Category: Documentary

By Joe Bendel. Where could a mountaineering Polish dissident go to most effectively fight communism in the 1980s? Obviously Afghanistan. Of course, getting there was no easy feat and staying alive once he arrived was even trickier. However, the late Adam Jacek Winker was not easily dissuaded. Anca Damian tells his extraordinary story in the animated documentary The Magic Mountain, which screens as part of the AFI’s 2015 EU Film Showcase.

For Winker, opposing the spread of communism was a decidedly personal matter. His cousin and uncle were among those murdered by the Soviets at Katyn. He was able to get out of Poland while the getting was relatively good, but he also felt guilty about abandoning his homeland in a time of prolonged suffering. As a result, he was always looking for a way to take the fight back to the Soviets. While living in Paris, he was a bit of a gadfly, providing unwanted reality checks for the French communists’ Labor Day festivities, but he was truly called to Afghanistan.

Since Winker only had a French “refugee” passport, getting to Afghanistan, by way of Pakistan, was a complicated process. However, once there, Winker fell in with the mujahedeen relatively quickly. He had the extreme good fortune to join up with Commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, the “Lion of Panjshir,” an ardent foe of communism, who later rejected the Taliban’s oppressive fundamentalism just as vigorously. Alas, Mountain also serves as an elegy to the assassinated Massoud, as well as his somewhat eccentric Polish friend and comrade.

Indeed, some the most poignant moments of Mountain focus on Winker’s efforts to promote and then memorialize the fallen Afghan hero. Yet, with respects to her central figure, Damian never descends into blinkered hagiography. Winker’s fault are readily identified, making him the stuff of classical tragedy, but viewers will understand where his zeal came from, and admire him for harnessing it.

Mountain incorporates archival photos of Winker and Massoud into the distinctive and diverse work of its team of animators and artists, including Theodore Ushev, Tomek Ducki, Matei Focsa Neagoe, Dan Panaitescu, and Raluca Popa. Frankly, a few sequences are almost excessively stylized to the point of self-defeating abstraction, but other visuals are absolutely arresting. Regardless, the film is always powered along by its sweepingly dramatic narrative.

Winker really was a character—a heroic character. He was also a principled individualist, who did not let his experiences in Afghanistan blind him to the dangers of Islamist ideology in his final years. Basically, he stayed on the right side of history, every step of the way, making his life story quite fascinating and instructive. Very highly recommended for fans of animation and biographical documentaries, The Magic Mountain screens this Saturday (12/12) as part of the AFI’s EU Film Showcase.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on December 10th, 2015 at 1:00pm.

By Joe Bendel. Romanian Germans have a long and complex history with their homeland that continues to evolve even to this day. Indeed, the fact that Romanian President Klaus Iohannis is a Transylvanian Saxon is quite significant. There used to be many more Saxon, Swabian, Zipser, and Bukovina Germans in Romanian but the 1945 Soviet expulsion of all able bodied ethnic German men took a brutal toll. Those who were left faced a difficult time of during the Communist era, but the Federal Republic of Germany did not abandon them. Răzvan Georgescu reveals the extent and legacy of the secret deal struck by the FRG and Ceauşescu in Trading Germans, which screens during the 2015 edition of Making Waves: New Romanian Cinema.

During the hottest years of the Cold War, West Germany traded hard currency in exchange for the immigration of almost a quarter of a million Romanian Germans. It was a long-term operation, spanning the years of 1968-1989. During throughout that period, Heinz-Günther Hüsch served as the primary German negotiator, even before his election to the Bundestag (as a member of the CDU). He ran an incredibly efficient operation, at least until Helmut Schmidt got involved and re-negotiated less favorable terms for West Germany.

Thanks to Hüsch and Romania’s unquenchable demand for hard currency (fueled by Ceauşescu’s corruption), a steady stream of Romanian Germans were allowed to leave the Socialist paradise. Apparently, they assimilated quite well in West Germany, in part because they spoke perfect German. Unlike the rest of the Soviet Bloc, Romania never curtailed their German language fluency and usage. However, they still feel profound sense of separation from their homeland. The Saxons particularly seem to have a deep agrarian connection to their ancestral land—most of which now lies fallow.

Hüsch and his chief Romanian counterpart Stelian Octavian Andronic offer some vivid memories and sly commentary on their extended pow-wows. Yet, some of the best insights regarding the nature of freedom come from Romanian German Karl Hann and Hansi Schmidt (formerly a star player for the Romanian national handball team).

There are some rather misleading descriptions of this film online that make it sound like a human trafficking documentary. As far we can tell from the HBO Europe produced doc, everyone whose passage the FRG purchased wanted to leave, albeit reluctantly. In fact, the Communist authorities often double-collected, charging the immigrants exorbitant passport fees, unbeknownst to Hüsch. Yes, they are sad to be estranged from their homeland, but the regime had already stripped them of their beloved land and their way of life. Frankly, it is a relatively feel-good Cold War story, told with sensitivity and telling details. Highly recommended, Trading Germans screens tomorrow night (12/7) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s Making Waves: New Romanian Cinema.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on December 7th, 2015 at 12:22pm.

By Joe Bendel. After the Six-Day War, Romania was the only Warsaw Pact country to maintain diplomatic relations with the State of Israel. That’s not much to say for the Ceauşescu regime, but at least it’s something. In truth, Israel and Romania had a long and complex history that predated 1967, going back to the very first organized Aliyah that originated in part from Romania. Oania Giurgiu talks to descendants of those very first pioneers in her sweeping yet highly personal documentary, Aliyah DaDa, which screens during the 2015 edition of Making Waves: New Romanian Cinema.

In the late Nineteenth Century, a hearty band of Romanian Jews returned to their ancient homeland. It was a hard life, but the local Arab population was rather glad to have them there as potential allies and buffers in their quarrels with the Bedouins. They would not be the last Romanian Jews to take the Aliyah journey to what would be known as Israel again in 1948. However, the fascist Antonescu regime imposed anti-Jewish laws, much like their Axis allies, which abruptly halted all Jewish immigration.

Jewish Romanian transit re-commenced in the immediate power-war years, but at that time leaving Romania was the safest part of the journey. Following the purge of prominent Jewish CP member Ana Pauker, Ceauşescu generally followed the Soviets’ anti-Semitic party line. Yet, he still periodically allowed spurts of immigration to Israel, in return for hard currency.

Those are the broad strokes of it, but it is the personal details that interest Giurgiu. Though not Jewish herself, she had always been fascinated by the fate of immigrating Jewish Hungarians after her parents bought their house from one such family. She also finds a visually distinctive way to tell their stories, constructing on-screen photo-collages inspired by the work of Tristan Tzara and Marcel Janco, two Jewish Romanians who were at the forefront of the DaDa art movement.

We should all know the fundamentals of Romania’s tragic Communist and fascist past, but seeing it as part of a continuum of over a century of history rather puts things in perspective. All things considered, it is miraculous the nation is not even more dysfunctional. To her credit, Giurgiu keeps the film grounded in the human realities of the grand macro forces through her interviews with the frank and welcoming Romanian-Israelis.

Strangely enough, Giurgiu’s cinematic collages also serve the material quite well, dramatically illustrating the passage of time through her layering-on and stripping off. She also assembles some striking archival photos, which are often haunting, nostalgic, or a little of both. Her interview style is decidedly informal, but it clearly works with both the learned scholars and weathered farmers descended from members of that 1882 Aliyah.

ADD is briskly paced but also provides a surprisingly comprehensive yet digestible overview of Jewish Romanian history up until the Revolution. It offers insights into both totalitarian systems that misruled the nation during the last century, while also earning way more style points than your garden variety documentary. Highly recommended, Aliyah DaDa screens this Thursday (12/3) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s Making Waves: New Romanian Cinema.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on December 2nd, 2015 at 10:48am.

By Joe Bendel. Few directors ever became a popular celebrity like Alfred Hitchcock. His imprimatur and famous profile were used to brand books, magazines, and even a television show. Yet, as bizarre as it seems to us today (with Vertigo recently eclipsing Citizen Kane on the Sight & Sound critics poll), in the early 1960s, Hitchcock was not widely hailed as an artist. The exception was in France, particularly among Cahiers du Cinema’s circle of critics and filmmakers. That most definitely included François Truffaut. He convinced the Master of Suspense to sit for an epic eight day interview that would eventually be edited into one of the most treasured film books of all time. Kent Jones uses the fiftieth anniversary of its publication as a springboard to celebrate the films it analyzes in Hitchcock/Truffaut, which opens this Wednesday in New York.

In 1962, Hitchcock only had a handful of films ahead of him, but that would include iconic films like The Birds and Marnie, as well as Frenzy, the late career masterwork the public really missed the boat on in 1972. By this time, Hitchcock had completed signature films like Vertigo that would largely out of public circulation for decades. In the pre-video era, reading Hitchcock/Truffaut became the only way to get a shot-by-shot sense of the master’s work.

In case we doubt that fact, Jones enlists a relatively small but eminent cast of filmmakers to explain how much the book has meant to them. Not surprisingly, many are alumni of the New York Film Festival, including Martin Scorsese, who often appears in filmmaking documentaries and David Fincher, who is considerably less ubiquitous. There are no slouches in H/T, but it seems a strange how little screen time Kiyoshi Kurosawa gets, considering he is probably the closest to Hitchcock stylistically.

Frankly, Jones’ wandering focus makes it tricky to nail down his precise intentions. Although he incorporates considerable excerpts from the surviving audio tapes, he is not solely concerned with the book and interview. There is some background context provided for both titular filmmakers, but he clearly privileges Hitchcock well above Truffaut. In fact, Jones does not even explore Truffaut’s Hitchcockian films, like Mississippi Mermaid and The Bride Wore Black. Rather, it often seems like Jones is content to follow the points raised by his cast of filmmakers and the commentary of Hitchcock himself, in an almost freely associative manner. While that makes it hard to elevator-pitch H/T, its Hitchcock-centrism still makes for fascinating viewing. Let’s be honest, most of us could happily listen to the old master discuss the catering on Topaz.

Jones simply can’t go wrong with Hitchcock. Even if we can’t precisely spell out the film’s thesis, it further buttresses our general cineaste convictions that Hitch was one of the craftiest, wittiest auteurs to ever look at the world through the lens of a camera. Abundantly watchable, Hitchcock/Truffaut is highly recommended for Hitchcock fans (and somewhat so for Truffaut and Nouvelle Vague admirers as well) when it opens this Wednesday (12/2) in New York, at Film Forum.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on November 30th, 2015 at 10:56pm.

By Joe Bendel. For jazz, the 1970s were the best of times and the worst of times. Fusion super groups like Weather Report and Return to Forever were selling out stadiums, but great swing and bop musicians found themselves professionally marginalized. Jaco Pastorius was a big part of that story. For bass players, he was the story. Regardless of what you thought of Weather Report’s style, there was no denying his ferocious technique. Sadly, he met a premature end, just like too many other jazz legends before him. Paul Marchand & Stephen Kijak survey Pastorius’s life and legacy in the simply but aptly titled Jaco, which releases today on DVD with a full second disk of additional, high quality interviews.

Early in Jaco, Juan Alderete of the Mars Volta refers to Pastorius as bass players’ “Hendrix” and it is easy to see why. Pastorius even did his own solo rendition of “America the Beautiful”—on the Fender bass. He is one of the few jazz musicians who is often referred to solely by his first name, like Miles or Duke. Granted, Jaco is a somewhat distinctive alternative to Jack or John Francis Pastorius, as he born, but he truly made a name for himself taking jazz to its funkiest limits.

Pastorius’s formative years were spent in Florida, where he picked up all forms of music, including the rhythms he heard on Cuban radio. One of the cool things about Jaco the documentary is the credit it gives to the Florida music scene at the time, including diverse artists like Anglo R&B road warrior Wayne Cochran and Algerian-born jazz pianist Alex Darqui. Just about everyone hired Pastorius, because he was that good. However, Pastorius returned the favor, bringing a number of his FL colleagues up to New York to play spots on his debut record for Epic.

Despite his widely hailed debut, Pastorius’s popularity really exploded during his stint with Weather Report. It was already one of the biggest super groups before he joined, but he took them to an unheard of level for jazz. Alphonso Johnson, Pastorius’s predecessor in the band, is quite a gracious good sport talking about the moment when he realized Joe Zawinul (the unofficial, first-among-equals bandleader) had eyes to replace him with Jaco. However, some of the most honest and revealing reminiscences come from drummer Peter Erskine, who joined shortly after Pastorius.

In fact, the interview segments throughout Jaco are unusually insightful and often deeply personal. It must have been a difficult process choosing what to include for the documentary, because there is not a lot of filler in the supplementary DVD. In one case, Joni Mitchell tells an anecdote that is more about Wayne Shorter than Pastorius, but Weather Report fans should find it equally interesting. It is also nice to hear Al Di Meola fondly remember time spent with Zawinul when his band was on tour with Weather Report, because the Austrian keyboardist comes across as somewhat mean-spirited in the doc proper.

In many ways, Pastorius’s story is the oldest one of jazz. He had enormous talent, but also terrible demons to wrestle with. Yet, it was not the drugs and mental health problems that killed Pastorius, but a club owner named Luc Havan, who served four excruciatingly long months for beating to death one of the most innovative bassists of all time, or as Pastorius’ widow Ingrid observed: “one month for each child he left fatherless.” However, Marchand & Kijak (perhaps wisely) prefer to celebrate his gifts rather than to stoke resentment over his untimely end.

If you watch Jaco the documentary and the additional footage, you will understand just how much Pastorius revolutionized music. Jazz fans that still don’t appreciate Joni Mitchell might finally start to get her after hearing how she related to musicians like Pastorius and Shorter. Flea (from the Red Hot Chili Peppers) will also surprise viewers with his jazz hipness, earning extra style points for the Thelonius Monk t-shirt. Likewise, Metallica’s Robert Trujillo is just as eloquent speaking of Pastorius and also helped bring the film together by serving as producer.

Both disks comprehensively illuminate Pastorius as an artist and a flawed human being, while further burnishing his reputation as a musician beyond category. Very highly recommended, Jaco the two-DVD set is a terrific package that would make a good Christmas gift for fusion fans.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on November 30th, 2015 at 10:55pm.

By Joe Bendel. Probably nobody was more responsible for the Elvis Presley death hoax brouhaha than Gail Brewer-Giorgio. She wrote the conspiracy book shrink-wrapped with a cassette tape of the King supposedly explaining how he pulled it off that you might remember from late television commercials. She also wrote an earlier novel about good old boy rock icon Orion Eckley Darnell, who faked his death at the height of his fame. It was intended to be a fantastical allegory, but the new boss of Sun Records used it as a business plan. Jimmy Ellis was the aspiring singer whose voice fit Orion’s mask. Ellis’s strange and sad career is chronicled in Jeanie Finlay’s Orion: the Man Who Would Be King, which opens this Friday in New York.

Even during his teenaged years, people were struck by how much the late Jimmy Ellis sounded like Elvis Presley. That might sound like a blessing, but for a prospective vocalist hoping to establish his own identity and career, it was more of a curse. Nobody wanted to sign an Elvis sound-a-like, until Shelby Singleton, the new owner of Sun Records and its storied catalog came across Brewer-Giorgio’s novel, Orion.

Just like the protagonist so clearly inspired by Presley, Singleton had Ellis perform as “Orion Eckley Darnell.” Since he only looked Presley if you were squinting like a bat in a spotlight, Ellis was required to wear a Lone Ranger mask whenever appearing in public. They never really said he was Presley, but there was a whole lot of winking and nudging going on. It was bizarrely successful for a while, as far as Singleton was concerned. Yet, Ellis inevitably became frustrated with the misplaced adulation and lack of proper recognition.

Finlay makes viewers understand full well the sad irony that had there never been an Elvis Presley, Jimmy Ellis could have been huge. He was not some cheesy Roger Clinton southern fried freak show. Ellis always sang with feeling and could croon a ballad with the best of them. Like Presley, he was attuned to many forms of southern music, from rockabilly to gospel. There was just no getting around that Elvis voice of his.

Ellis’s story turns out to be even sadder than we expect, but Finlay’s treatment gives him the respect and perspective he deserves. She engages in a bit of speculation regarding the adopted Ellis’s birth parents, but it is convincing enough to makes you wonder (but not about Elvis Aron, mind you). There is just some really nice documentary-storytelling going on in Orion. Plus, if you dig Elvis, you will definitely groove to Ellis’s spooky dead-ringer recordings.

It would be nice and altogether fitting if we could start speculation Jimmy “Orion” Ellis faked his death to once again pursue his musical dreams with a clean slate, but the senseless criminal nature of his murder and that of his employee are simply not conducive to fun conspiracy theories. Frankly, they both deserved far better. At least Finlay’s documentary will foster an appreciation of his talent, under his own name, which is not nothing. Highly recommended for fans of Presley, Orion, and old school Sun Records, Orion: the Man Who Would Be King opens this Friday (12/4) in New York, at the IFC Center.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on November 30th, 2015 at 10:55pm.