Doc Corner: From the Short List - 'The Distant Barking of Dogs' and 'Communion'

By Glenn Dunks

The Academy’s documentary shortlist often throws up a few left of field choices – titles that really do earn their primary flutter of American attention simply by being chosen among the 15-wide selection. A 2018 rule change for the category no doubt helped two such films from Europe, austere portraits of youth that are among the shortlist’s most accomplished albeit small scale choices.

The Distant Barking of Dogs was the most unexpected addition this year and was for me the title that I was most happiest to see. It is, after all, the best work of contemporary non-fiction that I saw all year (give or take a Yours in Sisterhood, which will hopefully appear on next year’s eligibility). It is a film that took me completely by surprise when I used it to fill a vacant morning slot at the Sydney Film Festival in May of last year thinking if nothing else I could at least nap. Lo and behold, this remarkable film from the rural warzone of Ukraine has lingered with me longer than probably any other documentary of 2018...

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Doc Corner: From the Short List - 'Free Solo'

By Glenn Dunks

Easily queasy viewers beware – Free Solo can be a daunting prospect to watch. And not just for the extraordinary climb that the film is all about, but if even just the poster churns your stomach, it’s probably not for you. Directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin follow up to Meru (of which I was less a fan for reasons I honestly don’t even remember – I watch too many movies to remember these things, apparently) charts Alex Honnold, the world’s most famous free solo rock climber, as he sets out to conquer his biggest feat yet: El Capitan, the 3000-foot vertical rock face, a granite monolith that has loomed over Yosemite for millennia.

The why of Alex’s mission remains a tantalizing carrot that dangles in front of the audience through his death-defying stunts.

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Doc Corner From the Short List - 'Won't You Be My Neighbor'

By Glenn Dunks

Now that the 15-wide documentary short list has been announced, we're going to be looking at some of the titles we've missed throughout the year (primarily due to access issues - this particular column is written from Australia) in the lead up to our top ten documentary list and more Oscar talk in the new year. Up first, the crowned champion of 2018's doc class: Won't You Be My Neighbor?.

Morgan Neville’s Won’t You Be My Neighbor? has proven to be one of the hardest films I’ve had to write about all year. It’s not a film that throws up thorny issues that demand one’s full attention or a documentary that challenges the mind. Instead, it’s the documentary that America has embraced to the tune of some $23-million box office and the title of the 12th most successful documentary ever made (!) It’s a film that people have taken to their heart and yet I sat here with my Word documentary open on a blank page for far too long...

What about this movie failed to inspire me in any way good or bad? Is Neville’s film my own personal answer to the long-quipped mystery of “can you ever just be whelmed?” (yes, but it turns out not just in Europe).

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Doc Corner: The Thrilling 'United Skates'

By Glenn Dunks

Dyana Winkler and Tina Brown’s utterly divine United Skates begins with a tangle of bodies that zig, zag and spin across a roller rink floor in choreographed fashion. Close-ups of sweat-damp skin and excited faces. Neon signs, fluorescent clothes and a thumping beat. In just these brief opening moments before the title crashes on screen, I was hypnotised by the way the camera was capturing these people and embedding itself on the floor, swooping and swinging with as much vigour as the people its watching. The way it captures their passion, their movement and, without even saying a word, their unbridled joy and the memories of days gone by.

It’s my favourite opening of the year; nothing has quite approached the very simple act of hooking me so immediately and in such a way that I bolted upright, eager to see where I was going to be taken. Luckily, United Skates isn’t just about the roller skates and the booty shorts and the basslines. It’s about so much more, smartly using a nostalgic touchstone of African American culture as a means to dissect contemporary issues around race.

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Doc Corner: The Thrilling Failure of 'Shirkers'

By Glenn Dunks

Apologies once again for the recent absense, but working 12-to-15-hour days in an office somewhat curb one's ability to sit down and write reviews. However, we're returning to regularly scheduled programming with one of the best documentaries of the year.

Documentaries about moviemaking aren’t uncommon. We see several released each year, usually offering creative insight and historical context to works of art both great and terrible – and in the case of those like American Movie even surpassing the reputation of the movie they’re about. Documentaries about failed movies are less common, although no less fascinating and often allow their subject to attain something of a mythical status. The latest addition to this sub-genre of non-fiction is Sandi Tan’s Shirkers, a thrillingly assembled combination of cinematic mystery, sombre tribute, and aching paean to lost potential.

“Shirkers” is not only the name of the documentary, but also the name of the film that Tan made in 1992 with her friends Jasmine Ng, Sophia Siddique and the mysterious older man named George Cardona. The original Shirkers was to be the first Singaporean film directed by a woman and was a radical change from the sort of film that the island nation was typically known for like 1972’s They Call Her Cleopatra Wong.

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