It’s a documentary-heavy list this week; no fluffy fiction for you to watch this weekend.
Without further ado, here’s this week’s list of 5:
1 – So you say you missed it when it was in theaters, on PBS and you haven’t rented or purchased it on DVD, and you really want to see it?
No sweat… Kartemquin Films critically acclaimed, award-winning documentary, The Interrupters, is streaming on Netflix right now. So you’re just a few clicks away from meeting The Interrupters, including Ameena Matthews in her fifth year working as a violence interrupter for CeaseFire, as well as Cobe Williams, Eddie Bocanegra, and the Director of CeaseFire Illinois, Tio Hardiman.
Trailer below:
2 – From acclaimed director Eugene Jarecki, and executive producers Danny Glover, John Legend and Russell Simmons comes the riveting new documentary, The House I Live In.
Filmed in more than twenty states, the film tells the stories of individuals at all levels of America’s so-called “War on Drugs,” looking at this war from several key POVs.
From the dealer, to the narcotics officer, the inmate, to the federal judge, the film offers a penetrating look inside America’s criminal justice system, revealing the profound human rights implications of U.S. drug policy.
The feature doc (4 years in the making) premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last year, where it reportedly caused quite a stir, polarizing audiences, en route to winnng the Grand Jury Prize in its category, and continued to play the international film festival circuit.
Watch the trailer below:
3 – The story goes… While filming a documentary on racism in Mississippi in 1965, Frank De Felitta forever changed the life of an African American waiter and his family. More than 40 years later, Frank’s son Raymond (director of City Island) returns to the site of his father’s film to examine the repercussions of their fateful encounter.
The documentary titled Booker’s Place: A Mississippi Story, is described as a intensely personal film about children struggling to understand their parents is also a heartbreaking portrait of the legacy of intolerance.
Trailer below:
4 – The Ambassador, from Danish director Mads Brügger – a darkly comic, genre-bending piece of film journalism from the international provocateur, which attempts to expose the global scheme of political corruption and exploitation happening in the Central African Republic.
Armed with a phalanx of hidden cameras, black-marked diplomatic credentials and a bleeding-edge wit, Bruegger transforms himself into an outlandish caricature of a European-African Consul. As he immerses himself in the life-threatening underworld of nefarious bureaucrats, Bruegger encounters blood diamond smuggling, bribery, and even murder–while somehow managing to crack amazing razor-sharp barbs at every steps along the way. From each absurdly terrifying/hilarious situation to the next, The Ambassador is a one-of-a-kind excursion from the man whom The Huffington Post called “the most provocative filmmaker in the world.”
As you might have guessed, the film drew a bit of controversy around the time of its release – controversy covered on this blog last year. In short, the government took legal action against Brügger, because he allegedly used a fake diplomatic title – “Consul General and Ambassador-At-Large” accredited to the Central African Republic – when shooting The Ambassador. And with that, the Government launched a full-scale investigation into how he managed to accomplish this..
The government also wasn’t too pleased with the portrait the documentary paints of the country, essentially as one that’s destructively corrupt.
Now you get to see it firsthand.
Trailer follows:
