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DOC NYC 11th edition (November 11-19, 2020)
DOC NYC 2020
FILMLEAF FESTIVAL COVERAGE THREAD LINK
Film lineup
DOC NYC is the largest documentary film festtival in the US and an important New York festival event. This year is its 11th edition, from Nov. 11-19, 2020, includes films about notable personalities such as John Belushi, Pope Francis, Bill T. Jones, Jamal Khashoggi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Frank Zappa, and others you haven't heard of who may turn out to be more interesting. There are 107 feature documentaries and 200 films and many events. Included will be 23 world premieres, 12 international, or North American premieres and 7 US ones. There will be 57 features, 53% of the total, directed by women. and 36 by BIPOC directors or 34%.
World Premieres at the festival include Nelson G. Navarrete and Maxx Caicedo’s “A La Calle,” Petra Epperlein and Michael Tucker’s “The Meaning of Hitler,” Gong Cheng and Yung Chang’s “Wuhan Wuhan,” Sian-Pierre Regis’s “Duty Free,” Noah Hutton’s “In Silico,” Nancy Buirski’s “A Crime on the Bayou,” Jeff Daniels’s “Television Event,” Ilinca Calugareanu’s “A Cops and Robbers Story,” Rosalynde LeBlanc and Tom Hurwitz’s “Can You Bring It: Bill T. Jones and D-Man in the Waters,” and Cheryl Dunn’s “Moments Like This Never Last,” among others.
Below is the lineup. I'll be reviewing a handful of the films, which are being made available virtually to the public, as was the case with the NYFF a while back. Since docs seem to be doing better than features in the pandemic year, this may be a good time to start.
VIEWFINDERS COMPETITION
40 YEARS A PRISONER, Tommy Oliver
A LA CALLE, Nelson G. Navarrete, Maxx Caicedo
ENEMIES OF THE STATE, Sonia Kennebeck
JACINTA, Jessica Earnshaw
LANDFALL, Cecilia Aldarondo
THE MEANING OF HITLER, Petra Epperlein, Michael Tucker
SO LATE SO SOON, Daniel Hymanson
STATELESS, Michèle Stephenson
THINGS WE DARE NOT DO, Bruno Santamaría
THROUGH THE NIGHT, Loira Limbal
THE VIEWING BOOTH, Ra’anan Alexandrowicz
METROPOLIS COMPETITION
BLUE CODE OF SILENCE, Magnus Skatvold, Greg Mallozzi
CALENDAR GIRL, Christian D. Bruun
CAN YOU BRING IT: BILL T. JONES AND D-MAN IN THE WATERS, Rosalynde LeBlanc, Tom Hurwitz
A COPS AND ROBBERS STORY, Ilinca Calugareanu
DOPE IS DEATH, Mia Donovan
FIVE YEARS NORTH, Zach Ingrasci, Chris Temple
HARLEM RISING: A COMMUNITY CHANGING THE ODDS, Rayner Ramirez
LA MADRINA: THE SAVAGE LIFE OF LORINE PADILLA, Raquel Cepeda
MOMENTS LIKE THIS NEVER LAST, Cheryl Dunn
WOJNAROWICZ, Chris McKim
WINNER’S CIRCLE
ACASA, MY HOME, Radu Ciorniciuc
BEAUTIFUL SOMETHING LEFT BEHIND, Katrine Philp
INFLUENCE, Richard Poplak, Diana Neille
MAYOR, David Osit
THE REASON I JUMP, Jerry Rothwell
SONGS OF REPRESSION, Estephan Wagner, Marianne Hougen-Moraga
STRAY, Elizabeth Lo
THE WALRUS AND THE WHISTLEBLOWER, Nathalie Bibeau
MASTERS
9TO5: THE STORY OF A MOVEMENT, Julia Reichert, Steven Bognar
CRAZY, NOT INSANE, Alex Gibney
LOVE & STUFF, Judith Helfand
MLK/FBI, Sam Pollard
MY PSYCHEDELIC LOVE STORY, Errol Morris
ORIGIN OF THE SPECIES, Abigail Child
PARIS CALLIGRAMMES, Ulrike Ottinger
AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES
CHASING CHILDHOOD, Eden Wurmfeld, Margaret Munzer Loeb
DEAR SANTA, Dana Nachman
THE DILEMMA OF DESIRE, Maria Finitzo
FOR THE LOVE OF RUTLAND, Jennifer Maytorena Taylor
HAMTRAMCK, USA, Justin Feltman, Razi Jafri
THE OIL WAR, David Schisgall
THE PLACE THAT MAKES US, Karla Murthy
RESTAURANT HUSTLE 2020: ALL ON THE LINE, Frank Matson
WOMEN IN BLUE, Deirdre Fishel
INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
76 DAYS, Hao Wu, Weixi Chen, Anonymous
THE LETTER, Maia Lekow, Christopher King
ONCE UPON A TIME IN VENEZUELA, Anabel Rodríguez Ríos
SMOG TOWN, Meng Han
SUMMERWAR, Moritz Schulz
WUHAN WUHAN, Gong Cheng, Yung Chang
INVESTIGATIONS
ASSASSINS, Ryan White
BABY GOD, Hannah Olson
A CRIME ON THE BAYOU, Nancy Buirski
THE DISSIDENT, Bryan Fogel
FINDING YINGYING, Jiayan “Jenny” Shi
THE JUMP, Giedrė Žickytė
KINGS OF CAPITOL HILL, Mor Loushy
MIRACLE FISHING, Miles Hargrove
MISSING IN BROOKS COUNTY, Lisa Molomot, Jeff Bemiss
THE MYSTERY OF D.B. COOPER, John Dower
NEITHER CONFIRM NOR DENY, Philip Carter
‘TIL KINGDOM COME, Maya Zinshtein
FIGHT THE POWER
THE BIG SCARY “S” WORD, Yael Bridge
DOWN A DARK STAIRWELL, Ursula Liang
NASRIN, Jeff Kaufman
SHUT UP SONA, Deepti Gupta
SINCE I BEEN DOWN, Gilda Sheppard
UNAPOLOGETIC, Ashley O’Shay
YOUTH V GOV, Christi Cooper
PORTRAITS
9/11 KIDS, Elizabeth St. Philip
DUTY FREE, Sian-Pierre Regis
FRANCESCO, Evgeny Afineevsky
IN SILICO, Noah Hutton
LESSONS OF LOVE, Malgorzata Goliszewska, Kasia Mateja
MEDICINE MAN: THE STAN BROCK STORY, Paul Michael Angell
NO ORDINARY MAN, Aisling Chin-Yee, Chase Joynt
RED HEAVEN, Lauren DeFilippo, Katherine Gorringe
TRUTH TO POWER: BARBARA LEE SPEAKS FOR ME, Abby Ginzberg
TWO GODS, Zeshawn Ali
]WEED & WINE, Rebecca Richman Cohen
JOCK DOCS
BIG VS SMALL, Minna Dufton
THE LAST OUT, Sami Khan, Michael Gassert
LIFT LIKE A GIRL, Mayye Zayed
OFF THE ROAD, José Permar
BEHIND THE SCENES
BELUSHI, R.J. Cutler
EL FATHER PLAYS HIMSELF, Mo Scarpelli
TELEVISION EVENT, Jeff Daniels
ARTS & CULTURE
BARE, Aleksandr M. Vinogradov
CRUTCH, Sachi Cunningham, Vayabobo
AN IMPOSSIBLE PROJECT, Jens Meurer
IN & OF ITSELF, Frank Oz
KENNY SCHARF: WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE, Malia Scharf, Max Basch
LOST IN FACE, Valentin Riedl
MADE YOU LOOK: A TRUE STORY ABOUT FAKE ART, Barry Avrich
ON POINTE, Larissa Bills
SELF PORTRAIT, Katja Høgset, Margreth Olin, Espen Wallin
THE VASULKA EFFECT, Hrafnhildur Gunnarsdóttir
SONIC CINEMA
AMERICAN RAPSTAR, Justin Staple
CROCK OF GOLD: A FEW ROUNDS WITH SHANE MCGOWAN, Julien Temple
ELDER’S CORNER, Siji Awoyinka
IN MY OWN TIME: A PORTRAIT OF KAREN DALTON, Robert Yapkowitz, Richard Peete
LOS HERMANOS/THE BROTHERS, Marcia Jarmel, Ken Schneider
RONNIE’S, Oliver Murray
TINY TIM: KING FOR A DAY, Johan von Sydow
UNIVERSE, Sam Osborn, Nick Capezzera
ZAPPA, Alex Winter
For tickets and the full DOC NYC shorts lineup, visit docnyc.net. or click on the logo below.
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 11-03-2020 at 03:07 PM.
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Reviewed so far:
EL FATHER PLAYS HIMSELF (Mo Scarpelli 2020)
In the Venezuelan Amazon a woman filmmaker shoots cast and crew as a handsome young director makes a film about his alcoholic father, also good looking, starring that father as himself years earlier when he was engaged in illegal gold mining.
76 DAYS (Hao Wu, Weixi Chen, Anonymous 2020)
A documentary about life and death in a Wuhan hospital in the two and a half months of the total lockdown early in 2020 when the outbreak of COVID-19 is being locally contained. This film is terrifying, grim, and intense, but full of humanity as the hospital staff treat patients like beloved family members. However "raw" this is one of the year's notable documentary films.
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Two more DOC NYC reviews:
ACASĂ, MY HOME ( Radu Ciorniciuc 2020)
About a Romanian Roma family with nine kds, mostly boys, living off the grid and forced to move to the city. While off the grid, life seems idyllic, and the journalist filmmaker Ciorniciuc follows them with fluidity and grace that's memorable. For a while, it's magic.
9/11 KIDS ( Elizabeth St. Philip 2020)
The filmmaker, who is Canadian, revisits half a dozen of the Booker Elementary School student reading class President Bush was sitting in on when he got news that the US had undergone a major terrorist attack: the Twin Towers. Not a great documentary - it doesn't go deep enough - but certainly a vivid little cross section of what it's been like to grow up black in America in the new millennium.
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MAYOR (David Osit 2020)
Osit is an American who followed around Musa Hamid the Christian mayor of Ramallah, the de facto capital of Palestine, for a couple of years and this is the subtle and impressive result. It reps a careful examination of the pains of living under the oppressive occupation of Israel while trying to maintain your dignity. A dozen international festivals and several big documentary awards.
Coming online Dec. 2.
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CROCK OF GOLD: A FEW ROUNDS WITH SHANE MACGOWAN (Julien Temple 2020)
This winner of the jury prize at San Sebastien, where it premiered, is a work of art, with all its artisanal-seeming framing of historic and family footage, and a portrait of the raucous, gifted, self-destructive yet life-affirming lead singer and songwriter Shane MacGowan of the Celtic punk band The Pogues, whose unique and haunting sound you'll get to know here, if you don't know it already. Much about Irish history too. Great music doc.
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Last edited by Chris Knipp; 11-23-2020 at 04:44 PM.
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