One Category at a Time: Documentary

There's no doubt in my mind that this is the most impressive quintet of nominees the Academy has put together in any category this year.

The only one I have slight reservations about is Gasland, and that has more to do with the Josh Fox's form and structure. Conceptually it's a very compelling piece of investigative media, with some eye-opening and infuriating information to present.

Waste Land is my fourth favourite, for its rousing emotional foundation and loose unintrusive style. It's a testament to Lucy Walker's range as a documentarian and a filmmaker that this was released the same year as her Countdown to Zero, which is much different in structure and subject matter. The film is indeed an inspiration.

Creeping up my ladder of preference to #3 you'll find Restrepo, an extraordinary objective observer essay put on film. That Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger could even get this film made is incredible enough, let alone that it should succeed so thoroughly in frightening and exhilarating us, and putting us in the mindset of the soldier.

My second favourite is Charles Ferguson's slick and focused Inside Job, which carries out the daunting task of explaining the excruciating mechanics of 2008's economic crisis to the layman with ease and intelligence. One of the most interesting and riling movies of the year, it's societal pertinence and professionalism will likely earn it Oscar gold.

And finally, the best of the lot (and that's saying a lot!), Banksy's droll Exit Through the Gift Shop, perhaps one of the most unusual "documentaries" I've ever seen, but one of the most memorable. Banksy is constantly molding it like a lump of clay, always into something fascinating, but it never stays that shape for long. Finally, by the end, he's left us with something that transcends shape; an epiphany. I've never seen such a unique and hilarious study of art and celebrity.

Will win: Inside Job
Runner-up: Waste Land

Should win: Exit Through the Gift Shop
Should have been nominated: Catfish

Review: GasLand

And my documentary rut continues! I promise I'll start reviewing some non-doc films as soon as they hurry up and open for me here in Canada.

Josh Fox sets out on a mission to investigate how natural gas drilling affects the lives of Americans whose land sits atop vast natural gas shale formations.

It's a story worth telling, and Fox's ambition in going out on his own to get to the bottom of ground water contamination and atmospheric pollution is commendable, but a lot of his film comes down to filler montages of him driving from state to state, hearing the the same horror stories over and over again from rural citizens who can light their tap water on fire or have been made ill because of hydraulic fracturing processes that have tainted their wells with deadly chemicals and natural gas. I'd venture that Fox puts himself front and centre a little too much, and his film also suffers a bit from amateurish production values (shaky/unfocused camera work and jarring cuts, for instance). It does get quite interesting in the end when we get to see a congressional hearing wherein sharp-minded politicians, environmental lobbyists, and industry representatives go tete-a-tete on the subject, but it doesn't make up for the relative shoddiness of the first hour and twenty minutes.

This managed to make the Academy's shortlist of eligible Best Documentary contenders, but I wonder if it can be nominated against the works of more professional film makers.

**1/2