COURTESY OF Göran Olsson
Angela Davis and other revolutionaries are featured in "The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975."
So many films, so little time. With more than 100 movies scheduled over a four-day period, figuring out what to catch at this year's Full Frame Documentary Film Festival - which starts today - is no easy task.
To help you out, here are a few that deserve your attention:
At the Edge of Russia (today 10:40 a.m.): A young Russian soldier is sent to a desolate border outpost in the Arctic manned by a group of grizzled veterans. Beautifully shot in widescreen, the film zeroes in on a day-to-day life that includes training exercises, patrols and lots of male banter. Focusing on some of the garrison's outsize personalities, "At the Edge of Russia" also brilliantly explores the boredom and exhilaration of military life. Top-notch in every respect.
Buck (Friday, 1:10 p.m.): Buck Brannaman is sort of the real-life Horse Whisperer - he even served as a technical adviser on the Robert Redford-directed film - a man whose innovative techniques have helped alter the world of horse training. Child of an abusive background, Brannaman has gone the opposite direction, treating his charges with kindness and empathy. As he puts it, he's not dealing with horses who have problems with humans, but humans who have problems with horses. A fascinating portrait of an interesting man, and not just for equestrians.
The Loving Story (Friday, 5 p.m.): The Lovings - Richard and Mildred - were a mixed-race couple arrested and convicted of miscegenation in 1958 Virginia. Their case eventually went to the Supreme Court which, in 1967, struck down all laws banning interracial marriages. Although the film is a bit too heavily dependent on archival footage, the subject matter is utterly fascinating, a reminder of a time that seems bizarre in a country where a mixed-race man is president.
Gun Fight (Friday, 7:10 p.m.): Two-time Oscar winner Barbara Kopple ("Harlan County USA"; "American Dream") uses the Virginia Tech massacre as a jumping-off point to take on the gun lobby. Slickly made and impassioned, "Gun Fight" really goes after the NRA and what Kopple sees as its appeal to the most extreme elements in American society. A powerful polemic that will divide audiences and provoke discussion.
The Trials of Darryl Hunt (Saturday, 10:30 a.m.): In 1984, Hunt, a 20-year-old black man from Winston-Salem, was sentenced to life in prison by an all-white jury, convicted of raping and murdering a white woman. Over the next 20 years, Hunt had his conviction overturned, was convicted again, denied a third trial when DNA evidence seemingly exonerated him, and finally released when another man matched the DNA found at the crime scene and confessed. This exhaustively researched, moving and harrowing film about racism and prosecutorial misconduct shows our justice system at its worst. Winner of the audience award at the 2006 Full Frame Festival, it is being shown as part of the Career Award being given to filmmakers Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg. Worth another look.
The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 (Saturday, 4:20 p.m.): A fascinating trove of historical footage shot by Swedish TV journalists as they covered the Black Power movement during an incredibly turbulent era. Blasts from the past caught on camera include Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael, Eldridge Cleaver and Bobby Seale, with contemporary commentary by the likes of Erykah Badu, Sonia Sanchez and Harry Belafonte. The Swedish perspective is illuminating, but the film has its flaws - it could use more context, and some of the interviews run on too long. But for anyone with an interest in this era, and the history of black consciousness, this is an absolute must-see.
Sound Underground (Saturday, 4:50 p.m.): A nearly wordless, highly impressionistic study of the musicians who play in New York's subway stations. The diversity is amazing: here are solo drummers, trombone players and classical guitarists; a country duo; a lady who plays the saw; a doo-wop group; and an eight-piece jazz ensemble, with a four-man horn section. If this short (33 minutes) work has a major fault, it's its running time - material like this deserves to be longer, to give time to Latin and Asian musicians, and interviews with some of the players. But it's still lots of fun.
Nostalgia For the Light (Sunday, 10:20 a.m.): Chile's Atacama desert is home to some of the world's largest telescopes, as well as the bodies of men murdered by the dictatorial Pinochet regime. Director Patricio Guzman's film draws interesting, and offbeat, parallels between women searching for the bones of their loved ones in the desert, and astronomers scanning the skies for cosmic discoveries. Beautifully shot, iconoclastic in concept and philosophically astute.
