Hot Docs is one of my favourite times of the year, and I'm going to try and cram in as many movies over nine days as I can. Hopefully regular visitors to this site won't be put off by some capsule reviews that I intend to throw up at the end of each day. And in case there's anyone looking for recommendations, here's an outline of where I might end up. For now, this is largely based on trying to decode the programmers' blurbs — some stuff will change as reviews start to come in and so forth. Plus, how many I end up going to is subject to the limits of my endurance, and so on.
Do remember that weekday daytime screenings for students and seniors are free. Say hello if you spot me in a line-up, looking dazed!
Friday, April 30
Part of Ripping Reality, a special retrospective of the best docs of the past decade.
Hopefully more than cutesy-pooness. We'll see what the reviews say on this one.Has it been six years since Spalding Gray left us? Steven Soderbergh assembles a biographical retrospective from Gray's monological films. If that doesn't mean anything to you, go to wherever you get your movies from and grab yourself Swimming to Cambodia.
"This jaunty and thorough investigative biography pieces together [...] the insidious connections between the business community and Brazil’s military dictatorship. An energetic, vibrant history of Brazilian politics in the 1960s and early ‘70s." The word jaunty sells me on this.
Saturday, May 1
First of the retrospective series of works by director Kim Longinotto. The director retrospectives are always a highlight of Hot Docs and highly worth checking out. Longinotto's last two films (Rough Aunties and Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go) were highlights at the festival for each of the last two years. Both of those, plus eight more, are being screened for this look back. Try and catch as many of these as possible.
Estonians wanted to watch Dallas, and eventually the iron curtain collapsed.
Sunday, May 2
There's always a fair number of enviro-themed docs and it's hard to tell the wheat from the chaff, but this investigation of the natural gas industry sounds good. Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner.
What a drag it is gettin' old.
Could be great or terrible, depending on how you feel about descriptors like "riveting experimental doc", "fascinating deconstruction", "haunting electro-ambient soundscape" and the word "truth" in scare-quotes. But the source WWI footage sounds fascinating.
What are the teenage girls who were screaming at their pop idol up to fifty years later?
Monday, May 3
The aftermath of a child abduction in small-town Poland.
Daily life in a Warsaw oncology ward. (My original blurb: "Apparently the man who threw tobacco in the macaque's eyes at the zoo is meant to directly represent Stalin." Too obscure?)
I'm still waiting on that perfect documentary about "endearing rural awkwardness" in Eastern Europe. Could this succeed where Village of Socks failed?
Peruvian locals try and stick it to The Man. The Man in this case being a multinational mining corporation.
Outstanding Achievement Kim Longinotto
Filmmaker gets an interview with Pol Pot’s second in command.
Adventures in low-budget movie-making in rual Argentina.
Swedish men who became women and decided to change back. (I hear that this will also be screening at Inside Out.)
Ghandi in Gaza?
It's like Who Shot Mr. Burns?, but in reverse.
Omnibus with four "powerful short films that examine social issues in an impoverished African nation".
How things are turning out for "the last of generation of Soviet children".
Tuesday, May 4
Outstanding Achievement Kim Longinotto
The makers of Jesus Camp look at America's ongoing batlles over abortion.
From the director of Dear Pyongyang, the story of a girl growing up in North Korea.
Wednesday, May 5
Examining the state of manhood in Finland with "the world’s third-worst rugby team".
Thursday, May 6
Stars of Track and Field — the later years.
"a compelling, impressionistic journey through a devastated Gaza" following the 2009 war.
In Kazakhstan, living off the scraps of the space race.
Part of the "Focus On" spotlight on Canadian filmmaker Tahani Rached.
A look inside the secretive world of falcon smuggling.
This mid-length doc about two 90-year-old best friends sounds right down my alley.
Outstanding achievement Kim Longinotto
American Radical: the Trials of Norman Finkelstein
Professor Norman Finkelstein was fascinating and infuriating in last year's Defamation. High on the list of films most likely to cause a shouting match at the post-screening Q&A.
Eyes Wide Open - Exploring Today's South America
"soberly reviews the toll the neo-liberal agenda took on the social and economic well-being of Latin America and explores how these countries are now restructuring public power."
We Don't Care About Music Anyway
A look inside Tokyo's avant-noise music scene.
Friday, May 7
This will appeal to two not-necessarily-overlapping constituencies: those who want to see it because it's about French gastronomy, and those that want to see it because it's directed by Chris Hegedus and D.A. Pennebaker.
Outstanding Achievement Kim Longinotto
Focus On Tahani Rached
War Games and The Man Who Stopped Them
A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.
Focus On Tahani Rached
Saturday, May 8
Outstanding Achievement Kim Longinotto
Russian mobsters!
Ugly Americans look for retirement properties in Nicaragua.
Music class at Jane & Finch.
Lifting the veil, as it were, on honour killings in Toronto.
Casino Jack and the United States of Money
The sleazy world of Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
Sunday, May 9
From the director of Bus 174.
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