The lovely folks at Dogwoof - http://www.dogwoof.com/ have generously donated five of their thought provoking documentaries for me to giveaway. Each Monday for the next five weeks I'll run a competition to win one of the DVDs. I'll draw the winner on a Sunday and post the winner's name at the start of the next week's competition. The first film up for grabs is Danish film-maker Michael Madsen's extraordinary Into Eternity - a look into the complex and dangerous world of nuclear waste management - my favourite documentary of the year so far.All you have to do to win the DVD is follow the blog and leave a comment below this post stating what your favourite documentary is. If you're already following just leave the comment. Cut off point for this week's draw is midnight on Saturday, so good luck to one and all.
There seems to be technical/gremlin issues with following and leaving comments on the blog. If you have trouble you can also enter by 'liking' The Fourth Wall on its Facebook page and leaving a comment under the post about the competition here - http://tinyurl.com/6fh9kcz
My favourite documentary fluctuates between a hit-list of about 5, but today it's most certainly When We Were Kings, Leon Gast's incredible Rumble In The Jungle film from 1996. Political history, sporting history and cultural history combine in a jaw-dropping fly-on-the-wall doc that spans so much ground it offers something different every time.
ReplyDeleteMuhammad Ali's bid to reclaim his heavyweight title after being stripped of it in 1967 (for refusing to go and fight in Vietnam - 'I ain't got no quarrel with the Vietcong. No Vietcong ever called me Nigger.') is the core of the film, but filmmaker Leon Gast manages to embrace a far broader scope by capturing so much more within the build-up to the fight and through contemporary talking heads, both from people who were there and those who weren't.
So you get the history of Ali and the amazing human drama of his seemingly insurmountable comeback against the behemoth that was George Foreman; you get an amazing snapshot of Kinshasa, Zaire in 1974 under the rule of Mobutu, as well as the history of racial tensions between Africa and the imperialists. You get the added cultural impact of the musicians brought over for the Rumble concert, featuring great footage of James Brown, BB King, Bill Withers, Miriam Makeba, The Crusaders… Then you've got Don King in all his Shakespeare quoting splendour as well as Norman Mailer and George Plimpton's brilliant narratives, recollections and stories. And that's just the start. There's SO MUCH going on in this film, it's a thing of rare and precious beauty.
In fact, I'm off to watch it right now. 'Ali bomaye!'. Kill him!
Favorite docs: tough choice but today I'm gonna say 'Fog of War' with close runners up 'When the Levees Broke' and 'Buena Vista Social Club'
ReplyDeleteI watched Project Nim at EIFF this week and it's already a new favourite. Absolutely fascinating and cinematic without being heavy-handed or forcing too much of a response. Excellent follow up to Man on Wire from James Marsh.
ReplyDeleteReally looking forward to seeing that, soon to appear in a 'what to look out for' blog post.
ReplyDeleteWas tempted to go for Bus 174 which offers an extraordinary insight into an everyday bus-jacking, but instead citing Los Olvidados by Bunuel, which occupies the neo-realist drama-doc space with the occasional surreal twist as it explores the lives of street kids in post second world war Mexico City. Not only remarkably watchable but also an early exploration of the possibilities of the doc as a dramatic medium as much as a documentary one (cf The Arbour etc).
ReplyDeleteLove Bus174. Never seen Los Olvidados but will seek it out soon after reading your thoughts on it. Good luck winning Into Eternity.
ReplyDeleteReally tough but I one I always mention to people is Nicolas Philibert's La moindre des choses (1997) (English title: Every Little Thing).
ReplyDeleteIMDB:The tranquil woods of the Loire Valley embrace the La Borde psychiatric clinic, an asylum in the truest sense of the word, where patients find sanctuary and repose. Patients and staff work together in rehearsals and preparations for their annual summer play. This year, they perform the modernist, absurdist classic, "Operette," by Witold Gombrowicz, whose dialogue is more nonsensical than that of the patients themselves.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119689/
A deeply moving film. He resisted filming at the asylum for years not wanting to take advantage of the subject and by focusing on the annual stage he definitely avoids this. Wonderfully human. No distressing or upsetting imagery as you might expect and would probably get from a TV doc. Philibert like to watch people at work. People who, just like him, care deeply about what they do - both the patients and the staff of the clinic.
I saw this at Sheffield Doc Fest in 2005 (I think). They held a retrospective of his work and Philibert was there in person to discuss his films. I fell in love with him and his films. Such a gentle human being.
Not sure where you can get this. Hopefully someone would release his complete works with subtitles soon.
I think a Nicolas Philibert collection has just been released hasn't it? That sounds great, one I don't know.
ReplyDeleteI was going to say Dear Zachary. But I'll go with The Arstrocrats. A wonderful melting pot of comedians brought together due to one joke. Fantastic film which shows that; sometimes not the joke itself, but they way you tell it that matters.
ReplyDeleteWatched it all the way through nearly every time it's on.
Ha, nice leftfield choice. I enjoyed it a lot.
ReplyDeleteLike most people above it's touch to choose a favourite but the film that blew me away on first viewing was 'One Day in September', Kevin Mcdonald's masterful documentary about the Palestinian siege of the Israeli team at the 1972 Summer Olympic Games in Munich. Tense and gripping. Dark Days and Capturing the Friedmans come a close 2nd and 3rd with The King of Kong trailing in a close 4th place. Anyone looking for fresh new ideas in cinema need only look at documentary film making these days.
ReplyDeleteAgree wholeheartedly about documentary being the 'fresh' face of contemporary film-making. Dark Days is my favourite documentary, still hits the spot every time I watch it.
ReplyDeleteOk, the winner is...William Thomas aka Flickerdrome. Cheers guys, another DVD up for grabs via a new competition on Monday morning.
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