gritty documentary and fluffy comedy bring a similarly hardheaded sensibility to the invisible epidemic of pain pill addiction.
Saturday, April 20 2013
‘Portrait of Jason’: Performance, Expression, and Art
The enduring unknown of Portrait of Jason is whether and how it's a portrait of a person or a hustler, an artist or a self, and whether it gives the lie to "intention" as a legible, assessable story.
Friday, April 19 2013
Tom Cruise Has an Awesome Ship and Awesome Weapons In ‘Oblivion’
Ray-Ban wearing Jack is the ultimate Tom Cruise hero. You can't quite tell whether this is a joke or a fantasy or yet another sig of the movie's utter lack of imagination.
Thursday, April 18 2013
‘Upstream Color’: A Metaphorical Exploration of What It Means to Have a Self
Upstream Color emulates the experience of trauma, as the personal turns abject and absolute, shaping all the rest of the victim's world and time going forward.
Wednesday, April 17 2013
‘Bitter Seeds’: The Scourge of Globalization
Bitter Seeds points out that these multilayered crises evolved because of an illicit deal struck by the US and Monsanto with the World Trade organization “that forced India to open its doors to foreign seed companies.”
‘To the Wonder’: New World Redux
Because Terrence Malick's To the Wonder eschews chronology and, for the most part, dialogue, you can't know when such sublime or difficult moments occur, or how they have effects, exactly.
Monday, April 15 2013
My Father and Jackie Robinson: ‘42’
The story of my father and Jackie Robinson suffused my childhood, and my admiration for both of these artists, both men representing history in their own ways, seems always to be part of my emotional and moral fabric.
Friday, April 12 2013
‘This Ain’t California’: Skateboarding, Filmmaking, and Finding Freedom
In Alexanderplatz, the skate punks find the perfect place to stretch out and fly, to resist and have fun, they find "corners, edges, and smooth surfaces everywhere: it was fantastic."
‘42’: The Mythology of Jackie Robinson, Done Right
42, like Lincoln, reminds us that one person, at a pivotal moment, can overcome popular prejudices and help change rules and expectations.
‘Disconnect’: Shortcuts and Surfaces
For viewers who've seen Murderball, the remarkable documentary by Dana Adam Shapiro and Disconnect's director Henry Alex Rubin (his first fiction feature), this glimpse of Mark Zupan may be just a bit thrilling.
Wednesday, April 10 2013
‘Play’ Immerses You in the Feeling of Vulnerability
No one imagines or even tries to see another perspective, here. Play -- as performances, as games, as the assumption of roles -- takes precedence over understanding.
Tuesday, April 9 2013
‘The Power of Few’ Is Experimental in More Ways Than One
The Power of Few, as its title suggests, affirms a faith in transformation initiated from outside the usual framework.
Monday, April 8 2013
‘Free Angela and All Political Prisoners’: History and Media
The film does looks back on events, but also considers how history, the public, collective, handed-down kind, is reified and entrenched.
