Alternative Film Guide

Blind mountain climbers, female African judges, Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, social injustice and racism, freedom of speech (or lack thereof), the destruction of the environment, the dysfunctional U.S. electoral process, a pedophile priest, assorted religious freaks, and — inevitably — the appalling political, military, moral, human, and downright bloody disaster known as Iraq are to be found among the 15 documentaries shortlisted for a future even shorter list (five nominees) for the 2006 Academy Awards.

Lucy Walker’s Blindsight, which recently tied for the Audience Award for Best Documentary at this year’s AFI FEST in Los Angeles, follows the first blind man to climb Mt. Everest as he leads six blind Tibetan teenagers up the tallest mountain on the planet. The other "inspirational" documentary in the running is Florence Ayisi and Kim Longinotto’s Sisters in Law, about two female judges at a courtroom in the West African nation of Cameroon.

In Storms of Emotions, Yael Klopmann asks several Israeli Army officers and members of the police border unit about their opinions regarding Israel’s disengagement from the Gaza Strip.

Ricki Stern and Anne Sundberg’s The Trials of Darryl Hunt shows how an innocent man was convicted of rape not because he was guilty, but because he was black.

In Shut Up & Sing, Barbara Kopple and Cecilia Peck analyze the negative repercussions that followed the Dixie Chicks‘ Natalie Maines’s anti-George W. Bush statement at a 2003 London concert. At the time, dissent was perceived as an act of treason by millions of Americans who ardently approved of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. As a producer, Kopple has already won two Best Feature Documentary Oscars, for Harlan County, U.S.A. (1975) and for American Dream (1990, shared with Arthur Cohn).

In Davis Guggenheim’s An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore shows that he may have lost the White House but he definitely gained something much bigger and more important: an understanding that Mother Earth will soon become Mother Dust if human beings continue acting like deadly two-legged bacteria.

Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore? is Frank Popper’s look at a Democratic primary election in Missouri, while Henriette Mantel and Steve Skrovan’s An Unreasonable Man paints a portrait of Ralph Nader, whose candidacy in the 2000 U.S. presidential election changed the course of the country (for the much, much worse).

Deliver Us from Evil is Amy Berg’s glimpse into the mind of Father Oliver O’Grady, a pedophilic priest who abused both the bodies and the minds of little children, and the trust of their clueless parents, while the Catholic Church’s hierarchy looked the other way. (Kirby Dick’s 2005 Best Documentary nominee Twist of Faith tackled a similar story.)

Sticking to the religion theme, Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady’s Jesus Camp deals with another form of child abuse (one that is perfectly legal) by showing how small American children are being indoctrinated in a radical brand of the Christian faith so that when they grow up they’ll help to transform the United States (and tomorrow the world?) into Christland.

And finally, Stanley Nelson’s Jonestown: The Life and Death of People’s Temple shows the results of deranged religiosity by depicting Jim Jones and his hundreds of followers, most of whom took part in a mass suicide ceremony in Guyana in 1978.

As for Iraq…

Laura Poitras’s My Country My Country follows a Baghdad doctor running for a seat in the City Council of a city in ruins; Deborah Scranton’s Tribeca winner The War Tapes consists of digital video images shot by several members of the U.S. National Guard unit serving in Iraq; Patricia Foulkrod’s The Ground Truth shows the after-effects of the war on returning American service personnel; and James Longley’s Sundance winner Iraq in Fragments is one of the rare documentaries made by American filmmakers that actually depict war-ravaged Iraq as seen through the eyes of the Iraqis themselves.

Press Release:

Beverly Hills, CA — The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today announced that 15 films in the Documentary Feature category will advance in the voting process for the 79th Academy Awards®. Eighty-one pictures had originally qualified in the category.

The 15 films are listed below in alphabetical order:

Blindsight
Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore?
Deliver Us from Evil
The Ground Truth
An Inconvenient Truth
Iraq in Fragments
Jesus Camp
Jonestown: The Life and Death of People’s Temple
My Country, My Country
Shut Up & Sing
Sisters in Law
Storm of Emotions
The Trials of Darryl Hunt
An Unreasonable Man
The War Tapes

The Documentary Branch screening committee viewed the eligible documentaries in a preliminary round of screenings. Documentary Branch members will now select the five 2006 nominees from among the 15 titles on the shortlist.

Nominations for the 79th Academy Awards will be announced on Tuesday, January 23, 2007, at 5:30 a.m. PST in the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater.

Academy Awards for outstanding film achievements of 2006 will be presented on Sunday, February 25, 2007, at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center®, and televised live by the ABC Television Network at 5 p.m. PST, beginning with a half-hour arrival segment.

Foreign Language Film Submissions for the 79th Academy Awards

 

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