“Don’t Visit Bad Axe, Just Watch ‘Bad Axe'”

Bad Axe, but a really good movie. Continue reading →

“Elvis Mitchell’s Documentary ‘Is That Black Enough For You!?!’ Is Black Enough and More”

Yes, it is! Blacker than black! Blacker than the blackest black times infinity! You did it, Elvis! Continue reading →

Tribeca At Home ’22: A Very Disappointing Round-Up

A swing and a miss followed by three other swings and misses. Continue reading →

“‘Dear Mr. Brody’s’ Letters Of Heartbreak”

Oh, dear. Mr. Brody. How could you, Mr. Brody? Continue reading →

“‘Flee’ Is A Candid Documentary That Uses Animation To Tell An Afghan Refugee’s Harrowing Story”

Run, don’t walk, and definitely don’t flee from this incredible film. Continue reading →

“Check In At ‘The Nowhere Inn’ With Annie Clark & Carrie Brownstein

God, yes, meta-docs, just inject that right into my veins, please. Continue reading →

“‘In the Same Breath’ Offers a Rare Glimpse of Life in Wuhan at the Beginning of the Pandemic”

In the same breath as I praise this movie, I also feel a whole lot of panic. Continue reading →

“‘Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story Of Roy Cohn’ Is A Deeply Personal Look At The Political Figure’s Awfulness “

Don’t let the “victim” fool you. Roy Cohn was, is, and will always be viewed as a large diameter asshole. Continue reading →

“‘The Painter and the Thief’ Puts Empathy on Canvas”

Sorry gang, I don’t have a pithy, clever, insightful, or even corny intro to this piece, the movie is just too good. Continue reading →

“What Imelda Marcos Can Teach Us About The Fake News Generation”

A movie that proves there is no justice in this world when all the wealth is in the hands of the unjust, so thank heavens for mass food poisoning. Continue reading →

“‘Memory: The Origins of Alien’ Bears Abiding Fondness For A Sci-Fi Legend”

And now, we go back in time to an era of peak crime and the year of Three Mile Island, Voyager I and Jupiter’s rings, space shuttle orbiter Columbia, and the Iran hostage crisis; also the year of “Alien.” Coincidence? Probably. Continue reading →

Review: Ask Dr. Ruth, 2019, dir. Ryan White

Upfront: This movie is about sex. My review of this movie is about sex. Everything is about sex. It’s necessary to get that out of the way to numb your delicate prudish American sensibilities. Continue reading →

“Race-Car Driver Hurley Haywood and Patrick Dempsey Talk About Their New Documentary, Hurley”

Andy becomes an authority on race car driving in the blink of an eye just by talking to Hurley Haywood and Patrick Dempsey. (Note: Andy is not by any means an authority on race car driving.) Continue reading →

“Films by Women: Five Movies to Watch from March (2019)”

One of the best oddball indies of 2019 to date, and one of the most daring, if not THE most daring, documentary of 2019 to date. Dig in. Continue reading →

Review: Black Mother, 2019, dir. Khalik Allah

A free association (sort of) visual essay documentary film about Jamaica in 2019, Jamaica in the 1800s, and how the latter has shaped the former into a land of beautiful contradictions. Continue reading →

“Peter Jackson’s WWI Doc ‘They Shall Not Grow Old’ Is A Marvel On Every Level”

It took Peter Jackson over a decade, but he finally made a movie to match, and even outclass, his “Lord of the Rings” trilogy – a documentary about World War I, made as only a guy like Jackson could make it. Continue reading →

“The 10 Best Documentaries of 2018”

Here we are, gang: Year end time. Time for the year to end. Time for the lists. Time for critics to tell you all what is best in this year that is ending. Yadda. I wrote about the new Frederick Wiseman film. You probably didn’t know a new Frederick Wiseman film even came out this year, did … Continue reading →

“The Director of ‘Bisbee ’17’ on Making the Year’s Most Daring, Revelatory Documentary”

I like a good, standardized talking head doc that’s lean, simple, but knows how to tell a nonfiction story through primary sources and such as that. But I like creative, nonstandard docs that feel more like art than journalism, and that’d be Robert Greene‘s Bisbee ’17, which you may recall I wrote about last month.  Bisbee ’17 … Continue reading →

Review: Bisbee ’17, 2018, dir. Robert Greene

Upfront: I dug Kate Plays Christine, documentary filmmaker Robert Greene’s last movie, but I am floored, still, by Bisbee ’17, his latest, and I saw it over two weeks ago. Maybe that makes me…I don’t know, simple? I think Kate Plays Christine hangs around the edges of fast comprehension. It’s elusive. I like an elusive film, and I’m … Continue reading →

“The Empty Rage of Michael Moore’s ‘Fahrenheit 11/9′”

  Maybe I’m not the guy to review a Michael Moore movie. I don’t dislike his work, per se; he’s great at crafting a convincing argument, not convincing in the manner of facts, but convincing in an emotional sense. He’s very, very good at riling up his target audience, preaching to a choir already at … Continue reading →