Tag: documentary

AFI Docs begins tonight with a Werner Herzog treat on Friday

AFI Docs has arrived! For one week every summer, the American Film Institute takes over DC, hosting five days of screenings for new documentaries and documentary shorts. AFI Docs attracts top talent from around the world – including, this year, a special event with Werner Herzog and his new film Lo and Behold. Tickets for … Continue reading “AFI Docs begins tonight with a Werner Herzog treat on Friday”

AFI Docs has arrived! For one week every summer, the American Film Institute takes over DC, hosting five days of screenings for new documentaries and documentary shorts. AFI Docs attracts top talent from around the world – including, this year, a special event with Werner Herzog and his new film Lo and Behold.

Tickets for Herzogpalooza are already sold out, but there are plenty of other documentaries to watch this week in downtown DC and Silver Spring. Highlights include…

  • The Man Who Saw Too Much, about a photojournalist who covered crime and tragedy in Mexico City for five decades.
  • Toucan Nation, which looks at toucan rehabilitation programs and animal welfare laws.
  • Sonita, the story of an aspiring rapper living in Iran, where women are not allowed perform music.
  • Obit, a behind-the-scenes look at the New York Times‘s obituary department.

The festival kicks off tonight with a screening of Zero Days, a new documentary from Alex Gibney (director of HBO’s Going Clear) about American Stuxnet virus reporetedly designed to attack Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

Tickets cost around $12 each, the usual price for a high-end movie screening. See the AFI Docs website for a full list of what’s playing this week. Or you can get the official app!

Documentarians name their 50 favorite documentaries

We’re suckers for any good, contentious list of best films. Whenever a publication puts together their top 300 films or the best horror movies, it inevitably has a few holes, which is an opportunity to talk about what makes art great. (It also give us justification to argue about movies.) The latest “best of” roundup … Continue reading “Documentarians name their 50 favorite documentaries”

We’re suckers for any good, contentious list of best films. Whenever a publication puts together their top 300 films or the best horror movies, it inevitably has a few holes, which is an opportunity to talk about what makes art great. (It also give us justification to argue about movies.)

The latest “best of” roundup comes from The Guardian, which asked top documentary filmmakers, including the directors of Waste Land and Man on Wire, to name their favorite documentaries. The usual suspects make the list – Hoop Dreams, Capturing the Friedmans, and The Thin Blue Line makes appearances – as well as a few odder names. (We’re pleased to see the inclusion of The Five Obstructions, a Lars von Trier experiment about the process of producing a film under increasingly absurd limitations.)

The list reflects a wide variety of styles, from Holocaust documentary Night and Fog to the strange meta-story of Sherman’s March. The Guardian’s fifty films are an excellent sampling of the genre. And since the contributors point out that their selections are only reflective of their own tastes, not the whole state of documentary filmmaking, it’s hard to quibble with the choices.

Most if every film on this list is available to watch at Media Services in the AU Library. We’ve also put together our own list of the 500 most essential documentaries in our collection. Both lists are great starting points if you’ve wanted to watch more documentaries but aren’t sure where to begin.

Watch these great new documentaries from Docuseek2

From Big Dream Our media librarian Chris Lewis once called streaming video website Docuseek2 “an embarrassment of riches” for fans of documentaries. We’re not gonna disagree: Docuseek2 lets you stream some incredibly high-quality documentary films, and this week, their collection got even larger. 43 new titles are now available via Docuseek2, including the comedic short … Continue reading “Watch these great new documentaries from Docuseek2”

From Big Dream

Our media librarian Chris Lewis once called streaming video website Docuseek2 “an embarrassment of riches” for fans of documentaries. We’re not gonna disagree: Docuseek2 lets you stream some incredibly high-quality documentary films, and this week, their collection got even larger.

43 new titles are now available via Docuseek2, including the comedic short Drones in My Backyard, women-in-STEM documentary Big Dream, and I Am Become Death: They Made the Bomb, a collection of interviews with participants in the Manhattan Project. Docuseek2 picks their films well, so even without seeing them, we can reasonably recommend everything they’ve added this month.

We added a full list of Docuseek2’s newest additions to the end of this list. If you want to browse the rest of their other 700+ films, you can always browse our full catalog list of Docuseek2 titles.

A Fragile Trust
After Winter, Spring
Arresting Power
Banking Nature
Beltracchi: The Art of Forgery
Big Dream
Black Dawn
Captivated: The Trials of Pamela Smart
Cheat Neutral
Code Black
Cuba: The Accidental Revolution – Pt. 2
Diamond Road
Divide In Concord
Drones In My Backyard
Game Over: Conservation in Kenya
Gore Vidal
GTFO
I Am Become Death: They Made the Bomb
Independent Intervention
Inside Burma
Japan’s Peace Constitution
Kabul Transit
Madam Phung’s Last Journey
Monumental
Oil and Water
Racing To Zero
Salvador Allende
School of Babel
Shift Change
Soldiers of Conscience
South Africa Belongs to Us
Split Estate (short version)
The Hand That Feeds
The Homestretch
The Motherhood Manifesto
The Mystery of the Lost Red Paint People
The Storytelling Class
The Tree that Remembers
The Trouble with Bread
They Are We
Toast
Where Am I? 
Without Shepherds

Take the Media Services Challenge: watch these 100 great documentaries

Congratulations on, presumably, passing mid-terms! Your workload will likely be in a bit of a downswing before we head into final project season, so you might be ready to spend some time chipping away at things you’ve been meaning to watch. If you’re the type that has always wanted to see more documentaries but never … Continue reading “Take the Media Services Challenge: watch these 100 great documentaries”

Congratulations on, presumably, passing mid-terms! Your workload will likely be in a bit of a downswing before we head into final project season, so you might be ready to spend some time chipping away at things you’ve been meaning to watch. If you’re the type that has always wanted to see more documentaries but never knew where to start, we have 100 films for your list.

This summer, we all put our brains together and made a list of the 100 best documentaries available in our collection through streaming. There are a few classics including The Battle of Chile and King Corn, as well as odder ones like The Yes Men Save the World. All of these documentaries are free to watch via your web browser if you sign into your library account, and they’re among the best in our collection.

If you’re feeling really driven, we’re challenging anyone with a hunger for documentaries to watch all 100 on the list before they graduate. No one has yet completed the Media Services Challenge, but if you do, we will enshrine you in a place of glory that we have yet to determine, probably on the wall next to your desk. It’s like a Man vs. Food challenge, but with fewer ribs and more social theory.

Four years ago, Scottish environmentalists took on Trump

With all the hot air swirling about Donald Trump in the past week, now because of his debate performance, we often forget that he was a blowhard in business before he was a blowhard in politics. He’s received flak for some of his higher-profile real-estate projects, many of which involve taking over historic spaces like … Continue reading “Four years ago, Scottish environmentalists took on Trump”

With all the hot air swirling about Donald Trump in the past week, now because of his debate performance, we often forget that he was a blowhard in business before he was a blowhard in politics. He’s received flak for some of his higher-profile real-estate projects, many of which involve taking over historic spaces like his purchase of Old Post Office Pavilion downtown. But once in a while when takes on the little guy, the little guy fights backs.

In the 2012 documentary You’ve Been Trumped, Trump pressures the Scottish government into loosening environmental regulations so he can construct a golf course on the coastline. Activists didn’t take kindly to this, and the film documents their protracted fight to preserve the Scottish coast, as well as looks at the general environmental damage caused by over-development. Trump famously tried to prohibit the release of this documentary and later called it “boring,” which to us reads as a glowing endorsement.

AU students, staff, and faculty can watch You’ve Been Trumped for free as part of our collection from Docuseek2. Log in via the catalog to stream the documentary from your device of choice. We understand if you’re sick of the Donald, but this is an excellently made film and a timely opportunity to continue with the pillorying.

AFIDOCS is underway!

Time for a quick PSA: the annual AFIDOCS documentary film festival kicked off yesterday! AFIDOCS is a terrific, half-week-long, city-spanning event that showcases new documentary features and shorts from around the world. Visit the AFIDOCS website for a list of where and when everything will be playing. Many of these documentaries will screen at the … Continue reading “AFIDOCS is underway!”

Time for a quick PSA: the annual AFIDOCS documentary film festival kicked off yesterday! AFIDOCS is a terrific, half-week-long, city-spanning event that showcases new documentary features and shorts from around the world.

Visit the AFIDOCS website for a list of where and when everything will be playing. Many of these documentaries will screen at the AFI’s flagship theater in Silver Spring, but other theaters throughout the city are participating if you don’t feel like making the trek on the Red Line.

If we have to play favorites with this year’s assemblage, we would pick The Look of Silence (Joshua Oppenheimer’s follow-up to The Act of Killing) and Code: Debugging the Gender Gap, which examines the history of women in computer programming.

Buy your tickets in advance if you can. These screenings will sell out!

Head back to dino-school before seeing Jurassic World

 What will blow up the box office this summer? Dino might. …okay, fine, we’re sorry. The point is that Jurassic World, the fourth movie in the Jurassic Park franchise, is going to be monstrously successful this weekend. Nearly every child of a certain age became obsessed with dinosaurs at the same time because of Jurassic … Continue reading “Head back to dino-school before seeing Jurassic World”

 What will blow up the box office this summer? Dino might.

…okay, fine, we’re sorry. The point is that Jurassic World, the fourth movie in the Jurassic Park franchise, is going to be monstrously successful this weekend. Nearly every child of a certain age became obsessed with dinosaurs at the same time because of Jurassic Park. In fact, we’re certain you can still name your favorite dinosaur.

We want to stoke that excitement again. So in addition to promoting our Jurassic Park movie collection (specifically the bonus disc that came with the trilogy box set, DVD 4904), we want to talk about our educational dinosaur videos. A catalog search turns up over fifty dinosaur-related items in our collection; here are a few highlights to get your dino-juices flowing.

(All these videos are available to watch streaming via the library catalog.)

  • Dino Death Trap: Take a close look at a Pompeii-type graveyard of dinosaur species trapped in lava – and well-preserved!
  • Dino Revolution: This video from 2000 sheds light on then-recent discoveries linking dinosaurs to birds
  • How to Build a Dinosaur: Watch up-close as scientists piece together dinosaur skeletons and reveal how they work on these reconstructions.
  • Reconstructing T-Rex: A 2009 documentary about recent discoveries about everyone’s favorite giant terrifying apex predator.
  • Dino Math: So this one isn’t really about dinosaurs, but it has kids solving math problems with dinosaur manipulatives. We figured this would bring back some good memories.

Early reviews indicate that Jurassic World is exciting but not quite as inspiring as the original. We hope this doesn’t prevent a new generation of kids from having their own overly-excited-about-dinosaurs phase. Luckily, we have educational dinosaur content like the videos above the carry the torch.

With Letterman’s departure, walk back through the old guard of late night

David Letterman ends his late night talk show career tonight. Although he has certainly settled into a curmudgeonly pattern in the last decade or so – and is probably indistinguishable from Jay Leno for many younger viewers – Letterman’s earlier years behind the desk remain some of the stranger and riskier network television ever produced.  … Continue reading “With Letterman’s departure, walk back through the old guard of late night”

David Letterman ends his late night talk show career tonight. Although he has certainly settled into a curmudgeonly pattern in the last decade or so – and is probably indistinguishable from Jay Leno for many younger viewers – Letterman’s earlier years behind the desk remain some of the stranger and riskier network television ever produced.  He pioneered the use of absurdism and sarcasm in the traditional talk show model, like in an episode where the screen rotated throughout the evening. He’s certainly an institution now, but for many years, Letterman broadcast on the edge of what producers would allow.

Letterman is the last remaining network talk show host who started before the year 2000, and his retirement arguably symbolizes the end of the old guard of late night television. This got us thinking about the history of late night and the older figureheads who defined the genre for earlier generations.

If you want to learn a little about the history of late night talk shows, we found a great documentary, Pioneers of Television, that covers the first twenty years of the format. We’re sure everyone is sick of hearing about Johnny Carson’s borderline canonization, but there’s great bits in there, like the story of host Jack Paar’s sudden disappearance mid-program. This is a streaming video, so you can access it off-campus and watch it at any time.

The talk show has certainly evolved beyond those older shows, with Jimmy Fallon’s energy or Eric Andre’s aggressive surrealism marking the new goal posts for future hosts. But it’s worth a trip back to remember why Letterman’s weirdness mattered in the television landscape.

See these 100 streaming documentaries before you graduate

AU students get access to our streaming video collection, which includes thousands of hours of great documentaries. We realize that there’s quite a bit to sort through, so finding the best of them (or even knowing to look for them) might be a challenge. To help you navigate the highlights of our collection, we’ve assembled … Continue reading “See these 100 streaming documentaries before you graduate”

AU students get access to our streaming video collection, which includes thousands of hours of great documentaries. We realize that there’s quite a bit to sort through, so finding the best of them (or even knowing to look for them) might be a challenge.

To help you navigate the highlights of our collection, we’ve assembled a list of the 100 Streaming Documentaries to See Before You Graduate. Everyone on the full-time Media Services staff helped put this list together, and we think it represents the best of the best online video content that you can get through American University.

You might recognize a few big names like the Ken Burns Prohibition series and environmental classic King Corn, but we found something for most every subject and interest. Literature students might be interested in an hour-long Bill Moyers interview with George Lucas about creating the mythology of Star Wars. And for political science majors, you can’t miss Street Fight, an unprecedented look at the ground game for now-Senator Cory Booker’s campaign for mayor.

Take advantage of these resources and watch these documentaries while you can! For those of you graduating in May, you’ve got a little over a month to binge all of them.

Caught up with The Jinx? Watch these investigative crime documentaries

HBO’s true-crime documentary series The Jinx ended in shock this week when the show’s subject, real estate magnate Robert Durst, confessed to multiple murders over an open microphone and was subsequently arrested. No spoiler warning on this one: Durst’s arrest made international headlines. After all, how often does a documentary change the course of the … Continue reading “Caught up with The Jinx? Watch these investigative crime documentaries”

HBO’s true-crime documentary series The Jinx ended in shock this week when the show’s subject, real estate magnate Robert Durst, confessed to multiple murders over an open microphone and was subsequently arrested. No spoiler warning on this one: Durst’s arrest made international headlines. After all, how often does a documentary change the course of the legal system?

As it turns out, The Jinx is only the latest documentary that resulted in arrests, appeals, and settlements. The true-crime genre is having its moment with the success of podcasts like Serial, but filmmakers have long been fascinated by controversial legal battles to the point of essentially intervening in the cases. If you enjoyed The Jinx – or if you just find the Durst story compelling – consider watching these four documentaries in our collection that famously jumpstarted the legal process.

Ken Burns investigated the story of a racially polarized rape case from 1989 in which five black and Hispanic minors were convicted on various assault-related charges despite a lack of evidence. Burns towards a damning eye towards the racist testimony and media coverage that propelled the case, as well as the accused party’s struggle to find closure after their convictions were overturned. Shortly after the release of this documentary, the city of New York awarded $41 million to the Central Park Five for emotional distress.

In 1994, three teenagers in Arkansas were convicted for the murder of three children in a supposedly Satanic ritualistic murder. The filmmakers of Paradise Lost were not satisfied with the trial, which used no physical evidence, and spent nearly twenty years investigating the murders and lobbying for the West Memphis Three’s innocence. Arkansas courts took notice, re-examined the case, and released the three convicted men after DNA evidence proved inconclusive.

Was the death of North Carolina woman Kathleen Peterson a stair-related accident or murder? This eight-part documentary series looks into the ongoing murder trial of Kathleen’s husband Michael and tries to find the answer. The filmmakers were given “unusual access” to the Peterson family and lawyers to produce this documentary. Michael Peterson remains in legal limbo, and this documentary is responsible for the increased scrutiny afforded to the case.

Randall Dale Adams was wrongly sentenced to death for the murder of a Texas police officer in 1976. Now-legendary documentarian Errol Morris poked holes through Adams’s trial in The Thin Blue Line, using a combination of reenactments and interviews to build the case for his defense. Within a year of the film’s 1988 release, Adams was a free man.