Who has time to be sick when there are all these movies to see? I'm having a blast. So's my nose. Day 5 Riccio . . . --- Air Guitar Nation
AIr Guitar Nation is a documentary about the Air Guitar World Championships (a proud product of Finland), and America's entry into the 2003 games courtesy of David "C-Diddy" Jung and the resilient Dan "Bjorn Turoque" Crane. The concept is funny enough, and it only becomes more laughable when we follow around the people who take it seriously. It also boasts more quotable lines than any scripted film, quirky zen absurdities like: "To air is human, to air guitar is divine." Then again, as one of the "guitarists" points out, it's actually a lot less absurd to watch than figure skating, if you really, really think about it.
Though their "craft" is ridiculous, the desire to be the best in the world at something is a compelling quest, and the characters are all so sincere that it's impossible not to get sucked in. Also, so far as performance art goes, watching people play an invisible guitar in visible (and wholly ridiculous) outfits is a lot of fun. (Also a little disturbing, such as one totally nude performer who plucks away at his, er, his, um, his . . . "banjo.") No matter how wacky, Alexendra Lipsitz's direction keeps the film steady, and the narrative arc is quite satisfying, if not a little too pat (as if it were scripted, even).
For a movie that is literally about nothing, in the purest sense of the word, Air Guitar Nation hits a lot of the right notes, and is anything but a bunch of hot air.
--- American Cannibal: The Road to Reality
American Cannibal, a surprisingly sleek and scathing documentary by Perry Grebin and Michael Nigro lacks only one thing: full access to their subject, "American Cannibal," a reality TV show pitched by two out-of-work TV writers (Gil S. Ripley and Dave Roberts) and bought by Kevin Blatt (distributor/"publicist" of the famous Hilton sex tape, A Night in Paris). As in Lost in La Mancha, everybody in this film seems to be out of control, save for the documentarians, but as informative as they are about the whole process of making TV, from pitch to production, their final act gives us all the brush off. That's more than a little rude, considering how much they make us invest in the film to that point.
American Cannibal works because it has resonant characters, a lively pace, and plenty of good humor about the whole reality TV subject. It's almost painful to watch everyone shit all over their good intentions, though as with most reality projects, there's a certain pleasure in watching a friendship (and their production company, KanDu) crumble, too. Also, it's hard to feel completely bad for them, given that the show they're producing goes beyond exploitation. The cast believes they are filming "Starvation Island" (to see who can last the longest without food); the plan is actually to test how they'll react to the prospect that they might have to resort to cannibalism. The frightening thing is that with just a little more luck and a lot more experience, "American Cannibal" might've been on your television instead of premiering at a film festival.
American Cannibal is good, solid film-making, and it's entertaining to watch. And, so far as we know, nobody died. What more could you ask of reality? (And isn't that the point?)
--- Mini's First Time
There is a first time for everything: Mini's First Time, a pitch-black comedy about a rebellious daughter who sleeps with her stepfather and uses him to kill her mother, is actually hysterical fun. Most of that has to do with the pitch-perfect casting: Alec Baldwin as the morally sketchy stepfather, Carrie-Anne Moss as the drunken whore (i.e., the mother), and Jeff Goldblum as the neighbor/pedophile. I'm sure one of those is a stretch. As for Nikki Reed, who plays Mini, she's no Lolita, and this film's a reverse on the whole concept: if anybody is using other people, it's Mini, who gets a thrill out of "firsts." That's how she first sleeps with her stepfather, in fact: being an escort is just another experiment for her.
Of course, after the murder, a persistent cop (Luke Wilson) starts closing in on the two deviant lovers (though Woody Allen might disagree), and it turns out that things aren't all fun and games. That's not entirely true though: writer/director Nick Guthe keeps all the disgusting violence as fun and games, and that's exactly what makes the whole thing so deliciously entertaining. There's no room for guilt, so it's just pleasure pleasure the whole way through, and that's a sin I don't mind committing.
--- The TV Set
The TV Set, directed and written by Jake Kasdan, is not a documentary, but I can believe that it's a fairly accurate depiction of the struggle pilots undergo to make it on air, and of the constant compromises artists endure in order to get their work through an assembly line of executives who think they know better. The casting is a little humdrum (save for Sigourney Weaver's brilliant performance as the bitch of all bitch executives), but it's not that they're bad in their roles so much as that they're playing such ordinary roles. David Duchovney (the writer) may never escape typecasting, and Ioan Griffudd (the second-in-command) is almost hiding (from Fantastic Four, perhaps?) in his role.
Like I said, The TV Set almost works better as a documentary (or, like Pittsburgh, as a docu-comedy): some of the scenes are quite slow (by necessity) and the narrative structure is a little bland and uncompelling to those who aren't looking for semi-subtle parody (it's certainly far from over-the-top). Anybody in the industry will no doubt laugh about this film over a couple of drinks, but they'll have earned those laughs. The rest of us have to work harder to appreciate the film, and that's the last thing you want out of a comedy, even a nice, simple, decent one like this.
--- Lockdown, USA
I'm sure this statement will cause someone to simply write me off as a racist, but I assure you, there is nothing sinister in my harsh assessment of Lockdown, USA as a poorly made documentary. I disagree with the message of the film (that the drug laws are "too" harsh). This is not because I want to see more people in jail; this is because Lockdown, USA hasn't convinced me that the current policy is wrong. Their linchpin case is Darryl Best, and I sympathize with the fact that an innocent man may have to spend a minimum of fifteen years behind bars (thanks to the Rockefella laws), and that his family is suffering. But that's not really the fault of the Rockefella laws so much as with the whole system of conviction; the problem is that Best's lawyers could not prove reasonable doubt against an aggressive D.A. None of these questions arise in Lockdown, USA, but that's because the film is agitprop: it isn't interested in solutions, it just wants to glorify Russell Simmons, and with him, hip-hop as a socially-conscious and mobilizing force. (If anything, it does the opposite.)
Given its presentation, Lockdown, USA is practically a comedy: Simmons doesn't know much about the law he's trying to abolish (nor, apparently, do any of his hip-hop peers, like Fat Joe). But he's got money, money he's willing to throw around in an effort to show the "power" of hip-hop (and his own munificence). This makes him look incredibly stupid (as the filthy rich often do), and is a strong argument against people like Simmons getting involved in politics. (Too bad that's not the point of this documentary.) I always had this image of Russell Simmons as the nice, laidback guy who comes out at the end of HBO's Def Poetry Jam: it's weird to hear him cursing and saying "nigger." In any case, for some "unexplicable" reason (heavy on sarcasm), he alienates the political lobbiests who recruited him to their cause in the first place, and winds up being a scapegoat for the minimal reform that Pataki eventually passes off as a "huge" achievement.
All in all, Lockdown, USA points out some interesting statistics about the increasing market for prisoners as a commodity (and hence the necessity for harsher laws to keep them there), but the whole film seems so unfounded and unfocused that it's actually hard to follow. This one-sided piece of unobjective drivel will play well to its target demographic--huge hip-hop fans--but to everyone else, it will appear simply as it is: aimless propaganda for a hopeless cause.
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