Tag: Documentary

It has been awhile since I have reviewed a food documentary. Honestly, after you have seen a few, they all start to blend together into the same knowledge pool. I can’t tell you the difference between so many of the ones I have reviewed anymore now.

So while they might not have individual lasting power, the information is something that usually you can keep inside. And despite knowing that, I still decided to watch and review Sugar Coated.

In terms of food and health documentaries, you can pretty much figure out what the main topic of discussion this one will be about. Unfortunately, another food documentary I saw at some point also was about how sugar was the real problem area, I just can’t tell you which one it was. Sorry. My bad.

And it turns out that the sugar industry is basically literally the worst thing ever, of course.

“Bitch, take all the sugar you want, we’re rich!”

I will be honest with you, it is really hard for me to talk about this documentary. Sugar, for actually a long time, has been considered toxic by some scientists. Not a lot of scientists, but some have talked about it. And it turns out that leading advocates of the sugar companies have tried to bury any scientific discovery about it.

Sure, okay makes sense. Then they are compared to the tobacco industry, making it seem like there is no consensus on the results of sugar and that more testing has to be done. And yeah, that is really shitty.

When it comes down to the analysis of this movie, I feel like I didn’t learn a whole lot of new information. In fact, the information about the history and the actual cover up, the only thing I have really retained, is all from the second half of the documentary. I wouldn’t call the first half filler, but it is full of information I have heard before and doesn’t fully grasp me.

At the same time, despite agreeing with the documentary and believing it to be correct, it presents information in a way that promotes flashiness over actual information. I always get weary over data presented in his format, and worry if what they are showing is correct or cherry picked information. Again, I don’t think the documentary is wrong, but its arguments are presented in lesser formats that lower the overall quality of the film.

Either way, this documentary isn’t going to end up on any best of the year lists, but can be interesting to someone if they are interested in a dietary change.

Michael Moore hasn’t made a documentary in six years. His last one was Capitalism: A Love Story back in 2009. Way back then, I didn’t have a movie review website. I was just a regular guy who watched movies. C:ALS was my first Moore documentary, hearing a lot about him growing up (thanks to Team America: World Police) and a lot of bad things thrown his way. So I watched all of his documentaries at that point in a single day.

And you know what I realized? I realized that the documentaries weren’t bad. Sure, Moore could be a bit of a jerk. And no, I didn’t agree with everything he said. But he also made a lot of great points and he tried to put them out in an entertaining way. Not all documentaries have to be super serious.

Either way, with all of the bad things going on in America, I am just surprised it has been so long since a new documentary. And when I heard this one was called Where To Invade Next, I again just made assumptions about the documentary and rolled my eyes. Every time I thought they would be terrible, and every time I have been wrong.

I figured this one would be about the wars in the middle east, why they are bad, and you know, the stuff I already knew. I don’t care about another war documentary.

But Moore fooled me. Instead this was a documentary about himself “invading” other countries, for the most part, European/English speaking places, in order to conquer them and steal their best attributes. And you know, steal them for America, which is what we do in wars or something.

I can’t make a joke here, because I have looked just as ridiculous in this pose.

So where do we go? Welllllll…

We go to Italy, where they have great work benefits, vacations if you get married, 8 weeks of vacation a year, and double pay in December. Then France, where the school cafeteria is actually good, lunch is class where your food is served, you have courses, learn to eat with style. In Finland, their school system is now the best, and they don’t even do homework, and sometimes only go to school 3-4 hours a day!

Speaking of school, in Slovakia, all of college is free. Even for foreigners, meaning Americans. Most people protest when there is a tuition increase, in America, we just say okay.

In Germany, there is free health care and spa vacations from work (for free) if you are too stressed. Hell, they even have a big middle class and workers serve on the board of directors!

Portugal got rid of outlawing drugs, and drug use went down. Norway has prisons that are like isolated communities, with your own house or room and very nice basic needs to survive. In Tunisia, the government funds abortions and in Iceland, women have led for a long time and are seen as great leaders thanks to progressive views. Things are very stable in Iceland (politically and socially, not economically or geologically).

And that is the crux of the documentary. A lot of foreign countries, most of which are super white and some that speak English well, have a lot of great stuff going on. Stuff that should happen in America, the wealthiest country. The land of the free. But certain rich people don’t want this to happen, and we then have a lot of problems.

Some of this you would have heard before and some of it is new. It is still an interesting thing worthy of discussion. But you know, Moore is still a dick.

Magic is possibly the greatest card game ever made, but I am a bit biased. I played for over a decade, in and out, depending on school and setting. At one point I was in tournaments weekly, paying $15 just for sweet cards and sweet fun.

And eventually I stopped playing and became a collector. Then in my mind they tried to piss off collectors more and more, either making everything fun super rare, or super common. It used to one special card a pre-release tournament every set, and then it ballooned to 40. No one has time for that.

Needless to say, I eventually sold my collection and quit magic for the most part, only willing to go back and play on a purely casual basis. I still keep up to date with the card game and they have had quite a few blunders in the last few years, alienating members of the community and their own judges for tournaments.

But now they have decided to fully back a documentary, Enter the Battlefield: Life on the Magic – The Gathering Pro Tour. Show casing individuals who are great players, who actually do make money from magic and winning huge tournaments. So yeah, show that off, let the kids dream and people might want to become great magic players! Or just show us what it takes and what people have to give up to achieve these high levels of success. Give us that sympathy level and make them feel human.

This is widely considered to be the best magic card in the game’s history.

Except this documentary does’t do any of that. It is little more than become a fluff piece on a few great players currently playing magic, with a bit of there stories.

In the intro it briefly explains the game and the tournament scene, as narrated by Wil Wheaton. It doesn’t do a great job of selling the game though, and anyone who isn’t already a fan won’t suddenly become one.

A large portion of the documentary is around three American players who formed a “team” to get better, the first female to get int he top 8 of one of the biggest tournaments, a long time magic player and writer, someone desperately trying to get into the Hall of Fame, and the last winner of the World Magic Championship, the biggest crazy tournament.

And sure, it may sound diverse, but really it is a bunch of Americans and an American-Israeli guy. It is awkward to see footage of the best tournament, see that 2 of the top 4 are from Japan, where one is highly considered to be the best player in the world, and not have them more featured in the documentary. It is just very pro American, pro English speaking players, instead of highlighting who actually might be the best.

At only an hour long, this documentary is quick to watch, but I fail to see what the actual purpose of it is. It won’t work to get new people into magic. It won’t make people want to become pro tour champions anymore than they already did (and cutting their appearance fees right before the documentary came out was also a strange tactic). And no one will really learn a lot about the game if they don’t already know magic.

This is a strange documentary. Like it feels like it was just an idea to waste some time, then someone thought it was good enough to release. Sure. Why not. And it will be forgotten about in a month.

Causing me pain with his stinger,
Shocking my life with lasers,
Killing Me Safely with TASER
Killing me safely…with TASER!

That’s right, we are talking about the wonderful TASER made by TASER International. The actual first shocking device was developed in the late 60’s early 70’s but it took decades to really hit off. The original problem with the device is that they weren’t really strong enough to do anything. You would get a slight zap and fight through it. They couldn’t just make it stronger, that could be bad news.

Well, eventually they were able to make it stronger and stop even the strongest guy from coming forward. They had science on their side to say it would do no real harm to those getting shocked. In most police departments as part of training they have to get shot with it to know just what it feels like to use it responsibly. The point of the TASER is to turn normally lethal situations into non-lethal situations. Now instead of shooting a bad guy, they can shock them and put them down and arrest them like normal people.

Sounds great! Especially if it can’t kill people and it saves many many lives!

And if “ifs” and “buts” were candy and nuts, we’d all have a merry Christmas.

Of course there are issues. Like people totally dying from getting hit with a TASER. The documentary shows quite a few real life cases of people who have died, despite claims from the TASER group who say the TASER didn’t do it, other causes were at play! That’s shady.

Technically this documentary is a bit shady too, tugging at my emotions with some graphic footage. There is one about a foreign dude stuck in a baggage claim at an airport, unable to communicate with anyone. That footage sickened me and I had to stop watching for a bit. Later one we get a case where it was a normal traffic stop, and then three cops decide to tase him for a long time, while his mom is nearby screaming that they are killing him. Sure enough, they did, and it basically killed me too.

There is some sound science behind the TASER, and technically if it is used correctly and in the right places, it can be a great service. But the real issues behind it is that there is no regulation to the training. It is all done by the TASER company and no one else. Add to the fact that police departments aren’t using it correctly, and you will find that there are big problems.

Doing my own research, I’ve found reports that cop shootings haven’t even gone down everywhere with Tasers. Instead, guns are still being used just as much and TASERs are being used as well at times when nothing should be used, like routine traffic stops. That is fucked up and abuse of power.

I am not saying the CEOs aren’t lying dicks, because they are. TASERs can kill people and should be used properly, they just aren’t being used properly and that is the biggest issue.

But honestly, what pissed me off the most was one of the CEO’s complaining on the radio about lawsuits and America. He brought up the Hot Coffee case and showed that he clearly knew nothing about it. So I figure he is a liar and an idiot, so fuck that guy.

Ugh. They reference the hot coffee case.

It is still quite hard to find new documentaries coming out that are easy to watch and not about another damn singer. I might have to refuse to watch any of them this year as a sort of protest.

Instead I found Gameshow Dynamos, a relatively recent release (within the last year at least) documentary about game show experts. I have only seen one “documentary” on game shows before, and it was Big Bucks: The Press Your Luck Scandal, which turned out to be quite creepy. There are probably great stories relating to the behind the scenes of the best game shows, and just someone needs to film it and make a sweet picture.

Gameshow Dynamos gave me a chance to see something different, and it was free on Amazon Prime, so even better.

Gameshow Dynamos is on the surface about two stories. One is the very specific story of Bernard and Claire Boiko. Two very different people who found each other, love, and grew a wonderful family together despite opposition. The other is a sort of history of the rise of Game Shows in America from the 1950’s to the 1990’s. And of course its pitfalls.

And obviously how the two stories connect and game shows saved the Boiko household from ruin.

I know I know, I used a promo poster picture. I suck.

Bernard’s first game show was Tic Tac Dough where he won an equivalent of $9000 in today’s money. He did it to pay back college debt and bills, but it didn’t last long. Then Claire went on the show, while pregnant for her third child and she also did fantastic, to help pay for medical bills.

And for awhile, they did a few game shows just to get by. Bernard didn’t make a lot as a teacher (until the teacher union succeeded in a pay raise), and they ended up with five kids. But there was a scandal back then where the producers would give popular people answers to do well for ratings. Bernard had to testify before a grand jury about it (he never was offered answers for cash) and it put a halt on the game show industry for awhile.

But eventually they got in it. And eventually their kids grew up. They did most of their game show playing once they were now grand parents, going on dozens of shows each separately, on the game show circuit because people liked them so damn much. And hey, game shows pay great.

This isn’t a sad story about game shows and debt and get rich quick ideas, but a happy one! And these people probably do hold the record for appearances on game shows a couple (and somehow never together on any two person game shows)! Also they talk about finding out the right hook for yourself to make you likable by producers to get on these game shows.

The documentary is a nice story, but at the same time, it does feel a bit too short. Its running time is just an hour, and a lot of it is basically the story of their life before they met, their marriage, and their problems. I would have liked a lot more footage of them actually on game shows, answering questions. We got bits and pieces, but not a lot of significant time. I want to see game show footage when I am watching something about game shows. More shots of them winning, losing, whatever. Heck, we got one of them on jeopardy but I don’t think we saw any actual questions from it, or watching them sweep a category or anything.

It was a good idea, but could have been better.

Believe it or not, reviewing a subject is actually pretty hard. What do you say? Do you know how to say it with more words than just “good” and “bad?” Are you able to convey your feelings in a factual way that makes people believe? Shit, just check out my guest reviews on the website. People thought reviewing films would be easy, but it takes awhile to really find your voice and your groove.

I can’t even imagine reviewing anything besides film. Television shows are similar, but no way could I review an episode or whole season. Goodreads only prepares me so much for book reviews. And food? Forget about it! I am the worst eater, so I could never even be a bit biased when it comes to food.

So you know what? Those people who review food, not the assholes on Yelp, they are the real MVPs.

I don’t know anything about these people, outside of the fact that they probably will eat anything. I never heard about Jonathan Gold, a famous food critic from Los Angeles. And by famous critic, I mean Roger Ebert levels of food criticism.

Here I am then. About to review a documentary about a guy who reviews food. Thankfully I have some experience reviewing a reviewer. Life Itself was pretty good!

Oh yeah, this dude loves food. All the food.

City of Gold is titled as such, due to Jonathan’s last name, and his relationship with the city of LA. Gold is apparently the first guy to really put himself out there and go to every little restaurant. Before then, the critics would only go to the fancy big French restaurants in the city, for the elite, and that was it. But not Gold. He went to every Mom and Pop shop, in every district, tasting cuisine from around the world.

To make a comparison, it would be like a movie reviwer only watching the top of the box office. Gold would watch the box office leaders, the weird indie stuff, and every straight-to-DVD B-Movie. (Hey, I used to do that when I had time!). Gold changed things for the food critics. He also isn’t extremely mean. A lot of critics bitch and moan over the smallest problems due to their “refined pallets” and ego. He doesn’t go around loving everything. But he gives it a chance. He learns about the story behind the dish, the culture that produced it, and how it might fare to similar dishes of that variety.

And of course, this leads to amazing business for these lucky shops to have been written about by Gold, the most trusted name in food since, well, anyone but Nestle.

What I liked most about this (arguably simple) documentary, is that samples of his writings were read out loud as a sort of narration, and I just found myself insanely jealous. He has such a way with words, every review becoming a beautiful story. I want him to write my biography some day. Or at least just narrate my life as a I sit around and do nothing on a computer.

Gold is an awesome person. And although the documentary is about him and what he has done to the industry, by the end it broadens out a bit to be about the city he is from as a whole. At the same time, it is still a very niche documentary. It won’t go leading any social change or change your thoughts on anything at all. But it is a nice use of your time, if you like learning about strangers.

I first heard about Meet The Patels months ago, and that is because an alumnus from my High School was the director! Now, she went there 14 years before me or so, but it was still cool. We got quite a few newsletters letting us know it was going to theaters and eventually Netflix.

Despite the connection though, I won’t be biased favorable for it. If anything, I might be biased against it. Because despite our school connection and being a member of the press, they wouldn’t give me a press screening to watch the film. What a bunch of jerks.

Patel is apparently a very popular Indian last name. Our story is about Ravi Patel, who is about to turn 30 and is currently unmarried. Unmarried and Indian! At that age! Oh no! His parents were part of an arranged marriage of course, after his dad had already moved to India. His wife was the 12th match and they knew it would work. And the mom is also quite good at arranging marriages, so it looks bad that her son hasn’t even had a girlfriend in 30 years!

But…but Ravi has had a girlfriend. He was dating a white ginger chick for two whole years without his family knowing about it. But he had an “Indian” problem and some commitment issues, so they ended it right before the documentary. The “Indian” problem is that he has always pictured himself marrying an Indian woman and knows it is what his family wants.

So he goes to his parents and agrees for them to work on arranging a marriage for him.

A photo of them taking a photo! Madness.

Now, arranged marriages aren’t like they used to be. The parents had to print out a bio sheet on their son and send it all around the country to friends and family, all of which passed it on. At the same time, the parents began to receive information on ladies across America. They sort through the ladies and give him women they think he will enjoy. He just has to go on a date with the woman and they decide on their own if they want to date any more in the future. If not, the parents keep trying and keep hooking them up with company.

And Ravi’s sister, Geeta, is there the whole time to document and film the whole thing. Weddings, Indian dating sites, and speed dating at Patel reunions. No it’s no weird. Basically everyone is a Patel, and most Patel’s just marry other Patel’s from different parts of India.

As a documentary, this story is about Ravi, but he isn’t really an interesting character. What makes the documentary interesting is learning about modern Indian American dating customs. The levels the parents go through to provide for their children. That is what an average viewer will appreciate about this documentary.

Ravi’s story on its own is…well, predictable. If you know how stories work, you can probably figure out how this thing will end already. I hope it was actually a real story and not a scheme done by the brother/sister to make it seem like a better story. But who can really say?

Meet The Patels is the type of documentary you might want to put on while working on other projects, not bothering to pause it if you need to run to the water closet. An average story about average people, with some nice culture aspects occasionally thrown in.

The oil industry is a fickle little bitch. I know quite a few people who are currently jobless as a result of a price crash and international disputes. But this documentary, The Overnighters, isn’t about the oil crash despite how easily it could have been. It was about the oil boon.

The only reason people would volunteer to move to North Dakota is for work. There are thousands of thousands of oil workers doing manual labor, working 12 hour shifts, non stop, oil rigging, hard work fun. And they make money. They get OT every week and have no free time, but they get paid and if they can keep it up, they can get rich quick.

Some people go out there because no jobs at home, some because they want to get away, some to support family back home, and some because they have no other alternatives. They might have had felonies or other law trouble and getting a regular job just isn’t going to work. So they hear about all the jobs up in North Dakota and just drive up there and think they will get lucky.

But a lot of people cannot find work right away. Not only that, but in all of these small towns, there are not many places to stay. Sure there are some apartments, but thanks to the boom and supply/demand, the rent is extremely high. Places like Williston, ND aren’t going to build a lot of apartment complexes, because they know it will eventually come crashing back down, then they will have virtual ghost towns.

So we have people living in cars, living in RVs, and an increasingly annoyed small town that is afraid of them for being strangers. For being people with potentially violent pasts.

But one man, Pastor Jay Reinke, opened up his church to some of these people to sleep on their floors. And the parking lot to others. Just so they could stay overnight somewhere warm as it is the Christian thing to do.

See, now you understand the title!

Pastor Reinke seems to be a genuinely good guy. He wants to help others when everyone else turns their back. He helps them find jobs, let them know about other places that can help out, and gives them advice on whether they should even try to stay and tough it out.

During the documentary, there is also a local ordinance wanting to ban people from living in RVs. If they find someone is staying in it for more than 28 days in a year, they can be fined or arrested. This will seriously ruin a lot of lives of people who are just trying to survive and get by, not hurting anyone. So Reinke even goes door to door with flyers, inviting the towns people to meet these men and get over their fears. To see that people can be helpful and more Christ-like. Hell, Reinke even opens up his home occasionally to a few people.

But Reinke has his own demons from his past that also affect his family (wife and two daughters), more so than anyone would realize. Just typing that sentence made this sound like a thriller, so forget that.

The Overnighters is a powerful documentary. You get to hear stories of many individuals, including Reinke himself. He seems to be a guy who wants to help, but still he ends up making enemies. It is a reminder that life can fucking suck, and makes one wonder how much worse it is up there given the oil crash.

And it affected me emotionally as well. It was easy to imagine myself in the position of some of those individuals, willing to do anything just to support the family. It is a harrowing documentary that might make you feel like shit.

So why not a 4? Well, I have some issues with the way they presented some information at the end. And also the questions that they didn’t answer in the documentary by the end. They seemed to focus more on the pastor and less on the men who were homeless and potentially about to be spotless as well, when it comes to a place to sleep. But it still didn’t take away from the power that most of the documentary had on someone watching for the first time. Those stories are the real power here. Sure, the pastor has his own unique journey, but I just care less about that.

Who is General Tso? Was he a real man? Did he like food or chicken? Did he make Chinese food? Did he make Chinese American food? Why do people even like this stuff?

Well, if you have wondered any of this, you have come to the right documentary. The Search For General Tso answers all of these questions and more! Hell, it does it in under 80 minutes as well. That means you can watch even more documentaries in a single day!

First of all, we have to accept that you can go to any Chinese restaurant around the country and basically get the same exact menu. The same chicken dishes, beef dishes, fish, pork, appetizers. Hell, might even get crinkle fries. You will get some soy sauce packets, the orange sauce packets (whatever the fuck that is), some fortune cookies, and probably get your food in a typical container.

Look at the picture below. If you go to the store, you will probably see a visual menu with that bad boy on it, General Tso’s chicken, and it will look a lot like that.

Why is that?! Again, it will explain how that ended up working out.

First of all, I should mention that General Tso was a real person and a pretty bad ass warrior. He made the rank of General!

And this is food for any military commander.

So the actual search for General Tso ended up being pretty easy. Since he has museum’s named after him, and whole buildings in parts of China.

That means the next hour of the documentary has to talk about something. So it talks about everything. Chinese immigration to the US, lack of jobs for immigrants / policies to prevent the Chinese from doing a lot, turning traditional Chinese food into Americanized versions, the rise of Chop Suey, why everything looks the same, and the eventual decline of the food.

And what’s that? Oh yeah, when General Tso’s chicken came into being. Where it came from, who invented it, and why it became super popular after the fact.

The Search for General Tso is a weird documentary and clearly it goes over a lot of information. It is incredibly informative, but not necessarily on information you ever thought you would care about. I feel like I learned a lot in the time frame, but I also felt like I could have learned more.

This film felt like the post it notes on the subject. The quick and dirty to tell the story, but without getting into the nitty gritty details. They spent maybe 3 minutes talking about Jewish families and Chinese Food, but there is a lot of history there. There could have been more on other dishes that started and why they became familiar. They didn’t even start to touch on the Chinese Buffet phenomenon, which probably had an interesting story as well.

A good start, but damn it, I want more.

You may have heard of Malala Yousafzai. If you have not, then you live in a bubble somewhere. Or you live in a repressed country and they are actively making sure you don’t hear about her.

She made a book that was titled I Am Malala, memoirs of her life up to that point. Very political. You see, she is a girl growing up in Pakistan. Her name is important, because her father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, named her after a Pakistani folk hero. He imagined she would be great! He also ran a string of private schools and taught her to read and write and love education. In that time, women’s education became a hard thing to achieve, because of the Taliban occupation of Pakistan. In fact, they destroyed many all women schools and banned women from schools for a time. This is the crux of the issue. Women’s rights, and a child’s right to an education.

Starting around 11, she became to get involved in politics. She started as an anonymous blogger for the BBC, telling stories of Taliban occupation and how it affected her life. It eventually grew and eventually her identity was discovered. As it grew, she spoke more and more about the right of education and women around the world. Not just the middle east, but in other parts of Asia and Africa and South America, women often do not get any education training at all. This keeps them in the dark and does a disservice for their entire gender in terms of finding equality and being treated with respect!

So, in 2012, when Malala was just 15 years old, the Taliban ordered an assassination attempt on her, as she was doing harm to their public image. Which is a sad and funny sentence to write. Obviously she had received quite a few death threats up to that point, but no real bullets. Thankfully she survived, but the bullet did go into her head, neck and shoulder requiring immediate doctor attention. The left side of her face is slightly paralyzed and more, but damn it, she survived the Taliban officially.

Don’t stop, Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop.

That was a lot of introduction! But He Named Me Malala, the name of the documentary, takes place after all of this. It shows her living now in a normal house, still in school, with her two younger brothers, father, and maybe mother. I have no idea if her mother is still alive, because she wasn’t mentioned or talked about in the documentary at all. It could be a privacy thing, or a fear thing because she is a woman. I don’t know. Half of this documentary tells her story, of some of the activism she has done, about her life before and after the assassination attempt, and a few of her speeches.

Malala is a great girl who is very passionate and was lucky to have an education from her father at home. It allows her to speak well on all of these subjects and it is great that she is using it to help insure education for every child in the world. And she won a Nobel Peace Prize at 17! Definitely a worthy child to know about and support.

But this documentary doesn’t seem to do a great job at it. It feels very subdued. Or basic. Like it was done as a small piece for a news station about a person and her life. It didn’t have a journalist narrating over the film, with her and her dad doing a majority of the talking, but it didn’t seem to give her the right respect. They didn’t go into huge amounts of detail about the atrocities of the Taliban or the assassination attempt. It was more about what she was doing now and how it can be hard to balance this while also studying for exams. It just turns her into a regular girl who sometimes gives speeches and talks to politicians around the world. It is good to humanize her, but at the same time, by doing so it just seems to lessen her achievements.

Overall, this documentary was probably made too early. Hell, they barely talked about the fact that she won the Nobel Peace Prize, as it was only featured in a small segment in the credits. Like they did the whole documentary already and then it happened so they had to find a place to put it. She will do great things in her life and already has, so it is just too early. We don’t need her in a documentary every few years.

The same situation happened with the concert documentary Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. It came out when he was just 18, as if he had already peaked and was on a decline. So now we also already have Justin Bieber: Always Believing and Justin Bieber’s Believer because they did it too early. Hell there are probably more out there and there will be more again. We don’t need Malala to be given the Bieber treatment. Please no more documentaries for at least ten years, when you can make it serious and important and not feel like a “fluff” piece.