Favorite Documentary?

[Anonymous User]

I've never heard of Klaus Nomi until my roomate who works UMVD and gets all these free movies brought one home that covers his life. It was a great movie, strange and tragic but great. If people don't like it then it's just because he was a hard person to understand. Anyone see it?

[Ed, Ego and Superego]

I once saw one that takes place in a little Florida town.  The filmmaker interviews the locals (yokels) and they talk about life, and stuff, and theres a lot of turkey hunting.  
But here is the catch:  I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the darn movie or town.  I do know this, however, in the movie Kalifornia,  Brad Pitt (I think it is) puts a stuffed toy/pillow over a guy's head and shoots him.   Right before this, the guy says he's from that same town and does some turkey hunting.   The theme of turkey hunting is a huge part of this documentary.  
Ideas?
-Ed (who usually remember much more than this)

[daveblackeye15]

I kinda liked Legened  of Boggy Creek (or something like that)

Okay it was a mockumentary but I still liked it.

[Mr_Vindictive]

When it comes to documentaries, I'd have to say that Control Room is at the top of my list.  

It's an amazing doc that takes a look at the Al-Jazeera news network at the beginning of the Iraq war.  The film shows that although those in power in our country call Al-Jazeera the mouthpiece of the terrorists, they're actually quite level headed, even moreso than our own media.  They just report what they see without any type of editing to make it sugar coated.

Superb film and well worth checking out.

I have a review here: http://keeptheticket.com/reviews.php?searchrid=19

[Yaddo 42]

I saw "Control Room" and liked it too, but thought that the network was somewhat conflicted as far as being objective. I did like seeing scenes like where the one guy who wanted to come to America (and he said he'd even work for Fox News if they'd have him) was translating with little notice an interview with what he was told was a US government official, only to find out that the guy was a spokesman for a think tank or group. Then to see him chewing out the man who brought him in for not checking out who they were putting on the air. Plus some of the extras scenes on the DVD were funny like the NBC correspondent being told to change the way he pronounced Qatar on the air since Chris Matthews had already pronounced it differently on the air. It was funny to me since since I've seen Matthews make tons of verbal goofs, factual foul ups, bad jokes, inappropriate references, etc. when he's on his show and he on a roll. He almost starts foaming at the mouth he gets so carried away with himself at times.

As for a good documentary to recommend, Werner Herzog's "My Best Fiend". It's his portrait of the late Klaus Kinski and their bizarre relationship over the five films they made together. Lots of clips of the films mixed with interviews of people involved and clips of the making of some films (lots of stuff from "The Burden of Dreams" about making "Fitzcarraldo"). Herzog first met Kinski when Herzog was a child in post war Germany and his behavior was crazed even then. Great wild stories and rememberances, footage of Kinski facing off with an audience during one of his "Jesus" stage readings, and this odd little clip of Kinski playing with a butterfly. The man was certainly insane (the film claims Herzog and Kinski had competing schemes to murder each other at one point), but for all his violence, pouting, and self-absorbtion, to see this this madman playing with a delicate creature like a contented happy child is strange.

[SaintMort]

I haven't seen enough to have an amazing opinion however I liked the Snowball Effect quite alot (it's about the making of clerks)

I'm more of a mockumentary fan

[Mr_Vindictive]

Ed,

Could the film you're thinking of be Vernon, Florida by Errol Morris?

[Ed, Ego and Superego]

Ska,
 Yes, thats the one.  I saw it in 1992 or so at an on-campus film festival in college and have not thought of it much since.  Here's the IMDB listing.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083281/

Ed

[Anonymous User]

If your into Documentary film & into rock&roll then you have to see a movie called "Edgeplay". It's a film about the all girl band The Runaways. The film is directed by one of the members. Some of the band members were Lita ford, Joan Jett, & the actress Cherie Currie form the movie "Foxes". It's a great film.

[peter johnson]

I just saw "The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill" -- I can't say it's my favorite documentary, but it does remind me of why I like the genre --
"Woodstock" is a great documentary.
"Cocksucker Blues" is also a great documentary, for the same reasons "Woodstock" is --
Any good concert video is really a documentary film --
While there is some debate as to how "true" it really is, "Nanook of The North"(1927) is really the precursor to every and any sort of sociological documentary film, and really set a lot of standards for the genre.
For my favorite, I have to nominate "Louie Bluie", about the old Texas blues singer of the same name.  I can't remember who shot it, but it's just so true and good and pure . . . plus lots of crude sex jokes & bizzarro porno art & strange poetry etc. etc.   -- seriously:  Seek this one out.
peter johnson/denny crane

[Scott]

HEART OF DARKNESS is one of my favorites. It's the making of APOCALYPSE NOW.

Would like to see CONTROL ROOM. Sounds interesting.

As a kid in the 70's I believed the movie LEGEND OF BOGEY CREEK to be real. I saw the creature as some sort of 3 toed bigfoot and they had yet to catch it. The boy running home along the wire fence and many other scenes were really scary. The director really knew how to make'em.

[Yaddo 42]

A friend told me the most surreal experience he'd ever had was seeing "Hearts of Darkness" in dubbed in German while he was visiting Europe. That followed by  not being able to convince any of his German friends that David Hasselhoff was only considered a third-rate TV actor in America, and that he couldn't give his music away over here.

[Dolph Lundgren]

To this day, it's Hitman Hart: Wrestling with Shadows.  I used to be a big wrestling fan, but I haven't seen any wrestling related program in a few years.  That being said, I dug this out a few days ago and watched it for old times sake.  The memories came flooding back.  To me, there's just so many parts that are almost surreal: Stu Hart's dungeon (probably the most disturbing thing I've seen), Bret Hart's obsession with his "Hitman Hart" character, although the character is pretty much him to a t, why the cameras just happened to be following Hart around before the infamous incident in Montreal, Hart complaining about family values in America, despite him being a complete ass toward his (now ex) wife, just how much of a jerk McMahon really was/is, and realizing how many people have died since the documentary's been made.  It's really interesting to go back and watch.  For some reason, I can't get enough of this documentary.

[Scottie]

I remember the day Owen Hart died in the ring and the subsequent refusal of Brett to attend a 2 hour WWF wrestling special dedicated to his brother. Oh man, I still have "Long Live Owen" and "Owen is not a nugget" written on the curtains in my room. I, like you Dolph, am a long time wrestling fan who has recently abandoned the sport, yet still loves to reminisce. I have a number of ECW tapes and an IWA death match tape I watch on rainy days.