Is the success of "You Can See Everything" a harbinger of a new Golden Age of Documentary Filmmaking? Probably not! But this week, New Yorkers have the chance to see tons of very good documentaries at the DOC NYC festival before they fall into the abyss of never securing a distribution or streaming deal.
We cannot tell you how many wonderful independent films we've seen at DOC NYC that have never resurfaced online or on the independent film circuit, betrayed by either lack of archival or music rights, or just the general shittiness of the film industry. So try to see as many as you can! Support independent journalism! (And if you're reading this before noon, definitely take advantage of DOC NYC's $5 film deal!)
DOC NYC starts Wednesday and runs through the end of the month. The country's "largest documentary film festival" will spread out across three of our favorite venues in Lower Manhattan (SVA Theatre, IFC Center, and the Village East) with an online streaming option for many films. We're especially enamored with the new "Archival Storytelling Competition," because we cannot get enough of old, lush film reporting.
Here are some of the films that we're not going to miss this year.
"Kenny: The Marxist Who Would Be Mayor"
For some reason, radical mayors are on our mind, and on the mind of much of the country these days, so this documentary, pulling from archival footage about Detroit lawyer and politician Ken Cockrel Sr. stands out. None of the issues Cockrel railed against have been resolved (even by his son, who did eventually become Detroit mayor), but this makes us pine for local politicians who could speak clearly and plainly about policing in their cities.
"The Newsreel: Characterization of Subversive Organization"
Every successful social movement needs some well-made propaganda, and this documentary follows the Newsreel, a filmmaking collective that spread out across cities and campuses across the United States in the 1960s, capturing activism and protest with an experimental approach that shaped modern documentary filmmaking.