Over the holiday weekend, The Sundance Channel is offering up some fairly rare and truly magnificent documentaries. Watch, tape or Tivo, but try not to miss them…
On Friday…
The Other Final - Johan Kramer's remarkably humane and joyous documentary takes us behind the scenes as the two lowest ranked FIFA members, Bhutan and Montserrat, prepare to have their own match a day before the World Cup final. I saw the picture at the Bermuda International Film Festival and have been blathering on about it ever since… though I have seen it on very, very few festival schedules. It’s a feel good doc, but in surprising and challenging ways.
The Game Of Their Lives – This is a bit more straight forward. Daniel Gordon tells the story of North Korea’s trip to the semi-finals – a first – of the World Cup. Fascinating, especially for those of us who do not see football as a national obsession.
And on Sunday…
Whole – Melody Gilbert offers us this doc on a subject that few people have ever even considered, much less looked at in such detail… people who want to have amputations to “complete themselves,” in very much the same way people want sex changes or plastic surgery. It really doesn’t seem like a winner from the outside, but seeing the film at the LAFF two years ago had a really powerful effect on me. We must remember the complexities of the human mind in order to continue to appreciate the complexity of the many who think so differently than you or I might.
Also over the weekend, really worth your time and a bit more accessible in recent years… Amargosa, The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam, Hoover Street Revival and the fabulously insane Dear Fidel: Marita’s Story.
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