Cut the Cord: Documentaries
March 2024. Volume 3, Issue 2.
Welcome back to Cut the Cord.
This month's edition is all about documentaries. From docs about bowling to docs about docs, here's a sampler of the countless non-fiction movies available on free streaming services.
A note: I typically use JustWatch.com to provide the data for where you can find these movies. Unfortunately, it seems to be increasingly unreliable. I can attest that at the time of publication, all of these movies can be found on Kanopy, Hoopla, Tubi, or YouTube. If it doesn't show up on JustWatch, give it a search anyway.
Subject (2022)
In the golden age of documentaries, who benefits? SUBJECT reveals the unintended consequences – good, bad, and complicated – of having your life shared on screen. Featuring the protagonists of acclaimed documentaries The Staircase, Hoop Dreams, The Wolfpack, Capturing the Friedmans, and The Square, as well as the filmmakers of Minding the Gap, Cameraperson, An Inconvenient Truth, and more.
Let's start with a documentary about documentaries. Subject is all about the good and bad that comes from telling these stories, from fame to acclaim to exploitation to exoneration. As the genre has exploded in recent years thanks to the true crime boom and streamers funding more and more of these projects, documentaries are on our minds more than ever before.
But what happens when the cameras leave? When the movie is out in the world and your story is no longer your own? Famous or infamous, your life is forever changed.
Subject checks in with some familiar faces, like Arthur Agee, star of one of the greatest documentaries out there, Hoop Dreams. But what it really does is examine the ethics of it all, then and now. It's fascinating stuff, a must for fans of the genre, and an excellent primer for people looking for more titles. If nothing else, you leave with a new list of things to watch.
A League of Ordinary Gentlemen (2004)
Filmmaker Christopher Browne documents the mission of a group of middle-aged bowlers as they attempt to revitalize the sport and get the television-watching public interested in it again.
I actually really enjoyed this documentary as an inside look into the lives of professional athletes. Sure, Walter Ray Williams Jr. is no LeBron James, but the movie gives us a lot of insight into what it means to dedicate your life to a sport.
On top of the high highs and low lows that come naturally in competition, it addresses difficult travel schedules. an athlete's obligation to sponsors, their relationship to the league, their public image/television time, their persona (classic or rebel bad boy), how it takes a toll on your family, and more.
At the same time, the movie never lets you forget you are watching a movie about bowling. They address the disdain they feel towards their farcical public image. They're constantly talking about what they can do to better the PBL. The sponsor they droll over is Odor-Eater.
For other professional sports, we build holy temples dedicated to the sport, the team, the city. You can see a game in the historic, beloved, century-old Fenway Park or the updated, state-of-the-art Michigan Stadium which can hold over 100,000. But even at the peak of bowling, at the height of the sport, you still drive your mini-van down to Lucky Strikes Lanes to get your reps in.
Virginia 12th (2018)
After unimaginable tragedy struck, Chris Hurst knew he was being called to something greater. His story isn’t just about an election — it’s about the people, and the proof that change is coming.
The story of Chris Hurst's campaign for the Virginia House of Delegates may feel hyper-local or maybe just a semi-personal story for me and my family, but if you appease me for a minute, I think I can explain how to zoom out on this whole thing.
When Chris Hurst became the evening news anchor for my hometown of Roanoke, Virginia's CBS affiliate, WDBJ, at the age of 22, they claimed he was the youngest anchor in the country. That very well may have been true, but it didn't feel that way. He was poised, professional, mature, and seemed tailor-made for the job. One of the earliest "big" stories of his tenure was, unfortunately, a tragedy that struck my family. Chris was caring, kind, and personable. WDBJ got the interview every station wanted. He kept in touch, remembered everyone's names when they bumped into him later on, and always followed up on the story and our family.
In 2015, not long after I moved away, tragedy struck Chris and WDBJ. On a foggy Wednesday morning in August of 2015, Chris' fiancee Alison Parker, a reporter, and Adam Ward, her cameraman, were killed live on air by a disgruntled former employee of the station. It shook the country, put Southwest Virginia on the map for the worst reasons (I'm from a small town, it didn't matter that I was living 3,000 miles away...we all felt it), and completely changed the course of Chris' life.
When Chris went looking for a new direction, he found it in the Virginia House of Delegates. He felt compelled to represent the state's 12th District, as chronicled in this documentary. The movie ends when Chris is sworn in for his first term (he served his constituents for four years, had some ups...and some downs, and now finds himself, as he puts it, "(very) happily out of office" and back in journalism), but I think his story and that of his campaign is still worth examination these years later.
As we barrel towards another election year, this story of grassroots campaigning, knocking on doors, giving out your personal cell phone number to the people you represent, negative attack ads, registering new voters, getting young people excited to vote - it's all still relevant and important. The documentary follows Chris' 2017 campaign, an off-year election but the first after the divisive Clinton-Trump match in 2016. With Trump back for more this year and a 2020 rematch against Biden looming, we cannot forget that no effort is too small or not impactful enough. Every level of this election thing matters, the trickle downs can also trickle up, and every vote counts in every election. Make sure you know how to vote and make sure you do it. Not just this year, but every year.
Doomed! The Untold Story of Roger Corman’s The Fantastic Four (2015)
A history of the ill-fated 1994 production of “The Fantastic Four” that was executive produced by Roger Corman.
There are plenty of documentaries about movies that didn't work or flopped or just fell apart, but I can't imagine there are a ton for movies that just never got released. It doesn't happen very often. Well, before David Zaslav.
The Fantastic Four seems to have a cursed relationship with the silver screen (not the Silver Surfer - that's different! Zing!) The Fox releases are critical flops, even though I like them for various reasons. But this Roger Corman low-budget affair seems to get the worst of it. I haven't seen it, but by all accounts, it's not bad. But the people in this documentary speak about it like it's Lawrence of Arabia. If nothing else, it got me interested in checking it out before next summer.
Maybe the MCU can finally get it right...
Another Body (2023)
A college student searches for justice after she discovers deepfake pornography of herself circulating online.
Deepfakes, or the process of using AI to distort someone's likeness into doing something they would never do, has become an increasingly hot-button topic as the technology has advanced. This is particularly true in election years, when fake videos of Biden and Trump circulate to spread disinformation.
Taylor Swift, maybe the most popular person in the world, has been the victim of countless deepfakes, most notably videos where she is performing sexual acts. When that happens to Taylor Swift, thinkpieces are written and lawmakers promise to take action.
But what about when it happens to a regular person - like the more than 100,000 victims, 99% of whom are women?
Another Body follows a young college student who sees her face, well, on another body in an adult video. With the police slow to act, she investigates the video(s) herself. To protect her identity, the film uses deepfake technology to not only provide anonymity, but to showcase just how tricky these videos can be to detect.
JustWatch does not say that the movie is currently streaming anywhere for free, but I watched it on Hoopla and have also seen it on my Kanopy searches. It's worth the watch.
The Bridge (2006)
The Bridge is a controversial documentary that shows people jumping to their death from the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco - the world’s most popular suicide destination. Interviews with the victims’ loved ones describe their lives and mental health.
content warning: suicide
Despite the fact that this is a newsletter of recommended movies, I cannot say I would recommend this movie to anyone, but it has been on my mind recently because I was reading up on the new suicide deterrent safety nets installed at the Golden Gate Bridge.
The Bridge, a 2006 film about Golden Gate, the deadliest place on Earth in terms of suicide attempts, has been one of the longest-tenured members of my Letterboxd watchlist because, well, it's a difficult viewing experience. The filmmakers set up across the bridge for a year, filming suicide attempts, police interventions, and civilian rescues. As you can imagine, it's haunting.
These clips are strung together by interviews with the parents, siblings, and friends of those people who took their lives.
After reading the recent news, I decided it was finally time to watch it.
And no, I can't recommend it. There are definitely some ethical issues in play here, attitudes towards mental health and suicide have changed quite a bit in the last two decades (we didn't know anything! Makes me wonder how much we still don't know and maybe never will...), and it's not for anyone with a connection to stories like these. But it lives as a relic of our past, one that will hopefully feel like a distant memory someday soon.
If you are having thoughts of suicide, call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
Credit: Each plot synopsis comes from Letterboxd via TMDb.