Asian and US Movie Reviews Blog » Documentary

Encounters at the End of the World by Werner Herzog (2007)

jonahlee — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 01:00:27 +0000

I had heard of Werner before I worked on his Blu-Ray disc of RESCUE DAWN, but did not know too much about the man, but after seeing RESCUE DAWN I was fascinated by this strange and possibly insane documentary and narrative director. This is the story of his journey to Antarctica to see the people living there, and to get footage from under the glaciers in the ocean, of the incredible creatures unlike anything else on Earth. Even though Werner is not in it, he is still a character, asking questions and narrating the film with his off the wall views of the world (the best are the lines about the blight of there being a yoga studio at the base in Antarctica!). And the people up there all seem a little bit insane in their own way, all poets and artists, and yet doing things they never trained for, lawyers working in greenhouses and the like. These people really seem like Werner’s kind of people, and that is why the documentary works so well. Not only do we see the amazing creatures, but we see these strange and quirky people and the world they live in.

Werner travels with his cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger to Antarctica, starting with McMurdo Station, the biggest settlement on the continent. Here they learn about the changing ice, and see the encampment that Werner seems to hate. They then take field training to be able to go out on the ice, and head to a seal camp.

At the seal camp we hear unearthly recordings of the seal calls underwater, which sound like something from a Pink Floyd album.

Next they go to the diving camp where they meet research diver Henry Kaiser and see footage of his trips into the other world under the ice. They are studying a strange organism that lives in the sand and shows almost an intelligence.

They travel to the original camp of Enest Shackleton.

Then they see a Penguin going the wrong way to his certain death, and talk to a scientist named David Ainley about it. They do not know why some penguins just go the wrong way and travel hundreds of miles to their deaths.

Werner travels to Mount Erebus, and active volcano that is easier to study than many in more volatile countries. They have cameras set up and scientific equipment, and we see footage of an earlier attempt to try and get into the base, that ended with wounded scientists. There are frozen ice tunnels created by steam called Fumaroles, and they go deep into one.

We go under the north pole, where there is a frozen sturgeon and ice carvings in the ice walls.

Scientists launch a helium balloon with a neutrino detector, covered in Hawaiian artwork and talk to the chief scientist Peter Corham.

Along the way they see the people who have drifted to Antarctica. People who do entertainment shows, and philosophers who work maintenance. A man who is descended from Mayan royalty as all his fingers are the same length.

A really interesting bunch that match the strangeness of the undersea footage that highlights the film, and was the reason for Werner’s visit.

••••

The film is worth seeing for the seal and underwater footage, but the most interesting thing is the trip into the mind of filmmaker Werner Herzog, because he has some strange ideas about people and life, and he does not hold anything back. A very interesting man.

Check this film out.

Macheads written, directed, edited and co-produced by Kobi Shely (2008)

jonahlee — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 20:33:09 +0000

I love the subject matter, about the cult of Macintosh, and that they got Andy Ihnatko, Guy Kawasaki and Raines Cohen to do interviews for this, but honestly, overall I felt pretty disappointed by this film. The actual editing seemed a bit amateurish, especially all the cuts in an interview on screen, which felt to me like they should have been covered with something, and the music which was bad, and did not seem at all to go with the picture, and often times contrasted to it. It felt like a rough cut with a bad temp music score. And maybe that is just the editor in me, but that is certainly how I felt. Honesltly I felt a bit ripped off for the price on an under an hour documentary.

This documentary talks about the history of the almost religious cult of Mac that started in the early days with the Berkley Macintosh User Group, and the Mac Evangelists, goes through the dark days of the Macintosh, when it was almost going away, and the return of Steve Jobs, and finally the beggining of the end of the Cult. Jobs returned and brought the company back, but the secrecy and corporate dealings, and internet have stopped people from wanting to personally meet. The kids today want to meet on the internet, so the cult is dyeing down, though there are still people fiercely loyal to Macintosh.

Religulous by Larry Charles (2008)

jonahlee — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 02:31:49 +0000

Damn I am so far behind on my reviews! Ha, need to start catching up, and soon. This film is Bill Maher’s pain against religion in the modern age. A documentary, but very slanted, because Maher admits to not believing at all in religion, but the thing he is he brings facts to the table that many of the people he talks to are not aware of. I really enjoyed this film, and just think it is too bad because the people who really should see this film, will never see it, because of who made it. And in fact it is a well done, and funny and enjoyable film, and Maher does not just go after one religion here, but them all.

Some of my personal highlights in the film are Bill talking two Vatican priests, both of whom seem to be the most reasonable people he talks to. One is a Vatican Astronomer and talks about how modern science didn’t exist when the bible was created, so you can’t take it literally. And another is a priest who laughs at people who take the bible as absolute fact, and not a collection of moral stories.

There are some scary things too, like the Jesus land in florida, the man who is making a museum that shows that the Earth is only 5000 years old, and that man lived with Dinosaurs, and even worse is the Arksansas Congressman who admits he might believe that Earth was crated 5000 years before, and admits they don’t have an IQ test to get in Congress. Scary!

Maher travels the world, talking to Muslims, and Jews and Christians, and tries to get them to explain some basic things to him, as he points out facts, like Christianity paralleling earlier religions, Jesus being much like an Egyptian story in the book of the dead. And another of my favorite moments when he talks about the founding father’s disdain for religion, which makes the current climate so much scarier.

This film at the least should open a dialogue about the current trend of religion and politics intermarrying, when they are supposed to be separate, and when we have presidents who believe they have a divine calling, the world can be a very scary place.

Sicko written and directed by Michael Moore (2007)

jonahlee — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:00:38 +0000

Moore’s amazing follow up to Fahrenheit 9/11 is this time about the American Health Care industry, and it instead of being killed was in fact universally lauded, even liked by FOX News. This is an a film about the American Health Care system, ranked very low in the world, and the only high level country to not have a universal health care system. The film talks about the people unable to get healthcare, but mainly focuses on the people who have health insurance and who have been denied care for various reasons. It then goes into the universal health care systems of other countries like Canada, England and France. In fact the film is so powerful it made me cry, especially as an American with a pre-existing possibly fatal heart condition who is unable to get health care.

The film is at it’s most powerful when dealing with the heros of 9/11 who worked at ground zero, and were refused health care for their injuries. Moore decides to take them to Guantanmo Bay Cuba, where the terrorists get great health care, but they can’t even get close, so they go to the Cuban health care system, where all the people final get actual diagnosis and treatments for their conditions, which they could never get in the US. The Cuban firefighters then meet and honor these heroes. Amazing that a country that we call an enemy would care for our heroes for free when we would not.

Also seeing health care in France, it makes me want to move there, they treat their people so much better than we treat ours, no wonder conservatives hate France so much.

We need true universal health care, and with Hillary Clinton taking so much money from big pharmaceutical and Obama not having a true universal health care, I will probably remain uninsured for the time being. And this needs to change. This country need to change, and needs to have true Universal Health Care that will take care of not only the rich, but also the sick and the poor. Everyone should be able to get healthcare!

Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater by Julie Anderson (2006)

jonahlee — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 20:41:57 +0000

Honestly until very shortly ago I knew very little about Senator Barry Goldwater, and he didn’t really come into the forefront of my mind until I read the Goldwater Conservative John W. Dean’s book, CONSERVATIVES WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE. WIth that I found out about a man who I did not agree with on many issues, but on others I do, and I wish he was still around today because he would be right with many of us who are against the Religious Right having any say in Politics, and he stood for conservative values, values that the new Republican party espouses but does not believe in, such as fiscal responsibility and actually trying to make America a safer place.

This is an excellent documentary on the man and and his career of over 30 years as a senator and his run for President against Linden B. Johnson up until his retirement and finally his death. It has interviews with people on both side of the political spectrum talking about this man from Arizona who had no compunction about saying what he felt and fighting for. And many of his views were very Libertarian including his belief in a woman’s right to abortion, and later his support of allowing gays into the military.

REVIEW CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS…

This was produced by CC Goldwater, his Granddaughter, and includes interviews with his sons and brother and surving family members, along with people from both sides of the political spectrum.

As HBO shows on it’s web site it has quite an impressive spectrum of people that are interviewed.

Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater includes interviews with Senators Edward Kennedy, Hillary Rodham Clinton (a onetime “Goldwater Girl”) and John McCain (who succeeded Goldwater in Arizona); former TV anchorman Walter Cronkite; humorist Al Franken; TV correspondent Robert MacNeil; former Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee; author George Will; 60 Minutes’ Andy Rooney; CBS News’ Bob Schieffer; White House reporter Helen Thomas; political consultant James Carville; former White House Counsel John Dean; Goldwater’s brother, Bob; sons Barry, Jr. (a onetime House Representative from California) and Michael; daughters Joanne and Peggy; and others.

And it really gives an unbiased look at him as a man and as a politician. He loved his family and always filmed and photographed them, but it does not sound like he was around much for them.

And he enraged and infuriated his enemies, and yet he was a great friend of John Fitzgerald Kennedy and when his party drafted him to run for President he looked forward to running against his friend, but when Kennedy was assassinated the campaign became brutal and he lost to Johnson and his scare tactics, though I think more to his opinionated voice and a couple of very wrong ideas.

For he was very pro nuclear weapons, and did say things about bringing them to bear in Vietnam and against the Kremlin so he came off as a warmonger. And even more hurtful in my eyes was his opposition to the Civil Rights act in 1964. He felt the laws were in place, and that things would work there way out, but things had not changed since African Americans had been given some rights. In this he was wrong.

In his opposition of the religious right and it’s take over of Conservatism he was very against, and was always pro a women’s right to abortion and had a gay nephew and after long thought came out for Gays in the Military.

He also never liked Nixon and he was the one that forced the issue with Nixon resigning, which is how he got to know John W. Dean.

He retired after more than 30 years as a Senator, and was very respected by many people and even liked by people that did not agree with his views because he did not make it personal.

•••••

This was a very good documentary. I really enjoyed it, and while I do not agree with many of his views, I would much rather have someone of Goldwaters true conservative ilk in control of the Republican Party instead of the Religious right that is perverting the democracy in this country and making this country a much worse place than it has been, and making the world a worse place as well.

This also pointed out more reasons why I dislike Hillary Clinton, because she got started in Politics campaigning for Goldwater, as she was a young conservative, no wonder she leans so far to the middle from the left. That is where she is politically and why I do not agree with her on so many things.

An Inconvenient Truth by Davis Guggenheim (2006)

jonahlee — Sun, 11 Jun 2006 17:18:04 +0000

This is a really well done and enjoyable, though horribly scary documentary based on former Vice President Al Gore’s slide show he presents on the environment, and on Global Warming. It is filled with facts that really refute the G.O.P.’s contention that Global Warming is just a theory and that the climate changes are cyclical, so that this is normal (yes climate is cyclical, since we using Antarctic ice we can plot the average temperature and CO2 levels of the earth, and never have the CO2 levels or temperature been so high. It is a really well done documentary intercutting Gore giving his presentation with footage of him around the world, as well as doing research and footage showing milestones in his life, and the environment and the world, and what is happening. It is very well done, and should be seen by everyone, not just liberals who already believe in Global Warming, but everyone so they can see the facts about Global Warming, and what is happening to the world that we live in before we have an environmental disaster that makes Katrina look like nothing.

This is Al Gore giving his presentation on Global warming, and giving un-refuted facts about what is going on in our world with the polar ice caps melting and getting thinner and much of Greenlands glaciers melting and starting to break up, and glaciers worldwide shrinking or even disappearing all together. We see how Gore got into this with a teacher who had only recently started reading the ever climbing levels of C02 in the atmosphere, a level that has a direct relevance to the average world temperature, as can be seen in the 650,000 ice record that scientists have tapped into in the Antarctic, and how they have know about the 7 ice ages, and the levels of air CO2 during all of them, and we have C02 levels and temperature levels never seen in the history of the earth. Not some cyclical change in the global temperatures, but temperatures and changes directly influenced by the pollution being let out by Mankind and the US in particular as the worlds largest polluter.

And most of the film is not political, as this really should not be a political issue, it is a survival issue, but it does delve into some of what the current Administration has done. Being one of only 2 Industrializes nations to refuse to ratify the Kyoto protocols, having the worst gas mileage for vehicles of any nation in the world, in fact even so far behind China’s gas current levels. Having one of their pundits change scientific facts to suite them, and when caught go take a job with Exxon Mobile, to attempt to turn Global Warming fact into a theory so it can be denied, and to suppress scientists at NASA whose research show the truth of Global Warning.

This also goes into the dangers that Global Warming is causing and will cause it not checked. The torrential storms, such as Katrina, famine and droughts that can already be seen all over the world. The ice caps melting, and while floating ice will not effect the overall sea levels, it is the land based ice that is melting, that is not only losing the world it’s clean water sources, but that when entering the ocean will not only affect the temperature and currents in the ocean, but if the ice in Greenland or on the shelf in Antarctica were to melt the entire world would have ocean levels rise 20 feet would displace millions.

And this does not have to ruin our economy in fact we can make money by being clean, and developing new technologies that other nations are now working on, we could use clean energy such as solar and wind power and more energy efficient and less polluting cars like hybrids. We can do something about this and we all should, instead of denying the scientific facts.

You can see some about this at the films official web site Climate Crisis.

An interesting side not that I noticed while watching the film is that one of the producers, Lesley Chilcott was a producer I used to work for in Commericals. She was in fact one of my all time favorite producers to work for and she had heavy involvment from this, in fact as you can see in this article on the film and the Apple program Keynote that Al Gore uses for his slide show, Apple Article, you can actually see a photo of Lesley with Al Gore in the editing room, here is the photo, she is the one on the right.

Wow I need to get in touch with her and see if she ever needs an editor or an assistant editor in the future for something like this!

Actually I did, and it is her, and she is going to keep me in mind for the future! How cool is that? What a nice woman.

The Battle Over Citizen Kane by Michael Epstein and Thomas Lennon (1995)

jonahlee — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 18:42:04 +0000

This is included on the CITIZEN KANE DVD, but was a TV show from 1995, and is just under 2 hours long. It is the story of the making of Citizen Kane, as well as the story of Orson Welles and William Randolph Hearst and how he tried to stop and destroy this film. With old photos and video to fill in the story. This is an incredible documentary and a must see for all fans of Citizen Kane, and anyone who has seen it!

This is an incredible documentary that goes into the fact that Orson Welles was given this film at age 25 after his War of the Worlds radio broadcast, with the best deal any director ever had or ever will had, and how he took on William Randolph Hurst, and neither man won, and Welles never reached the top again. It was Welles depiction of Hurst’s girlfriend Marion Davies that supposedly disturbed him the most, and that is why he did all he could to destroy Welles, even having him called a Communist. And it has interview footage with Welles himself, which really ads to this incredible story.

What an incredible documentary!

Mondovino by Jonathan Nossiter (2005)

jonahlee — Sun, 05 Feb 2006 04:15:03 +0000

While filled a huge amount of very interesting information about the state of the wine world today, and with Interviews with so many of the people who are important, it is the production and editing that mars this film. The camera is so shaky it gives me a constant headache, often the camera wanders off to show something else while someone is talking, and the editing without narration seems really jumpy and off. Yes their is information here, but no overall story, with some scenes that shouldn’t be here at all, and do we really need to watch Dogs sniffing each others buts. While very informative I would pass on this one.

Ostensibly about the impact of globalization on the worlds different wine regions, but the film is so badly shot and put together that is just painful to watch, what should be a joyous subject makes one very sick. There is some interesting stuff about a huge controversy with wine moguls Mondavi, but it really gets lost in this film.

This filmmaker needs to get lessons on shooting and holding a camera and editing to make a successful story,and narrative, which really isn’t there.

Pass on this one for sure.

Magnificent Desolation: Walking on the Moon 3D by Mark Cowen (2005)

jonahlee — Sat, 05 Nov 2005 19:19:18 +0000

Tom hanks produced and narrated this excellent documentary and 3 dimension recreation of the the Apollo moon landings, meant to bring that sense of wonder to a new generation of children and including the best 3D effects I have ever seen in a film. Sure it is a little short on science, and more into spectacle, but that doesn’t take away from the power and the impact of this film, and it doesn’t hurt having an almost all celebrity voice cast narrating the film, with some actors from the Right Stuff and Apollo 13 joining in. You should not miss this film at the IMAX because a home viewing experience just won’t be the same! The only thing bad I can say about it is the non-powered 3D glasses do make the image not as sharp as it could be

Magnificent Desolation Web Site

Tom Hanks leads the narration on the 12 men who have walked on the moon, showing it in amazing 3D re-creations with actors, and along with original voices from the landings and readings by Matt Damon, Morgan Freeman, Scott Glen, Bill Paxton, Kevin Pollak, Gary Sinise, John Travolta, Donnie Walberg and Matthew McConaughey.

This film really gets you psyched about space exploration and makes you want to me next to the moon, in fact it makes me want to go to Space Camp as an adult, which I have always wanted to do anyway. AN AMAZING FILM!

John Cleese: Wine for the Confused by David Kennard (2004)

jonahlee — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 19:36:01 +0000

As as aspiring wine aficionado, at least since my trip to Napa with my girlfriend, I have wanted to learn more and more about wine, especially since my trip to Berringer, and since I am also a very large fan of John Cleese I thought this would be an ideal show, and it is, though a little short, so it could have gone farther.

Cleese first takes a group of his friends and tries to get different ways of describing wine, then journeys to various wine makers and learns more about the 3 big red and 3 big white wine grapes, and they wines they make and the difference. The only thing not really covered were rose wines. And then he tells you to get a good wine shop and have conversations about wine to learn more and develop your pallet. This show is fun and well done, and makes you want to explore your own wine tastes, and to develop your own wine vocabulary.

It is too short, but has some additional tips from Cleese, and some extended scenes with the wine makers, that do lengthen this out a bit, but it should certainly be longer.