Is This The Real Life? Documentaries You Love

[Smilla]

Thanks for your post, Lula! I've been dying to see Grey Gardens for a while now, but have had trouble getting my hands on a copy.

[topher]

I got half way through Stevie last night. What a sad life this guy went through.

The background of this is the director was a Big Brother to Stevie when the director was in college during the 80s. He goes back and finds out what happen to Stevie since then.

One more that I really liked was Sound and Fury. A look at a deaf family dealing with cochlear implants. It really opened my eyes to the deaf world.

[Smilla]

Has anyone seen the documentary, Crumb, about the life of R. Crumb, the cartoonist? Good documentary...don't know how I feel about the subject.

[Deleted]

Some Kind of Monster might be my favorite documentary ever. How fascinating that these guys opened up in front of the camera like that! I am not even a fan of Metallica's music but I love them anyway.

Capturing the Friedman's was excellent as well. Disturbing and thought provoking. Denial, man. It's a bitch.

I have been meaning to watch the 7 Up series for years. It looks like netflix only has up to 35 Up. That's no good.

Spellbound was pretty good. Damn, I wish I would have entered spelling bees!

Festival Express. I was hoping it would have more behind the scences stuff but the live performances were cool.

I just got Word Wars yesterday. I'll let y'all know how it is.

[Deleted]

Has anyone seen or have any thoughts on Edet Belzberg's "Children Underground"?

This made me want to run to Romania and adopt all these poor kids, which I know is illegal as Romania does not all international adoptions. God this film broke my heart.

[jennipoo]

I know this thread is about documentaries that you love, but just wanted to say that White Enamel scared the shit out of me. As in, I couldn't move from my couch for 4 hours and only then because my husband came home. Supposedly it's about the "real" Blair Witch. Someone on ye olde syte tried to convince me it wasn't real, but I never really got a clear answer. Or maybe I did and I'm just a big ol' baby.

[decormaven]

If you liked Riding With Giants, check out Dogtown and Z Boys, which details the 70's skateboard stars from California. While it's a bit draggy in parts, it's a good reflection of that era. I also enjoyed Spellbound about the National Spelling Bee.

Edited because my font finessing isn't quite there yet on this board.

[foxfair]

I love this thread!

I've also got another doc to recommend - it was aired on PBS and was, I think, a Frontline production. Anyway, it was called 'The Farmer's Wife' and it followed a family trying to make a go of their farm somewhere in the midwest (I don't remember the state) - it was very long, more than 6 hours, and it mainly focused on the wife/mother. It was another one that you can't quite work out whether you feel uplifted or totally depressed upon coming to the end of it. The woman had a HARD life and so did the husband. After it aired there was a big debate regarding the husband and whether or not he was a 'bad husband' (he did a lot pf physical farm work but seemed unable to help his wife emotionally or with the kids and dumped a lot of his own emotional problems on her to deal with - there was a big gender split in who was sympathetic to which spouse). Anyway, very engrossing and, to some degree, shocking - I can't really conceive of a life like that, especially these days.

I'm interested in hearing more on 'White Enamel' although not sure I should. I couldn't walk my dog in the woods for a month after seeing Blair Witch.

[topher]

If you liked Riding With Giants, check out Dogtown and Z Boys, which details the 70's skateboard stars from California.

It being delivered by Netflix today.

[ribbue]

I've also got another doc to recommend - it was aired on PBS and was, I think, a Frontline production. Anyway, it was called 'The Farmer's Wife'

Foxfair, wow, thanks for bringing The Farmer's Wife up because I totally forgot about it! Seriously, there are so many great documentaries, but this may be my favorite. Very heartbreaking. I wonder what their lives are like now.

I won't repeat many of the great documentaries mentioned here, but I would also add two very small ones that I've seen played every so often on The Sundance Channel. The first, called Closer to Home, is about a couple getting married and their relatives' (Jewish on one side, German on the other) experiences during WWII in the Holocaust and the Gestapo. The second one is a bit more fun, about a moviemaker's obsession with a French ex-politician/businessman/actor called Who Is Bernard Tapie?. I think Steven Soderbergh, a friend of the director, was the producer.

Finally, this probably belongs in the Unpopular DOCUMENTARY Opinions thread if there is ever one created, but for whatever reason I was not a fan of Spellbound.