Drone – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 19, 2015 Reviews The debate about drones is only in its infancy, but Drone proves that there’s plenty of discussion to be had. Interviews with former drone pilots in the US and human rights lawyers in Pakistan highlight...
I’ll Be Back: Are Sequels Always Worth The Wait? Phil W. Bayles June 12, 2015 Analysis, Features, Opinion This year has brought with it a huge number of (incredibly) long-awaited sequels. We've just witnessed the reopening of Isla Nubar in Jurassic World, next month we'll go back in time for Terminator...
The Russian Woodpecker – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 10, 2015 Reviews The first time we meet young Ukranian artist Fedor Alexandrovich, he’s producing a play called Dreams of a Ridiculous Man. It’s an apt description of Fedor himself. With his wild eyes and unkempt facial...
Orion: The Man Who Would Be King – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 10, 2015 Reviews Doc/Fest was made for films like Orion: The Man who would be King – stories so ridiculous and unbelievable that they must be true. The archival footage of singer and Elvis sound-alike Jimmy Ellis gyrating...
Generation Right – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews Given that, in the words of director Michelle Coomber, Britain "voted itself back into the 1980s" last month, Generation Right could hardly feel more timely. Coomber interviews academics, activists and...
Match Me! – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews Imagine Richard Curtis directed Catfish and you’ll have some idea of what Lia Jaspers’ Match Me! is all about. We follow three people as they try various methods of finding a partner. Johanna attends a...
Surviving Sandy Hook – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews In a way, it will always be "too soon" for a documentary about the tragic elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut. Jezza Neumann’s film shows a community ripped apart by the cataclysmic event,...
Containment – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews One imagines Brad Bird would be very enamoured with Moss and Galison’s work – there are parallels to be drawn between the message of Tomorrowland and the tone of this documentary about the disposal of...
Falciani’s Tax Bomb – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews The opening credits of Falciani’s Tax Bomb look like Wes Anderson made Catch Me if You Can. Much like the rest of the film, it’s a stylish little sequence that ultimately doesn’t really tell...
Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews If it’s true that the act of observing something changes the nature of the thing being observed, it’s equally true that it changes the observer. In Spectres of the Shoah, director Claude Lanzmann...
Good Girl – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews “A feel-good film about depression” isn’t the easiest of sales pitches, but it’s an apt description of Good Girl. It’s bleak subject material, not least in depicting Solveig’s treatment by...
A Sinner in Mecca – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 9, 2015 Reviews After exploring the gay Muslim community in A Jihad for Love, filmmaker Parvez Sharma turns the camera on himself as he clandestinely films his pilgrimage to Mecca. Sharma's journey shines a light on Saudi...
Don’t Breathe – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 7, 2015 Reviews The line between fact and fiction gets seriously blurry in this bizarre, Georgian documentary about a middle-aged man’s search for medical attention. As Levan sits through meeting after meeting with...
Merchants of Doubt: Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 6, 2015 Reviews “Only two things are infinite,” Albert Einstein once said, “the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not so sure about the universe.” One imagines Robert Kenner came to the same conclusion while...
The Greatest Shows On Earth – Doc/Fest 2015 Review Phil W. Bayles June 6, 2015 Reviews Roll up, roll up, for a documentary experience like no other. Icelandic director Benedikt Erlingsson takes footage from the National Fairground Archive at the University of Sheffield and assembles a...