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REVIEW: The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years [1988]

2016/07/072016/07/08 Jared Mobarak

“It doesn’t matter—the size of your pencil. It’s how you write your name.” Director Penelope Spheeris changes the aesthetic and to some extent the goals of her documentary series The Decline of Western Civilization with Part II: The Metal Years. Like its predecessor depicting the contemporary 1980 Los Angeles punk scene, we get a glimpse at obscure metal bands like Odin, London, and Seduce as they traverse the circuit with varying levels of success. Interwoven with them, however, are interviews of the genre’s mostly glam metal pioneers like Steven Tyler…

REVIEW: The Decline of Western Civilization [1981]

2016/07/072016/07/07 Jared Mobarak

“I don’t think of myself as a happy person, but I had fun tonight” You don’t get much more punk rock than Penelope Spheeris‘ concert documentary The Decline of Western Civilization. At least not American punk since the film details the club life in Los Angeles during the 80s rather than mid-70s Britain. We’re talking Black Flag, Germs, Catholic Discipline, Circle Jerks, X, The Bags, and Fear. Spheeris had both audience members and band members sign waivers to have their likenesses used in a movie and preceded to film multiple…

REVIEW: The Trials of Muhammad Ali [2013]

2016/07/032016/07/04 Jared Mobarak

“A white man’s heaven is a black man’s hell” While the structure of Bill Siegel‘s The Trials of Muhammad Ali delivers nothing new to the language of documentary—archival footage mixed with present-day interviews working towards a specific thesis—the story at it’s back is too interesting to blindly dismiss. We all know Ali as a poet, the champion lording over Sonny Liston, and a member of the Nation of Islam. We know him as a conscientious dissenter who never ended up in jail, but do we know the details surrounding this…

REVIEW: De Palma [2016]

2016/06/23 Jared Mobarak

“I’m driven by unrealistic ideas” I’ve seen twelve Brian De Palma films in my lifetime—a seemingly healthy number when you consider the industry. A guy like Terrence Malick began his career just five years after Brian and it’s only his seventh film that hit DVD this week. Unfortunately for me, twelve doesn’t come close to equaling half of De Palma’s filmography. It’s a problem I always say I’ll rectify considering I’ve missed biggies like Blow Out and Carlito’s Way, but not one that would prevent me from checking out Noah…

REVIEW: Weiner [2016]

2016/06/202017/11/30 Jared Mobarak

“We don’t care about the personal garbage. We’re from the Bronx.” Here’s the rub on the whole Anthony Weiner scandal(s): Bill de Blasio’s approval rating just fell to 41% on May 24th. Would Weiner have been better? Who knows? Would he have won if not for a faulty timeline between his final sexting partner and a People magazine article wherein he said he was done with the extra-marital (non-physical) affairs? Maybe. Actually, there’s a pretty good chance he would have. I don’t follow politics nor do I lean Democrat, but…

REVIEW: Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World [2016]

2016/06/132016/06/14 Jared Mobarak

“Did you get the ‘G’?” Documentarian Werner Herzog‘s latest film Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World peers into the longer than expected history of our uncontrollable phenomenon known as the internet. The word uncontrollable doesn’t, however, allude to this network having created an artificial intelligence—although, as one subject states, who’s to say an AI hasn’t already been born that simply refuses to make itself known? No, the internet’s unchecked power stems from humanity’s present-day reliance upon it to literally survive. It’s become an extension of who we are…

REVIEW: Atomic: Living in Dread and Promise [2015]

2016/06/082016/06/10 Jared Mobarak

“The cherry blossom and the sharp sword. Humility and arrogance.” Director Mark Cousins leaves us with a quote at the end of his experimental documentary composed solely of archival video and audio entitled Atomic: Living in Dread and Promise. It’s by W.G. Sebald and reads: “We gaze at it in wonder, which in itself is a form of dawning horror.” The description is apt, especially as I found myself basking in the beauty of these mushroom clouds forming in the sky with austerity despite the carnage left behind. There’s wonder…

REVIEW: The Royal Road [2015]

2016/05/262016/05/26 Jared Mobarak

“These inconceivable melodramas punctuate my waking life” No description of Jenni Olson‘s essay over landscapes film The Royal Road is more concise or accurate than the final words spoken upon the culmination of its 65-minute visual monologue: “I want to tell you a story about love and loss and San Francisco that reveals more about me than I ever expected to say.” This goal is achieved on every level with imperceptibly moving vignettes of Californian locales flashing across the screen that may or may not have anything to do with…

REVIEW: Presenting Princess Shaw [2016]

2016/05/252016/05/25 Jared Mobarak

“Why am I going in the same direction with no direction?” Even though Presenting Princess Shaw isn’t a film about filmmaking, you can’t help wondering about the logistics of its creation considering director Ido Haar is listed as the project’s sole cinematographer. The story of Princess (Samantha Montgomery) and Kutiman (Ophir Kutiel) focuses on music and the internet creating a community of disparate strangers miles away from one another with an ever-present potential for collaboration between them. We watch Samantha live her life in New Orleans as a nurse attending…

REVIEW: Holy Hell [2016]

2016/05/232016/05/24 Jared Mobarak

“Maybe it’s worth it” Every story containing religious or spiritual content inherently brings with it supporters and detractors beholden to personal agendas either from experience or unwavering positions of faith. It’s difficult subject matter to truly expose objectively because religion and spirituality are by definition subjective when compared against an infinite number of other similar institutions preaching their own “one true” notion of identical drives for peace, clarity, and happiness. People want to believe there’s an answer—a fix to solve their problems with love the universal healer and protector. We…

REVIEW: Человек с киноаппаратом [Chelovek s kinoapparatom] [Man with a Movie Camera] [1929]

2016/05/21 Jared Mobarak

Labeled the best documentary of all time by Sight & Sound in 2014, Dziga Vertov‘s Человек с киноаппаратом [Chelovek s kinoapparatom] [Man with a Movie Camera] lives up to its pedigree thanks in no small part to the level of cinematic innovation somehow utilized as far back as 1929. Besides the obvious period clothing and aesthetic, that release year seems a lie with an estimated 1,775 shots in just 68-minutes. So when most movies of the era drag with melodramatic performances mugging for the camera as intertitles cut in to…