Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson

For all of its illumination of one of the most enigmatic figures in American literature, "Gonzo" mistakenly paints Hunter S. Thompson as a writer whose star burned out decades before his long foreshadowed suicide in 2005. Director Alex Gibney taps Thompson’s longtime friend Johnny Depp for narration duties, but fails to interview the actor for his insights into the film’s subject. The documentary is frontloaded to a fault, covering Thompson’s early career that produced such milestones as Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga" "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72" and "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas." Although billed as a definitive film biography of the fearless interloper who invented "Gonzo" journalism, the movie falls short on covering large swaths of Thomposn’s later career. Absent is the ‘80s period when he wrote as the San Francisco Examiner’s media critic while doing research for an unpublished novel called Polo is My Life. As an introduction to the life and ideas of one of America’s last truly original literary voices, the movie does an adequate job, but there is nothing "definitive" about it.

Rated R, 95 mins. (B-)

Trumbo

Blacklisted screenwriter and freedom-fighter Dalton Trumbo is revealed in this touching documentary that utilizes talking-head interviews along with Trumbo's letters to people and institutions to flesh out the man responsible for such film classics as "Johnny Got His Gun," "Spartacus," "Roman Holiday," and "Papillon." Joan Allen, Michael Douglas, David Strathairn, and Donald Sutherland are some of the actors that vicariously channel Trumbo by reading his letters as monologues mixed with dramatic and comic inflection. Trumbo was named as one of the House on un-American Activities Committee's list of 10 blacklisted screenwriters indicted by Congress for contempt for refusing to confirm or deny membership in the Communist Party. The hugely successful Hollywood writer served a year in prison before taking his family into exile in Mexico along with some of his Hollywood Ten peers. Upon returning to the states penniless a year later, Trumbo began writing a plethora of blackmarket screenplays under a variety of different names. He was never able to collect the Oscar he won for "Roman Holiday." "Trumbo" is a passionate depiction of a fiercely ethical, grouchy, prodigious, articulate and loving individual.
Rated PG-13, 96 mins. (B+)

Gunnin' for That #1 Spot

Harlem's legendary Rucker Park at 155^th Street and Frederick Douglas Boulevard, is a place where basketball greats like Dr. J and Wilt Chamberlain first proved their skills. The public institution is at the center of this vibrant documentary about 8 of the highest ranked high school basketball players of 2006. Beastie Boy member Adam Yauch uses clever baseball-card-style graphics to brand high school B-ball phenoms Jerryd Bayles, Michael Beasley, Tyreke Evans, Donte Greene, Brandon Jennings, Kevin Love, Kyle Singler, and Lance Stephenson as basketball's next NBA hotshots. Although much of its archive footage from high school games shows up blurry, pixleated or in an otherwise raw form, it nonetheless clarifies the abilities of thoroughly committed young players executing their most impressive basketball skills. The picture inevitably hits its stride during the Rucker Park Tournament were nicknames like "Wireless" or "Kevlar" can only be awarded to the players by the loquacious courtside announcer calling the game. It’s the intelligent and gifted players that make the biggest impact derived from their respect for the opportunity before them.

Rated PG-13, 80 mins. (B-)

Man on Wire

Filmmaker James Marsh ("Wisconsin Death Trip" and "The King") has made a brilliant love letter to the late World Trade Center that transcends the cruel fate of the twin towers via the daredevil artistry of Philipe Petit, who wire-walked between the buildings on August 7, 1974. Part biography and part suspense thriller, "Man on Wire" seamlessly unites archive footage with reenactments and interviews to give the viewer a multi-dimensional grasp of the enormous ensemble effort that allowed Philippe to perform for 45 amazing minutes, 1,350 feet over Manhattan’s dazzling skyline. The film traces the moment when a 15-year-old Philippe first read about the towers before they were built. From that moment, the skilled wirewalker street performer became obsessed with realizing his dream. With the help of close friends and some very knowledgeable associates, the crew set about penetrating the WTC’s security with the methodical precision of professional bank robbers to prepare the steel cable and rigging equipment needed for the task. No amount of description can transmit the passion and joy in this wonderful picture, assisted by a lyrical musical score by composer Michael Myman. See this movie.

Not Rated, 102 mins. (A+)

Encounters at the End of the World

Werner Herzog has embedded his logic and passionate speech patterns so deeply into his individual brand of cinema that his narrative and documentary films speak to us with a loving authority that is unavoidable. Such is the nature of his latest daredevil piece of filmmaking in which he travels to Antarctica's McMurdo scientific research station to investigate the unifying bond that connects the workers and scientists who work there under six months of never-ending daylight. Indeed, it's an eccentric lot. There's a plumber descended from Aztec royalty--you can tell by his hands, and scientists who love to sit around watching sci-fi horror movies from the '50s. "Encounters at the End of the World," is just that--an adventure documentary where our perception of nature's fierce beauty and the people who co-exist there are filtered through Herzog's mad-genius mind and inexhaustible lust for life and danger. It's cinema with gusto--damn you bet.

Rated G, 99 mins. (A)

My Winnipeg

Guy Maddin ("The Saddest Music in the World") is the most accessible and successful avant-garde filmmaker working today. In "My Winnipeg," the Canadian auteur takes the viewer on a historic tour of his childhood growing up in the small economically depressed town. Maddin’s unflattering depiction of his mother (represented by ‘40s noir icon Ann Savage) as a cruel and neglectful woman comes across, as does his father’s dislocation after losing his job at the ice hockey stadium famous for popularizing the sport. Shot in his signature black-and-white, the highly personal "docu-fantasy" sustains a dreamlike quality that freely allows non sequitur ideas, historical events, and memories to come alive. If you go into a Guy Maddin movie with an open mind the rewards can be more lasting than any other film genre. Deeply personal transformative civic thought is the name of the game here.

Not Rated, 80 mins. (B+)

Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired

It took a woman filmmaker (Marina Zenovich) to contextualize the behind-the-scenes horse-trading and injustices involved in Polanski’s famous 1977-1978 trial for unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor that led to his escape/exile from America after serving a brief prison sentence. Zenovich blends a plethora of clips from Polanski’s films with precise interview footage from attorneys on both sides of the case to outline judicial abuses by the presiding judge, Laurence J. Rittenband, whose career was shuttered due to his maleficent treatment of the case. Disturbing and informative, the film shows two highly egotistical men (Polanski and Rittenband) with a similar proclivity for young women in a media frenzied dual that neither could escape.

(B+)

Chelsea on the Rocks

Abel Ferrara combines archival footage and reenacted scenes from Sid and Nancy’s last days while staying at the Chelsea Hotel, with interviews of some of the famous hotel’s more colorful residents to elucidate the passing of one of Manhattan’s landmark havens for artists. Stanley Bard, the hotel’s well-loved manager and caretaker for 45 years, was pushed out by a new management company intent on raising profits with a Chateau Marmont-like renovation. The documentary is just one more reminder of the war on culture taking place on a vast scale all over the world.

(B-)

Tyson

Director James Toback leverages his twenty-plus year friendship with the former “Baddest Man on the Planet” to capture a warts-and-all documentary confessional from Mike Tyson that feels like the most candid therapy session you’ve ever witnessed. Whatever preconceptions you have about Tyson will be challenged in a modern story of self-destruction and renewal that is as much about one vulnerable man’s desperate need for guidance as it is a reflection on American society, the media, and the sport of boxing. “Tyson” is nothing short of magnificent.

(A)

Surfwise

"Surfwise" is a surprisingly moving documentary that uncovers an unimaginably personal familial/social experiment. Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz is the stuff of legend. After earning medical degrees from Stanford University and serving in the military, Doc became president of the American Medical Association in Hawaii and got divorced twice before living off the land in an Israeli desert for a year where he developed his ideas about healthy living. He introduced surfing to Tel Aviv and found Juliette, the woman of his dreams, while conducting a study of the psychosexual behavior of 100 women. Living out of Doc's car, the star-crossed lovers began having the first of nine children they would home-school from the mobility of a 24-foot camper while living a nomadic surfing lifestyle built on the challenges their poverty presented. Documentarian Doug Pray ("Scratch") connects the narrative dots between the Paskowitz's nine children that survived their unconventional upbringing with varying degrees of success. You have to see this unusual story to believe it.

Rated R, 93 mins. (B+)

Grand Canyon Adventure: River at Risk

The winding Colorado River presents a worthy 3-D subject for producer/director Greg MacGillivray ("Coral Reef Adventure") to splash across IMAX screens in the interest of alerting the public to the river's devastating loss of water and wildlife. With a historically-based narrative delivered in voice-over by Robert Redford, the documentary follows a river-rafting expedition that includes Robert Kennedy Jr. and his daughter Kick, author/photographer Wade Davis with his daughter Tara, and Shana Watahomigie a Native American river guide. The rafting adventure gains familial resonance due to Robert Kennedy Jr.'s experience when he was 12, when his father took him on a similar trip down the river. Although muddled at times from its cross-purpose agendas of trumpeting conservation and establishing a story arc that never quite congeals, "Grand Canyon Adventure: River at Risk" is a lush look at a journey that few people will ever experience except vicariously through this film. It certainly achieves its stated purpose of emphasizing the dire need for great water conservation in all aspects of our daily lives.

Rated G, 43 mins. (B-) (Three Stars)

Bra Boys

Russell Crowe lends his Aussie accent to narrating this unique documentary about the tight-knit tribe of surfers in Australia’s Maroubra Beach who call themselves "Bra Boys." Writer/producer/director Sunny Abberton is a former pro surfer who wears the "Bra Boys" tattoo shared by his brothers—Koby, Jai, and Dakota, and whose complex personal story of surfing and violence the film tells. Abberton places Maroubra Beach in its historical context as a public housing project slum overlooked by a prison, and adjacent to the biggest sewage plant in the Southern Hemisphere. Gradually, we come to intimately relate to the Bra Boys as fearless protectors of a culture built on loyalty and the surf. "Bra Boys" exposes a specific slice of rebellious Australian surfing culture hardboiled from the senseless violence visited upon them by authorities and rival gangs alike. Maroubra means, "place of thunder." Upon seeing this gripping movie, you’ll know why.

Rated R, 84 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

Girls Rock!

The Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls in Portland, Oregon is the staging ground for this sloppy documentary about a group of 8 to 18-year-old girls living out rock 'n' roll dreams with the help of volunteer musicians from bands like Sleater-Kinney, and from a largely lesbian staff of instructors. Filmmakers Shane King and Arne Johnson never address the elephant-in-the-room lesbian issue, but dwell on candid moments of cacophonous expression from misfit girls teamed up into bands to write a song that they will perform for over 700 people on the last day of camp. Rhetoric far outweighs substance in this vaguely satisfying and preachy doc.

Not Rated, 90 mins. (C) (Two Stars)

Blindsight

Documentarian Lucy Walker’s follow-up to her debut feature "Devil’s Playground" is a timeless and poignant testament to a group of six blind Tibetan children who, with some extensive help from a climbing team, attempt to climb the 23,000-foot Lhakpa Ri mountain next to Mt. Everest. The trip is set in motion by blind educator Sabriye Tenberken, a German woman operating a school in Tibet for local blind children with the help of her sighted boyfriend Paul Kronenberg. Inspired by blind mountain climber Erik Weihenmayer’s accomplishment of becoming the first blind man to reach the summit of Mount Everest, Tenberken contacted Weihenmayer about guiding a group of blind Tibetan kids up Lhakpa Ri. After preliminary training for the charming children by a group of experienced American climbers, the full team embarks on a journey that delineates fundamental differences between Eastern and Western philosophies via internal clashes between Tenberken and the goal-orientated climbing guides. Visually stunning and emotionally moving, "Blindsight" is real joy through and through.

Rated PG, 104 mins. (A-)  

Chicago 10

Documentarian Brett Morgan ("The Kid Stays in the Picture") makes superheroes of the group of idealogical scapegoats dubbed "The Chicago Seven," which included such outspoken social-cause icons Abbie Hoffman, Tom Hayden and Black Panther Bobby Seale who were charged with numerous crimes related to the 1968 Democratic National convention. With a combination of cinematically conceived animated court room sequences, photos, and newsreel footage, Morgan energizes the group's historic trial in all of its carnival aspects. Here is an unabashed call to a new age of protests. Is it agit prop propaganda? You bet. Hank Azaria, Dylan Baker, Nick Nolte, Mark Ruffalo, Liev Schreiber and the late Roy Scheider voice the characters' animated embodiments.

Rated PG-13, 103 mins. (A-)

Standard Operating Procedure

Documentarian Errol Morris effectively takes the viewer inside the atmosphere of psychological and physical abuse doled out by American military at Abu Ghraib by connecting the thousands of damning photos taken to their context. And he doesn't stop there, but shows the judicially perceived difference between which abuses were considered criminal acts and which were merely acts of standard operating procedure. With his trademark use of slow-motion microscopic images and direct-to-camera interviews, Errol Morris spells out in no uncertain terms the extent of one of the biggest cover-ups in modern U.S. history. Morris correctly calls his investigative documentary a "nonfiction horror movie," but it is also an essential window into the depths of depravity that the Bush administration instilled in its lower ranks. You could very easily walk away from this film convinced that the fall of Western civilization is already upon us. Once again, Errol Morris confirms his status as the greatest documentarian working today.

Not Rated, 117 mins. (A+)

Taxi to the Darkside

The torture abuses at Bagram Air Force Base, Abu Ghraib, and Guantanamo are linked directly to Pentagon and White House officials in a scathing documentary that uses the murder of an innocent Afghan cab driver as a talking point to expand on the wider issue of torture. Known for his documentary "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room" director Alex Gibney uses graphic photos and previously unseen video footage, along with interviews with soldiers involved in administering torture, to expose the self-destructive effect of inhumane tactics of incarceration, punishment and torture. Deeply upsetting "Taxi to the Darkside" is yet another chapter in a story that will not go away.

Rated R, 106 mins. (A-) (Four Stars)

U23D

The transparent state-of-the-art 3-D look of a colorful U2 concert at a coliseum in Buenos Aries, Argentina is extraordinary, and easily makes up for the band’s lyrically simplistic agitprop songs. Their highly polished presentational performance is captured for its spectacle by co-director Catherine Owens, whose artistic influence stretches to the design of the massive multi-media walls that flash out images and words behind the band. U2 fans will have much to love, and less enthusiastic audiences will nevertheless marvel at the sheer visual achievement of 3-D technology that is already outdated.

Rated G, 85 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

Nanking

Documentarians Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman brilliantly combine archival footage from Japan’s 1937 massive attack on China’s former capital of Nanking with heartbreaking interviews of Chinese survivors, guilty Japanese soldiers, and actors giving stage readings from the diaries of Westerners who created a safety zone to protect 250,000 Chinese people. The lesson that war is always a crime is hammered home in the recounting of horrible atrocities that curdle the blood. Actors including Stephen Dorff, John Getz, Mariel Hemmingway, Woody Harrelson, and Jurgen Prochnow portray Westerners who formed the Safety Zone Committee to provide a safe place for refugees in spite of its rejection from the Japanese government. "Nanking" was inspired by Iris Chang’s book "The Rape of Nanking," about the systematic rape of tens of thousands of Chinese women ranging in age from very young to very old. Philip Marshall’s unobtrusive score, performed by the Kronos Quartet, tempers the film’s often disturbing and painful content that is nevertheless an essential part of our understanding our modern times through the prism of history.
Not Rated. 91 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

Billy The Kid

Debut documentarian Jennifer Venditti follows the struggles of Billy, a 15-year-old boy with an autistic type of disability that causes him to constantly shift his eyes as if searching for a way out of his cloistered small-town existence in Maine. Billy wears his heart on his sleeve in describing the sins of his biological father that have left him to grow up in a double-wide trailer home with his doting mother and consistently absent radio announcer step-father, whom Billy idolizes. Heavy metal music and horror movies inform Billy’s self-image as he courts a local girl without realizing the cards stacked against him. Billy’s candid and self-conscious efforts at socializing give the film its uncomfortable microcosmic study of adolescence in modern-day Americana, but the filmmaker’s inability to reveal Billy’s stepfather ignores an essential element of the story. In the end, it’s the absent father figure that hobbles the story of a decent kid unable to edit himself for better or for worse.

Not Rated. 85 mins. (C+) (Two Stars)

Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten

Julien Temple, the director of the notable Sex Pistols documentary "Filth and the Fury," proves he's the right man to make a documentary about the Clash's late frontman. From Joe Strummer's (AKA John Mellors) unsettled childhood as the son of a diplomat and the brother of a boy who committed suicide, through his teenage days spent as a bohemian squatter and on to his life with the Clash and then the Mascaleros, Temple brings Joe Strummer's life full-circle. Martin Scorsese, Bono, Johnny Depp, John Cusack, and Mick Jones are among those interviewed to share their memories of one of the most influential singer/songwriters of the Punk movement. The cumulative effect of this great documentary is to give viewers a strong sense of Strummer's uncompromising humanitarian ideals. You'll laugh, you'll cheer, you'll shed a tear.

Not Rated, 125 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

Runnin’ Down a Dream: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

To celebrate the 30^th anniversary of his life in rock ‘n’ roll, Tom Petty proposed to director Peter Bogdanovich ("Paper Moon") that he make a definitive documentary covering the history of the band. The result is a comprehensive account of Petty’s significant rise in music from humble beginnings in Gainesville, Florida where his first band Mudcrutch developed the sound that would get the band signed to a record label albeit under the singer/songwriter’s name. With full access to Petty’s personal archives and interviews with Petty and members of his mostly loyal band, Bogdanovich combines live concert footage to give a candid understanding of Petty as a performer and a creative artist. Of special interest is footage of Petty and his band during their two-year stint as Bob Dylan’s backing band, and Petty’s collaboration with the Traveling Wilburys that included Roy Orbison and George Harrison. Although frequently taken for granted, Tom Petty has had more hits than Bruce Springsteen and stands as one of America’s finest rock ‘n’ roll stars. This movie is like ice cream; you just can’t get enough.

Not Rated, 238 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

Terror’s Advocate

Only director Barbet Schroeder ("General Idi Amin Dada: A Self Portrait") could capture this complex and engaging look at French lawyer Jacques Verges, the man who represented such villains as Nazi Klaus Barbie and café bomber Djamila Bouhired, who Verges married and had two children before vanishing for eight years. Schroeder doesn’t judge his subject so much as allow Verges to give an open monologue of self-representation about his varied past. When Verges says that he’d defend George Bush for war crimes if Bush pled guilty, we begin to understand the reverse psychology of a man who romantically affiliated with the wife of Carlos "the Jackal." As the son of a Vietnamese mother and a father from the remote Reunion Island, Verges and his twin brother fought in De Gaulle’s infantry before Verges went on to study at the Sorbonne with Pol Pot as a chummy classmate. "Terror’s Advocate" elucidates the character and defense mechanisms of a man much more complex and radical than the George Bushes of the world. For that reason alone, this documentary is an indispensable document of eccentric rationalization at work on an international platform of judicial prudence.

138 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

For the Bible Tells Me So

If you’ve ever wondered about the context behind the lines of scripture that bible-thumpers repeatedly use to denounce homosexuality, director Daniel Karslake’s insightful documentary takes on each word with the assistance of Rev. Laurence C. Keene and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Karslake interviews various Christian families with gay children to gain insight into the ramifications of their awakenings. Prominent is former Democratic Representative Dick Gephardt whose relationship with his gay daughter Chrissy is a significant touchstone. Other families include Randi and Phil Reitan and their son Jake, ministers Brenda and David Poteat and their daughter Tonia, and Mary Lou Wallner, whose lesbian daughter Anna’s suicide taught her a lesson of tolerance too late. While the movie seems tilted toward Christian families attempting to work through issues of having a gay son or daughter, "For the Bible Tells Me So" fills a yet another heretofore blank chapter on Gay rights.

Not Rated, 98 mins. (B) (Three Stars)

Toots

Documentarian Kristi Jacobson’s "Toots: The Rise and Fall of the World’s Greatest Saloonkeeper" is a lovingly nostalgic and quick paced recollection of her grandfather Toots Shor, Manhattan’s most popular saloonkeeper. In an essay about Manhattan, the great E.B. White wrote, "No one should come to New York to live unless you’re willing to be lucky." Those words proved beautifully true for Toots until he lost everything in a bad boxing bet in 1939 before building an overnight empire at 51 West 51^st Street. Unfortunately, failure would befall Toots again many years later. Toots’s friends and regulars such as Mike Wallace, Maury Allen, Walter Cronkite, Gay Talese and Yogi Berra recall the lifestyle, atmosphere and relationships that Toots helped forge. Toots’s bar was a landmark watering hole where cops, politicians, sports stars, artists, journalists, actors, mobsters, politicians, and tourists came to dwell. Archival footage and photos of Toots’s epic era of Manhattan overflow amid segments from early television shows like "This is Your Life," Edward R. Murrow’s "Person to Person," and clips taken from an 8-hour audio interview with Toots himself. "Toots" is a great window into the great communal party bar atmosphere that made New York tick in the good old days.

Not Rated, 85 mins. (A) (Five Years)

My Kid Could Paint That

Documentarian Amir Bar-Lev makes himself a moving target when he breaks form to editorialize in private monologue about his doubts over the veracity of 4-year-old Marla Olmstead creating museum-worthy paintings without the help of her father. Marla became an overnight sensation when her first art gallery showing of abstract paintings sold out, and she became a choice subject for television and radio shows. Her likeable parents, Mark and Laura, agreed to let Amir Bar-Lev film them for a year, during which time "60 Minutes" televised a full hour show with Charlie Rose accusing the Olmsteads of "finishing" Marla’s paintings. The documentary is as much about how we view the value of art, as it is about the way art is created. There is a payoff interview with Laura and Mark that answers the question if Mark assisted his daughter on the paintings. "My Kid Could Paint That" is a thought-provoking movie about the ethical shades of gray. See it for yourself.

Rated PG-13, 83 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters

Here’s one of those unfolding documentaries where unforeseen events and deeds make the subject more appealing than even the filmmaker expected. The activity circles around the retro ’80s video arcade game "Donkey Kong," wherein construction worker Mario attempts to rescue a woman from King Kong atop a high construction site. In 1982, a young man named Billy Mitchell broke the world record on "Donkey Kong" (he scored 874,300 points) at a public competition. Now, 25-years later Billy is a cheesy, mullet-sporting, hot sauce entrepreneur who worries that his video game crown will be knocked off by one Steve Wiebe (pronounced wee bee), a good natured family man and science teacher from Redmond, Washington. Hope, pride, personal identity and an air of fierce competition underlie the enjoyable action. Many laughs are generously afforded at the expense of Billy Mitchell, arguably the most ridiculous human being on the planet.

Rated PG-13, 79 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

The 11th Hour

"The 11^th Hour" is an essential bookend chapter to "An Inconvenient Truth." This global-warming documentary culls information from over 50 experts of many divergent backgrounds to succinctly verbalize the dire crisis of the Earth’s ecosystem, and also provide thought-out solutions. Leonardo DiCaprio fits the bill as a likable and concerned narrator for the concise editorial segments that split up the film. Writer/director sister team Leila Conners Petersen and Nadia Conners do a great job covering a lot of ground in a rhythm that doesn’t feel rushed. For all of the devastating data about the plight of our forests, rivers, oceans and atmosphere, the movie carries significant educational content about our local environment as it connects globally to a world where we are all united. "The 11^th Hour" is a fount of vital information about "our" planet. As with so many current documentaries, this is the stuff we should be watching on television news.

Rated PG, 93 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

No End In Sight

Writer/director/producer Charles Ferguson’s documentary "No End In Sight," painstakingly goes through every misstep of the Bush Administration’s needless creation of a quagmire in Iraq. Organized, concise and plain as day, "No End In Sight" is necessary viewing for audiences the world over. Most impressive are Ferguson’s interview subjects that include Faisal Al-Istrabadi (Iraqi Ambassador to the United Nations), Chris Allbritton (Time Magazine journalist), Ambassador Barbara Bodine (In Charge of Baghdad for the U.S. Occupation), Gen. Jay Garner (Administrator, ORHA, Feb-May 2003), Barry Posen (Professor and Director, National Security Program, MIT) and a very dubious Walter Slocombe (Senior Advisor for National Security and Defense, CPA). This documentary is the kind of news we should be seeing on our television screens nightly. Campbell Scott narrates.

Not Rated, 145 mins. (A-) (Four Stars)

Ghosts of Cite Soleil

In 2004, documentarian Asger Leth, the son of Danish filmmaker and Haiti resident Jorgen Leth, secured the trust of rival sibling gang leaders in Haiti’s Port-au-Prince slum Cite Soleil to show the underbelly of a place that the United Nations sites as "the most dangerous place on Earth." Bily and his brother 2pac are both supporters of Aristide, and as such lord over different sections of the 500,000 people slum as members of Aristide’s personal army of "chimeres" (ghosts), so called due to their short life expectancy. Lele is a blonde French relief worker who facilitates direct to camera commentary from 2pac and Bily, with whom she alternates romantic affairs. Wyclef Jean helped produce the film, and scored the music that provides a pulsating backdrop for the spontaneous violence that constantly erupts at great danger to the filmmakers. As a native born Haitian, Wyclef Jean (former Fugees bandleader) is a role model that 2pac communicates with by telephone for feedback on the rap songs he writes. It’s telling when Jean describes the way Haitians have been influenced by rap as music that they will "live by and die by." Indeed, rap’s slang vocabulary of violence seems to be the only way that 2pac and Bily are capable of relating to the oppressive poverty and violence around them. "Ghosts of Cite Soleil" is a raw sociological study that discloses innumerable levels of social disorder in Haiti. The desperation and opportunism on display is disgusting, as it is intriguing.

Not Rated, 86 mins. (B) (Three Stars)

Your Mommy Kills Animals

The title of Curt Johnson’s documentary comes from the title of a PETA-published propaganda "comic book" for children, and relates to revelations about the hypocritical corporation (PETA) that itself killed "85% of the animals it took in during 2003 in Virginia." Interviews with animal-rights activists from such organizations as Greenpeace, the Animal Defense League, Best Friends Animal Sanctuary and militant groups like the Animal Liberation Front and Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, contribute to a boisterous debate over what actions should be taken against organizations that abuse animals. David Martosko, of the Center for Consumer Freedom, carries the film’s obscured theme that "morality" is a religious-based ploy used by all sides of the animal abuse debate that lead the FBI to rank animal-rights activists as the No.1 terrorist threat in America.

Not Rated, 106 mins. (B-) (Three Stars)

ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway

Even audiences not enamored with Broadway musicals could find Dori Berinstein’s documentary, about the trajectory of four Broadway shows, entertaining and informative. "Wicked," "Avenue Q," "Caroline, Or Change" and Boy George’s "Taboo" provide plenty of behind-the-scenes vantage points as the 2003-2004 Broadway season comes down to the list of winners and losers on Tony Award night. You have to respect the tremendous efforts of the creative people who throw their dreams into the Broadway ring, and this little doc goes a long way toward showing the years of work behind each make-or-break production.

Rated PG, 104 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

Crazy Love

If you don’t know the tale of Burt and Linda Pugach, then you’re out of the loop on one of the biggest running tabloid stories in New York history. Burt Pugach was a married and wealthy New York attorney when he fell head-over-heels in love with one very lovely but disinterested Linda, a 20 year-old Bronx girl. Jealousy brought out the worst in Burt and Linda suffered the consequences, but the pain of love and hate comes full circle in this fascinating documentary by Dan Klores ("Ring of Fire: The Emile Griffith Story").

Rated PG-13, 93 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)

Zoo

Bestiality with horses is the overriding topic of this problematic docudrama about a Seattle "family man" that died of a perforated colon after having sex with a horse under the supervision of a group of fellow "zoophiles." Filmmaker Robinson Devor feigns interest in local and national media coverage of the tragedy famously referred to as the "Enumclaw horse incident of 2005," while failing to provide a historical legal context for the event. Bestiality was not illegal in Washington State at the time, but Devor fails to examine how such laws there have changed. Most distressing is the treatment of the horse in question, an Arabian stallion, by horse "rescuers" who immediately castrate the animal that they claim is "innocent." This deeply disturbing film skirts its intrinsic exploitation intent by never speaking its subject’s name, or for that matter exploring realities of the man’s life beyond his circle of zoophiles. This nightmare-inducing film is as dark and lurid in tone as the mind of its maker.

Not Rated, 76 mins. (D)

Sacco & Vanzetti

A long-held cause celebre for leftists the world over, the story of immigrant activists Sacco & Vanzetti is told in Peter Miller’s documentary as a reference point for the way immigrants are still mistreated in America. With archive news footage and fresh interviews, Miller fleshes out Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti as two men from different Italian backgrounds set up as "Red Scare" scapegoats for a botched robbery attempt that they most likely had no knowledge of until after their arrest on May 5, 1920. Black-and-white newsreel footage of public protests in Europe and Japan gives context to America’s head-in-the-sand attitude toward the world’s condemnation of the Sacco & Vanzetti trial. Tony Shalhoub and John Turturro add their vocal skills to the film in reading letters the two doomed men wrote.

Not Rated, 81 mins. (B-)

Air Guitar Nation

Put aside all of your preconceptions of air guitar as a hobby of shamelessly untalented wanna-be guitar players, and step into the world of competitive air guitar. Alexandra Lipsitz’s patient documentary follows air guitar masters David "C-Diddy" Jung and Dan "Bjorn Turoque" Crane from America’s first nationwide air guitar championship to Finland for the international championships. The performance art of air guitar takes on a rarefied identity as an incorruptible force that cannot be merchandised because "it doesn’t exist." Perhaps air guitar is an activity that Sartre would have embraced.

Rated R, 81 mins. (B)

Who The Fuck Is Jackson Pollack?

The purchase of a large splatter painting for five dollars at a thrift store in San Bernardino, California changed Teri Horton’s life when she learned that Jackson Pollack might have painted it. Writer/director Harry Moses follows Teri, a colorful 73-year-old former truck driver, through a tricky gauntlet of art professionals in her tireless 15-year effort at proving the origin of a very special painting without the benefit of a provenance. Dismissed by specialists from the art world, Horton hired forensics art authenticator Peter Paul Biro, who discovered a fingerprint on the back of her painting that perfectly matched one on a can of paint in Jackson Pollack’s conserved studio. The movie is an enjoyable look into the hypocrisy and prejudices of the art world as experienced by a down-to-earth woman with a heart of gold and a sense of principle to match.

Rated PG-13, 74 mins. (B)

Fuck

As Lenny Bruce famously pointed out, fuck is an important word because, "if you can’t say fuck, you can’t say fuck the government." It’s along this freedom-of-speech bent that filmmaker Steve Anderson interviews people like Billy Connolly, Janeane Garofalo, Hunter S. Thompson, Pat Boone and Ice T to arrive at the history and universal significance of the most simultaneously used and reviled words in the English language. It appears that we have WWII largely to thank for the proliferation of vulgarity in mainstream usage, but the word "fuck" has developed into an essential quip of primal expression that is universally understood regardless of its grammatical usage. With whole documentaries dedicated to taboo words like "slut" and "fuck," we can employ our vulgarities to even more stinging ironic effect.

Not Rated, 93 mins. (B)

Cocaine Cowboys

Brian De Palma’s "Scarface" didn’t begin to scratch the surface of the real violence and depravity that consumed Miami during the ‘70s and early ‘80s era of Colombia’s Medellin cocaine cartel. Documentarian Billy Corben’s revealing film exposes the methods and players in South Florida’s drug trade that literally built the city of Miami that we know today with billions of dollars in blood cash. Corben’s exhaustively researched film utilizes news footage, along with interviews with former drug traffickers and assassins, to give a clear dissertation on a brutal and vile chapter of American history that condemned Miami to what Time magazine called "Paradise Lost" in 1981. Television’s "Miami Vice" composer Jan Hammer provides the film’s infectious musical score.

Rated R, 118 mins. (A)

Shut Up & Sing

Famed documentarian Barbara Kopple ("Harlan County U.S.A.") fails to provide adequate political and social context to events surrounding singer Natalie Maines’ public remark in a London auditorium that she was ‘ashamed that the President was from the state of Texas.’ It’s common knowledge that the offhand comment effectively ruined the Dixie Chicks’ musical career compared with their enormous previous success, but Kopple and her co-director Celia Peck do little to expose the mentality and actions of those responsible for bringing the genial band low. The most inspiring element of the film is the genuine fortitude and loyalty that Maines and her bandmates Emily Robinson and Martie Maguire exhibit outwardly and to one another.

Not Rated, 93 mins. (C)

The Bridge

The documentary genre is the most accessible format for incipient filmmakers to cut their teeth on, but the template can backfire when a film’s subject is one as loaded as suicide. Rookie documentarian Eric Steel prepared by filming the world’s most popular suicide site, the Golden Gate Bridge, every daylight minute of 2004 using multiple digital cameras, before editing detailed footage of jumpers with interview footage of family members and friends of the deceased. Steel’s heavy-handed editing and emphatic use of poorly chosen music turns tragedy into exploitation as he utilizes actual suicides for dramatic tension and release. Steel never provides an essential context of comparing the Golden Gate Bridge with bridges equipped with suicide barriers, nor does he deal with San Francisco’s political disregard for the hazards that the bridge presents. You will never look fondly at the Golden Gate Bridge again after seeing this disturbing documentary by a filmmaker ignorant of the volatile narrative water that he dishonors.

Rated R, 95 mins. (D)

Deliver Us From Evil

Amy Berg’s riveting and brave documentary about Father Oliver O’Grady, ‘the most notorious pedophile in the history of the modern Catholic Church,’ is more frightening than any horror movie you have ever seen. We are gradually introduced to O’Grady in candid interviews and filmed depositions that reveal the hidden depths of the monster’s dark depravity that allowed him to molest, rape, and offend hundreds of children across Northern California with the complicit assistance of the Catholic Church. The Church is exposed as an all-powerful cult that knowingly protects pedophile priests that have molested, and continue to molest, tens of thousands of children around the world. When some of O’Grady’s victims (one raped when she was nine-months-old) speak candidly about the abuse that they suffered and the long-term traumatic effects, the film becomes a desperate plea for immediate action against the religious institution and its endemic corruption. "Deliver Us From Evil" has already prompted new legal attention in Los Angeles toward Cardinal Roger Mahony who allowed more than 550 priests under his jurisdiction to molest children without punishment.

Rated R, 101 mins. (A)

49 Up

There should not be an adult in the western world who isn’t at least tacitly familiar with Michael Apted’s groundbreaking documentary series based on the idea that a person’s personality is formed by the age of seven. Begun as a documentary called "7 Up," for Britain’s revered Granada television studio and the BBC, the "Up" series has collected more than four decades of interviews, done at seven year intervals, with the same group of 14 British children from various social classes to whom Apted returns to converse. This latest chapter in the sequence brilliantly extends Apted’s unprecedented social study of personality and social milieu as reflected by human potential. "49 Up" keeps with the series’ established format wherein footage from all of the former films (7, 14, 21, 28, 35, and 42 "Up") is interspersed within each interview to give the audience a rich mosaic of perspective on each person’s life experience.

Not Rated, 136 mins. (A)

American Hardcore

For a documentary ostensibly about the history of the hardcore punk music movement that reigned in America during the ‘80s, director Paul Rachman and writer Steven Blush indefensibly omit the genre’s most talented and high-profile band (The Dead Kennedys). In place of potential commentary from Dead Kennedy’s singer Jello Biafra, former Black Flag front man/poseur Henry Rollins underscores the homoerotic subtext of "straight-edge" bands like Minor Threat. The Bad Brains, from Washington, D.C., are justly showcased for their potent musical contributions even if the meandering film fails to properly address the political and social significance of the Dead Kennedy’s music.

Rated R, 100 mins. (C-)

This Film Is Not Yet Rated

Even if you’ve never given a second thought to who bestows ratings on movies or how those ranks are given, Kirby Dick’s enlightening documentary will catch you up in its infectious spin of curiosity. Kirby hires a private detective to uncover the identities of the MPAA’s secret ratings board members, and compares specific content of Hollywood movies against independent films to examine inequities that skew in favor of violence and heterosexual themes. John Waters ("A Dirty Shame"), Matt Stone ("South Park"), Kimberly Peirce ("Boys Don't Cry") and Mary Harron ("American Psycho") are some of the filmmakers who share their candid opinions. The film comes full circle when Kirby sends the movie to the ratings board to be rated before going through their appeals process. This is cinematic activism in motion.

Not Rated, 97 minutes. (B+)

America: Freedom To Fascism

Film producer Aaron Russo ("Trading Places") uses the first half of his incendiary and scattershot documentary about the authoritarian state of America to expose the only partially ratified 16^th amendment of the U.S. Constitution as not giving Congress the power to impose an unapportioned direct tax on labor. Interviews with former IRS employees and discussions about court cases contribute to his premise that there is no law binding citizens to pay the Fed’s "voluntary" income tax, but Russo doesn’t support his claims with hard evidence. It’s just so much editorial hearsay. The film goes on to proffer that since the Federal Reserve Bank emptied Fort Knox of its gold that our currency is worthless and that we the people are on the brink of being implanted with rice-sized tracking chips that will take the place of cash. "America: Freedom To Fascism" captures America’s current gloom and doom zeitgeist with plenty of controversial ideas to send any dinner party into a shouting match.

Not Rated, 95 mins. (B-)

a/k/a Tommy Chong

Josh Gilbert’s curt documentary about the arrest and conviction of comedian and former bong-maker Tommy Chong reveals the federal sting operation that put Tommy Chong in a state penitentiary for nine months for shipping glass bongs to Pennsylvania. Peter Coyote, Jay Leno, Bill Maher, Eric Schlosser and George Thorogood comment on Chong’s arrest, which is shown to have been an obvious strategy by former Attorney General John Ashcroft to punish Tommy Chong (of "Cheech and Chong" fame) for his lifelong comedic work built on ‘stoner’ humor. This state-of-American-affairs movie is just one more reminder of the heightened level of fascism that chokes the country under its neocon regime. Tommy Chong’s naturally easy-going personality and genuinely inspired humor brands him an elder statesman of comedy alongside the likes of George Carlin.

Not Rated, 78 mins. (B)

The Heart of The Game

Writer/director Ward Serrill’s wonderful documentary, about a Seattle high school girls basketball team the Roughriders coached by the inspiring Bill Resler, is a "Hoop Dreams" of the early 21^st century. Coach Resler, a University of Washington tax professor by day, invigorates his girls b-ball team with animal metaphors that encourage them to ‘sink their teeth in and draw blood!’ Personal issues of the players come to the fore as one girl is revealed to have suffered sexual molestation by a private coach, while the team’s star player Darnellia Russell finds her African-American identity at odds with the college scholarship she desires. Ward Serrill seamlessly weaves together a historical context of girls basketball along with candid pieces of existent social commentary to capture a micro/macro vision of challenges facing our culture. "The Heart of the Game" is an altogether enjoyable, exciting, informative and tragic documentary. Rated PG-13, 98 mins. (B+)

Road To Guantanamo

Director Michael Winterbottom brings us face-to-face with the national humiliation of Guantanamo prison where the Geneva Convention and legal protocol have been disposed of like the now-filthy rivers of our country. The docudrama is based on a dossier by the "Tipton Three," a group of young British Muslims who spent two brutal years in Guantanamo on false charges after departing from a wedding in Pakistan for Afghanistan where they hoped to provide volunteer services for its embattled civilians. The "Tipton Three" were the first, and only prisoners to date, to be released from Guantanamo; they were released without ever being charged and without apology. Winterbottom tells the story using the detainees themselves as actors suffering the same humiliations, deceits and acts of violence that the boys suffered under the ridiculously inhumane conditions at Guantanamo prison in Cuba. See for yourself how the Bush administration is polarizing the world one victim at a time.

Rated R, 91 mins. (A)

Wordplay

Patrick Creadon’s documentary about the New York Times crossword puzzle’s creators and fans is a positively joyful movie that will appeal even to audiences who have little affinity for the mind-bending puzzles. Celebrities like President Bill Clinton, Yankee baseball pitcher Mike Mussina, and comedian Jon Stewart play peanut gallery to the bulk of the movie which focuses on the top competitors at the annual Stamford, Connecticut crossword puzzle tournament as they work toward the big competition. New York Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz gets plenty of screentime as he elaborates on the process of creating the most highly regarded crossword puzzles in the world.

Rated PG, 84 mins. (B+)

Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man

Filmmaker Lian Lunson uses a 2005 Sydney tribute concert to Leonard Cohen as a home base for her relatively shallow examination of the ‘best folk singer to slit your wrists to.’ Rufus Wainwright’s performance of Cohen’s song "Hallelujah" (prominently featured in "Shrek" and "Lord of War") outshines every other artist in the show, including Nick Cave, U2, and Beth Orton. Lunson gives brief glimpses into Cohen’s painstaking and overwrought writing process that gave him currency with Beat poets, Janis Joplin and ‘70s punks before the melancholy malcontent from Montreal turned to Buddhism. If anything, Lunson’s amateurish film makes Leonard Cohen’s depressing music seem more entertaining than it really is.

Rated PG-13, 104 mins (C)

Who Killed The Electric Car?

Forget everything you think you know about electric cars and discover this terrific documentary that exposes the real story behind General Motors' EV1 electric car that won the hearts of everyone who drove them when they were made available to a limited sector of the public in 1996 through a lease program. Director Chris Paine interviews automakers, legislators, engineers, consumers and car fans to solve the riddle of how and why the clean-running cars were repossessed and shredded by General Motors. The film shows how politicians on both sides of the isle conspired with oil companies and car manufacturers to rob our ecology of one of its most promising assets. Charlie Sheen narrates this entertaining and crucial movie.

Rated PG, 92 mins. (A-)

An Inconvenient Truth

Since being robbed of his proper place in the White House, former Vice President Al Gore has turned humanitarian crusader and delivered his urgent and authoritative lecture on global warming to more than a thousand audiences all over the world. Director Davis Guggenheim expands Gore’s highly polished multimedia lecture into dramatic form with personal footage of Gore that exemplifies his 40-year commitment to a subject that is consuming our Earth. Gore discharges party lines and embraces global warming as the "biggest moral challenge facing global civilization" in an imperative and frightening film that promises to shift the priorities of everyone who sees it.

Rated PG, 100 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

95 Miles To Go

Comedian Ray Romano is shown is all of his peculiar and neurotic grandeur in this candid documentary of an eight-day comedy tour through the South. Romano’s longtime comic friend Tom Caltabiano rides shotgun while the flight-phobic comedian drives their rental car with two digital cameras attached to the dashboard. The contrast between Romano’s effortless stand-up routines before large corporate audiences and his touchy everyday demeanor plays like a twisted reality show where the class clown is also the teacher. The laughs are infused with a dry biting wit that’s too blunt to be called sarcastic. You won’t get a bellyache, but you just might get a headache.

Rated R. 81 mins. (C)

Why We Fight

Director Eugene Jarecki ("The Trials Of Henry Kissinger") methodically uses Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Presidential farewell speech as a talking point for such people as Richard Perle, Gore Vidal, John McCain and Wilton Sekzer, a Vietnam vet and retired New York City cop, to discuss America’s corporate-led military crisis. In his 1961 speech Eisenhower warned Americans to guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence by the "military-industrial complex." Unfortunately, Eisenhower didn’t point out congressional compliance with the interests of the military-industrial and left the public to wonder how such a warning should be heeded.

Rated PG-13, 98 mins. (A) (Five Stars)

Why We Fight

Director Eugene Jarecki ("The Trials Of Henry Kissinger") uses Dwight D. Eisenhower’s farewell speech as a talking point for such people as Richard Perle, Gore Vidal, John McCain and Wilton Sekzer, a Vietnam vet and retired New York City Cop, to discuss America’s military crisis. In his 1961 speech Eisenhower warned Americans to guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence by the "military-industrial complex." Unfortunately, he removed the word "congress" from the phrase and left the public to wonder how such a warning should be followed. Eisenhower’s concerns for the country’s destruction from within by attempting to protect against threat from the outside world are shown to have come to full fruition in the guise of corporate warmongers such as Haliburton and Lockheed Martin. Jarecki explains how neocon think tanks have robbed the American people of their imagined democracy in a country that spends more on its military than all other military nations combined.

Rated PG-13, 98 mins. (A)

Roving Mars

The interaction of two amazing NASA roving robots, named "Spirit" and "Opportunity," with the mysterious terrain of Mars is authentically captured by writer/director George Butler on IMAX cameras. Butler ("Shackleton’s Antarctic Adventure") takes the viewer behind the scenes at NASA to witness the invention and construction of the mind-boggling solar-powered robots by a group of more than 4000 scientists, technicians and laborers. The director makes a colossal cinematic leap when he shows the launch and landing of the robots on Mars before depicting their dramatic discovery that water once existed on the tiny planet. "Roving Mars" is an unforgettable and informative movie that more than fills the IMAX 100’ X 80’ screen with far away images that make every viewer an astronaut.

Rated G, 40 mins. (A)

Rock School

Paul Green is no Jack Black. The eccentric Philadelphia-based 32-year-old music teacher responsible for teaching kids to perform rock in the idiom of Zappa, Zeppelin and Pink Floyd is a much scarier creature that Black's creation for "School Of Rock." Green is shown with warts and all in Don Argott's snappy documentary as he whips his students into shape by screaming, cursing and pushing them to learn their songs. For all of his questionable methods, Paul Green gets results that are revealed when he takes a group of students to perform the difficult music of Frank Zappa at a Zappa festival in Bad Doberon, East Germany. As Green himself points out, "the fact that the movie got an "R" rating because he curses a few times says a lot about the society we live in."

Rated R, 93 mins. (B) (Four Stars)

Murderball

The quadriplegic rugby sport referred to as "Murderball" is lovingly examined in a well-crafted documentary that goes a long way toward showing the mental and physical fortitude of these wheelchair bound athletes who insist on living life to the fullest. Filmmakers Henry Alex Rubin and Dana Adam Shapiro focus their attention on the indomitable Mark Zupan of Team USA and his fierce rival Joe Soares of Team Canada as the men drive their Quad Rugby teams toward the 2004 Paralympics Games in Athens. "Murderball" is an inspirational and poignant movie that shatters innumerable misconceptions about quadriplegics and their ability to function at a high level of physical ability.

Rated R, 85 mins. (B+)

Mad Hot Ballroom

"Mad Hot Ballroom" is a testament to the elementary public school system of New York's five boroughs, to its kids and to the dance teachers of the American Ballroom Institute. Teams of fourth and fifth grade girls and boys from Brooklyn, Tribeca and Washington Heights train to compete in a citywide dance contest as director Marilyn Agrelo reveals the personalities of the young students whose lives are enriched by their contact with each other and their teachers through ballroom dance. The narrative (written by Amy Sewell) assembles toward its built-in trophy award climax with the teams performing five dances, the Fox Trot, Swing, Rumba, Tango and Meringue. Charming, poignant and festive "Mad Hot Ballroom" is an inspirational documentary that shows the power of dance to invigorate self-esteem and ambition in young hearts.

Rated PG, 110 mins. (B+) (Four Stars)