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AFIFest

Sunday at AFI Fest 2021

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How strange that AFI Fest 2021 is already coming to an end. But perhaps next year the festival will be able to move back to a weeklong fully in person event. Still, it is important to thank the staff and volunteers for the work they did to make this such a wonderful—and safe—experience. And of course, I’m thankful that they grant me so much access to these wonderful films.

Do you remember going to movies full of viewers that becomes a common experience? We are reminded of that experience in Zhang Yimou’s One Second. Set in the Cultural Revolution, a man who has escaped from a labor camp is desperate to see a newsreel that has a brief onscreen appearance of his daughter. In the first town he’s in, the movie is finished, and the film is to be transported to the next town. But a girl steals one of the cans of film and the man chases her down to retrieve it, since the film won’t be shown if incomplete. The first part of the film is a humorous back and forth of the two of them taking the film from each other. When The film gets to the next town, one can (the one with the newsreel) has come loose and been dragged along the road. At first the projectionist cancels the movie, but the community is heartbroken. Soon they are all working together to save the damaged reel.

This is a story that reflects our love of cinema—even if it is Party propaganda. When the film eventually play, the audience sings along. This is more than just watching the moving shadows on a wall. This is an event that touches the whole community. There is certainly something to be said for watching this film in a theater with other people rather than sitting at home. It is also a story of family—not just the basic meaning of family, but also the family we can become with others.

Clint Bentley, director of Jockey, grew up in the world of horseracing. He hadn’t seen a film that accurately captures that world, so he made one. Jackson Silva is an aging jockey whose body is beginning to betray him. He hopes for one last great horse. Ruth, a trainer with whom he’s close, has a new horse that might be great for the two of them. But Gabriel, a young rookie jockey shows up, claiming to be Jackson’s son. At first, Jackson denies it could be true, but the idea warms on him, giving him a chance of a legacy beyond racing.

I’m something of a sucker for father/son stories. This one has an interesting twist in it. But it is also something of a meditation of mortality, as seen as the end of the life that Jackson has always known. The film is filled with scenes at sunset and sunrise (mostly sunsets) with beautiful skies. We understand that this is both a sunset and a dawn for Jackson and Gabriel. Jockey won the Audience Award for narrative films and opens in US theaters December 29.

Holy Emy, from director Araceli Lemos, is the story of two Filipina sisters in Greece whose mother was forced to return to the Philippines. Emy, the younger, has a special ability that her mother had. At times she cries blood. And she has the power to heal. Her sister Teresa tries to keep this hidden, so Emy won’t be taken advantage of. But a pseudo-mother who lives across the hall, has her eye on them. She knows that something is going on with Emy, and believes they have to baptize her to keep the devil at bay. Teresa is also dealing with a sudden pregnancy and a boyfriend who is more interested in what Emy can do than being a father.

This is a film that is filled with the color red—often blood. It also has a good deal of religious imagery and language. Yet, for all that religious feel, I never felt the film got to the serious religious questions that such a story raises. It seems to want a humanitarian basis for the use of such an ability, but it never seems to quite fit with what we are watching.

And we finish up with a few more shorts.

Johnson Cheng gives us Only the Moon Stands Still, a story of three generations of Chinese women in a failing dance ballroom. The ballroom may be closing, but for the youngest of the three the world may be opening up—if she’s willing to let her mother push her out of the nest. Only the Moon Stand Still won the Audience Award for short films. (22 minutes)

In Motorcyclist’s Happiness Won’t Fit into His Suit, Gabriel Herrera uses a motorcyclist to create a metaphorical reenactment of the hubris of colonialists. A bit too artsy for my taste. (10 minutes)

Sales per Hour, from Michelle Uranowitz and Daniel Jaffe, is set in a retail clothing boutique. The staff works at upselling through the day. But when they discover a sexual encounter in the dressing room, they face a dilemma about what they are willing to allow to keep sales moving.

Holy Emy: Coming-of-Age Amidst Spiritual Realities

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As we grow into adulthood, we all face choices which decide who we are going to be. In Holy Emy though, the decisions aren’t as important as the end result.

Set in Athens, Holy Emy tells the story of Teresa (Hasmine Kilip) and her younger sister Emy (Abigail Loma), two sisters who are left alone when their mother returns to the Philippines. When Teresa suddenly becomes pregnant with the child of a Greek sailor, she remains accepted and loved by the Filipino Charismatic Catholic church where she attends. Feeling like she doesn’t belong there, Emy explores the home of Mrs. Christina, an elderly woman who runs alternative healing practice. As she explores her spiritual options, Emy’s openness to Mrs. Christina creates tension within the home amongst those who remain concerned about the mysterious forces that she could be awakening within her.

Directed by Ariceli Lemos, Holy Emy is a fascinating coming-of-age story that spirals into an exploration of the relationship between the Divine and humanit. With simplicity in her visuals, Lemos somehow manages to create an aura of both terror and wonder regarding the spiritual impact on the everyday lives of her characters. In other words, this is not a film which wants to offer the viewer wild special effects but instead chooses to give the spiritual world a far more realistic look. Admittedly, the film takes a while to truly get going. However, solid performances from leads Loma and Hasmine Kilip keep the film moving.

On the surface, Holy Emy is very much the story of two sisters as their relationship begins to take a new path. Having grown up together, both Emy and Teresa’s lives have always followed the same trajectory. However, as these young women approach adulthood, their paths begin to diverge, leading to an identity crisis within Emy. As Teresa’s pregnancy and on-again, off-again relationship with the father lead her to independence, Emy finds herself feeling somewhat lost and alone. When the effects of Emy’s spiritual journey begin to settle in though, Lemos’ film takes a decidedly more dramatic turn.

As a result, the film becomes a quite literal spiritual tug-of-war for Emy’s soul. Caught between the world of the Catholic church and the alternative healers, Emy is simply asking what it means to connect with the divine. However, at the same time, both Mrs. Christina and Teresa’s church cry out for her to commit to their practices. Whereas Mrs. Christina wants commitment to her teaching, Teresa’s church cries out in fear for her involvement with supernatural forces outside the church’s comfort levels. What’s more, both spiritual options also come with their own potential problems. Although Teresa’s church seems like a supportive place, so too do they also demand that you fit into their more restrictive ‘theological box’. At the same time, Mrs. Christina’s home may seem to fit Emy’s personality better yet she too is also demanding of her young protégé.

As a result, while the film opens to the door to the impact of the supernatural, it does not necessarily settle on a particular ‘side’ of the spiritual debate. As her spiritual influence begins to grow, Emy is portrayed as one who both heals and hurts. In other words, although she shows remarkable abilities to give life to others, so too does she possess the power to do damage to others. In this way, Lemos’ film refuses to either justify or demonize Emy’s choices. For Lemos, the most important aspect of Emy’s decision seems to be the discovery of what’s best for her in her own spiritual journey. In this way, the film offers no particular ‘agenda’ other than to suggest that perspective shapes one’s spiritual understanding and self-actualization.

In Holy Emy, the spiritual inquest is more important than the spiritual answers.

As a result, Holy Emy is an intriguing piece that revels in the in-between. While eventually Emy chooses her path (no spoilers), Lemos offers no definitive decision as to whether or not she agrees with her decision. Instead of focusing on her spiritual abilities, the aspect most celebrated within the film becomes the end result of Emy’s growth into her own person.

For Lemos, the destination becomes more important than the journey.

To hear our interview with director Araceli Lemos and star Abigail Loma, click here (YouTube) and here (podcast).

Holy Emy is now playing at AFI Fest ‘21 in Los Angeles.

Saturday at AFI Fest 2021

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If you’re in the mood for a time-bending coming-of-age story, Petite Maman will do the trick. From director Céline Sciamma (Portrait of a Lady On Fire, Tomboy) this is the story of eight year old Nelly, who after her grandmother’s death goes to the grandmother’s house with her parents. This is her mother’s childhood home. Nelly remembers her mother telling her about building a hut in the woods. One day her mother suddenly leaves without telling Nelly. When Nelly plays in the woods, she meets Monica, a girl her age who is building hut just as her mother described. When she goes to Monica’s house, we see it is the same house she is staying in, only many years earlier.  We (and Nelly) understand pretty quickly that she’s encountered her mother as a girl. Nelly moves back and forth between present and past houses and people. As she does so, she learns about her mother, her mother’s fears, and her own insecurities.

As in Sciamma’s previous films, Petite Maman has wonderful cinematography and brilliant character studies. It’s not so much a story of time travel per se as it is a mystical connection that will forever bond Nelly with her mother. Has it always been a bond that her mother has known?

Hit the Road is the premiere film from Iranian director Panah Panahi. This is a bizarre road trip with a loving (although it’s hard to tell sometimes) family driving across the country for some unknown reason. (It’s somewhat revealed later in the film.) The father is in the backseat with his leg in a cast. (Is it really broken?) The eldest son is driving with the mother beside him in front. The very energetic younger son seems to bounce around the car. And there’s a sick dog in the back. The chaos becomes a bit claustrophobic as we travel with them in the car.

The difficulty with the film is being not quite sure what it is about what is happening in Iran that has triggered this emergency road trip. I can conject various possibilities, but I expect the film’s Iranian audience would have a much better grasp of the situation.

And, of course, I have some shorts to share.

In Are You Still There? from directors Rayka Zehtabchi and Sam Davis, we spend a hot day with Safa when her car battery dies and she must wait in a strip mall parking lot until her mother can get off work to come jump the car. It is a long day (condensed to 15 minutes) that ends in triumph.

The documentary short Video Visit by Malika Zouhali-Worrall shows us the program at the Brooklyn Public Library that allows families of those held in New York City jails to have video call with their incarcerated families. It lets us discover the difficulties families have visiting in person, and the bureaucratic hurdles the library staff faces to try to keep this important program in place.  Libraries rule! (23 minutes)

Yoruga, directed by Federico Torrado Tobón, is a brief story of a lonely man in the not to distant future who goes to “Noah’s Ark”, a facility where some animals still survive. He can afford a one minute visit with one of these animals, and he shares a bit of his life in that short time. (7 minutes.)

Friday at AFI Fest 2021

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“We are responsible for the community we build and the stories we tell.” This is the tagline for AFI Fest 2021. That phrase appears on various promotional materials. It reflects the idea that films are more than just entertainment; they help to shape the way people see the world. That understanding is very appropriate for the features I watched on Friday.

In Orit Fouks Rotem’s Cinema Sabaya, a group of Jewish and Arab women take part in a class to learn how to make videos. The women vary in age and background. Week after week, as they share their assignments, they begin to learn of each other’s lives and dreams. At times the differences seem stark, yet there are also many ways that they discover common fears and concerns. Their time together sometimes crosses lines of intimacy before they know it. In some ways they all have dreams fulfilled through this class. This is an exploration of both community and stories.

This was a scripted film (with a very documentary feel) that gave the actors a great deal of freedom as they delivered their lines. It was based on a number of real women’s stories. One of the interesting bits, for me, is that the film director teacher never really shared her own life the way these women did. She really is a bit separated from the group as a whole. Perhaps a sign that sometimes when filmmakers stand a bit outside looking at others, there is a wariness.

Ali & Ava from Clio Barnard is the story of a South Asian man and an Irish woman who are both dealing with loss and loneliness. Ali’s marriage is breaking up following his wife’s loss of a pregnancy. He is keeping their separation a secret from his close-knit family. Ava has been widowed about a year, but there were issues in the marriage before her husband died. When the two meet, a connection develops and grows over a lunar month. Ava’s adult son is none too happy to have any man in Mom’s life, let alone a man of color. As the two people begin to share their lives and secrets, they have to struggle with the question of if they are ready to find new happiness.

This film feels very much like a Ken Loach film—in large part because of the Yorkshire setting and working-class characters. (I hope if the director reads this, she takes that as the compliment I intend.) We get the feeling of real people as they struggle with the real trials of life.

Today’s shorts included:

Enviar y Recbir (Shipping and Receiving) from director Cosmo Collins Salovaara. A warehouse worker is told to do what he wants with a damaged dress. He tries to give it to his daughter who is uninterested. A neighbor doesn’t think it’s appropriate for his daughter. Yet the man won’t let it go to waste. (9 minutes)

New Abnormal from director Sorayos Prapapan. A look at what life has become during the COVID-19 pandemic, with temperature checks, masks sold out at a drugstore, washing hands, and all the other things that are so common now. It’s done with a touch of humor. (14 minutes)

Mon Amie qui Brille dans le Nuit (My Friend Who Shines in the Night) is an animated film from Grégoire de Bernouis, Jawed Boudaoud, Simon Cadilhac, and Hélène Ledevin. A ghost on its way to whatever the hereafter might be is struck by lightening and falls to earth with no memory. A man helps it find its way back to where it needs to be. (9 minutes)

Your Street from director Güzin Kar. A look at a short road in an industrial area in Germany that has been named after a four year old victim of a Neo-Nazi attack. Is using such a road as a memorial a good way to be reminded of the past? (8 minutes)

Sandstorm from Seemab Gul. Zora, a Pakistani schoolgirl, sends a dance video to a virtual boyfriend, who blackmails her with it. It is a struggle as Zora faces the patriarchal society she lives in. (20 minutes)

Thursday at AFIFest 2021

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Welcome to the 2021 edition of AFI Fest. Last year, the festival was all done virtually. This year is a hybrid with some films being available virtually and others only shown in the theaters at the TCL Chinese Theatres in Hollywood. The festival is abbreviated from pre-pandemic years only covering 4+ days instead of the usual 7+. But there are still some exciting films coming here. My first day was a virtual day.

Paris, 13th District (Les Olympiades, Paris 13e) is the latest film from Jacques Audiard (A Prophet, Rust and Bone, and The Sister Brothers). His films are often intense and challenging. Paris, 13th District is a look at the Millennial world of relationship that seem to be a mash up of friendship, lack of commitment, and sex (lots of it).

We open when Camille shows up at Emilie’s apartment to answer an ad for a roommate. Emilie was hoping for a woman, but after some talking, spark begin between them. But when Emilie is more committed to the relationship than Camille, they break it off. Nora, a second year law student is mistaken by friends as an internet porn star. In time Nora works with Camille at a real estate agency, and they connect. Nora also contacts the porn star and they begin an online friendship. There are various turns along the way, but it all ends up with people finding something special.

In Megan Mylan’s documentary Simple as Water, we meet various Syrian refugee families struggling to find a place in the world as they are separated from others. A mother with four children in Athens, hoping to be able to be reunited with her husband in Germany. Another mother in Turkey considering putting her five children in an orphanage because she cannot care for them. A man in the U.S. with a 9th grade brother who lost a leg in a bombing. A woman still in Syria hoping to get word of a son missing in Raqqa. All are in a kind of limbo. They have hope for reunification and a future better than they are living, but nothing is assured for them. Simple as Water will be available on HBOMax on November 16.

And let’s look at some shorts while we’re here.

In the Israeli film Her Dance from Bar Cohen, Aya shows up at her sister’s wedding Sabbath dinner uninvited. She hasn’t been invited because she is estranged from her Orthodox family because she is a trans woman. Her mother is afraid someone will recognize her and the groom’s family will cancel the marriage. Some terrible things are said (especially by Aya’s mother), but there is a touch of grace, even if we are left in an emotional emptiness. (22 minutes)

For H.A.G.S. by Sean Wang, the filmmaker was going through his eighth grade yearbook and decided to contact some of his friends from that time to touch base and see how everyone was coping with adult life. It is a rather phrenetic mix of edited conversations with yearbook pictures of the various speakers. They seem to be in one of those cusp periods of aging—not yet middle age, but no longer young adults. (9 minutes)

My Name Is Pauli Murray – Historic Footnote

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“I want to see America be what she says she is in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. America, be what you proclaim yourself to be!”

When filmmakers Julie Cohen and Betsy West were making the Oscar-nominated RGB, they came across a citation that Ruth Bader Ginsberg had in her brief arguing for women’s rights before the Supreme Court. They thought it was worth finding out who this person was. My Name Is Pauli Murray is what they discovered. Fifteen years before Rosa Parks, Pauli Murray was arrested for not moving to the back of the bus. Decades before the Wilmington Lunch Counter Sit-In, Pauli and other students desegregated restaurants in DC. Pauli was one of the founders on the National Organization for Women. Essays Pauli wrote were part of the arguments laid before the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education. Pauli made the case that the Fourteenth Amendment could be used to protect women’s rights (as Ginsberg argued). And yet, so few of us have heard of Pauli Murray.

Pauli Murray stars in MY NAME IS PAULI MURRAY Photo: Courtesy of Amazon Studios ©2021 PM PM Doc, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

The film’s title makes it clear that this is an introduction. Pauli Murray’s name is one we should know, but don’t. And Pauli is an interesting personality. Pauli was something of a polymath. Pauli was an author, lawyer, poet, and eventually a priest. (Pauli was the first Black woman ordained in the Episcopal Church.) Pauli often practiced confrontation by typewriter, writing letters to people of power. When writing to FDR, Pauli would copy Eleanor Roosevelt, which lead to a friendship.

You may note my lack of pronouns here. Pauli was gender non-conforming, and in today’s language would probably identify as transexual. As a child Pauli dressed and acted as a boy. The family referred to Pauli as a boy/girl. For a time, Pauli rode the rails in the persona of a man. When facing surgery at one point, Pauli anticipated the doctors discovering undescended testes. (They didn’t.) This sense of inbetweenness is important for understanding some of the work that Pauli did.

Much of the film is made up tape recordings of Pauli reading from an autobiography as it was being written. It is important that we can hear that story in Pauli’s own voice. It is also important to hear the stories of people who knew Pauli and who have continued to build on that legacy.

What I miss from the film (and that is no doubt because of my ministerial background) is any real examination of the theological understandings Pauli developed while attending seminary later in life or serving as a priest. Given Pauli’s wonderful insights while studying the law, I would expect that Pauli could also bring that background and intellect to the realm of religion with similar insights.

Pauli Murray stars in MY NAME IS PAULI MURRAY Photo: Courtesy of Amazon Studios ©2021 PM PM Doc, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Pauli Murray truly was one of those unknown giants upon whose shoulders people are still standing seeing a future that can be made better. Pauli might well be seen as a footnote in the history of civil, women’s, and LGBTQ rights. To be a footnote does not lessen the impact. Indeed, we use footnotes as foundations for important ideas. Pauli may not have been someone most of the world see do important things, but great things were built upon Pauli’s work.

My Name is Pauli Murray in in select theaters and will be available in Prime Video beginning October 1.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg stars in MY NAME IS PAULI MURRAY Photo: Courtesy of Amazon Studios ©2021 PM PM Doc, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Photos courtesy of Amazon Studios.

Nine Days – Life Before Life

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“You are being considered for the amazing opportunity of life.”

What were you like before you became you? Is there life before life? Edson Oda’s Nine Days doesn’t so much ask or answer such questions, it plays with the possibilities they present. In the process we have a chance to consider what a gift it is to live.

Will (Winston Duke) lives in a secluded beachfront bungalow. There he spends his days watching a bank of TV sets that show the world through the eyes of various people around the world. He makes notes on each, keeping his file up to date. Will and his assistant Kyo (Benedict Wong) look forward to special days in the lives of their charges. One such day an upcoming concert debut by young Amanda (a bit of a favorite of Will’s). But when she suddenly dies in an accident (suicide?), Will is devastated. But he has to get busy, because it is his job to choose a new soul to be born.

Will, we discover, has chosen all of these people he watched (and perhaps vicariously lives through) for the gift of life. We aren’t sure if he is a divine being, or just a cog in the cosmos. But having had “previous experience as a living person” he understands the challenges that life can hold. (Kyo hasn’t had such experience. His job is to make sure Will follows the proceedures and to act as a sounding board in Will’s deliberation.)

Soon a selection of new souls arrives for interviews. Each new soul has their unique personality. Some are easily dismissed, but he settles on a group of five finalists. He gives them various tests to try to determine which will have the best shot at success in living. The others return to nonbeing. But we can tell that Will’s grief over Amanda’s death is affecting his judgement.

One of the finalists, Emma (Zazie Beetz), intrigues Will. She shows up late for her first appointment. She fails to give clear answers to his questions. Yet she has an empathetic and curious character. It is hard for him to dismiss her, even though she doesn’t fit into the process well.

Oda notes that one of his influences in Hirokazu Kore-eda’s After Life (which happens to be one of my all-time favorite films. Nine Days is in many ways a perfect companion to that film. After Life is souls being processed after their death. Here is the process before birth. Oda gives a very clear nod to that film in the loving way Will gives those whom he rejects a small artificial life.

By looking at life as something that is not yet for these characters, we get to see a bit of the wonder, the pain, the joy, the hope, and the peril that makes up life. We grieve for those souls not chosen for this “amazing opportunity”, because they have been given a taste of what that could be. We celebrate the possibilities that will exist for that one soul who is chosen. And we should ponder what it means for us to have been given the lives we have.

Nine Days is opening in select theaters with a rollout to follow.

Photos courtesy of Sony Picture Classics.

The Best of AFI Docs 2021

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Now that AFI Docs has wrapped up, it’s time to see the winners and to make note of my favorites.

Here are the award winners from the festival:

AUDIENCE AWARD: FEATURE

STORM LAKE

DIRS: Jerry Risius and Beth Levision. For 30 years, in Storm Lake, Iowa, Art Cullen and his family have been publishing a Pulitzer Prize-winning local newspaper. But, with newspapers everywhere going extinct, how long can they keep it up?

AUDIENCE AWARD: SHORT

SHELTER

DIR: Smriti Mundhra. A verité documentary that follows three young children and their families as they grapple with housing insecurity in Los Angeles.

SHORT FILM GRAND JURY PRIZE

RED TAXI

DIR: Anonymous. As protests in Hong Kong escalate, taxi drivers experience a city in upheaval driving the streets day and night. Anonymously filmed by locals.

SHORT FILM SPECIAL JURY PRIZE

THE COMMUNION OF MY COUSIN ANDREA

DIR: Brandán Cerviño Abeledo. Andrea’s First Communion ceremony lacks glamour. For Andrea, things without sparkles are meaningless.

SHORT FILM SPECIAL JURY PRIZE

S P A C E S (M E Z E R Y)

DIR: Nora Štrbová. A multi-textured animated exploration of memory as a container of identity, based on the personal story of the filmmaker and her brother who was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

I have my own personal favorites. Storm Lake was among my favorites, along with My Name Is Pauli Murrayand the episodes that were shown of 9/11: One Day in America (that one was a surprise to me).

Among the Shorts, my favorites were When We Were Bullies, and two that I think need to be paired together: Under the Lemon Tree and Mission:Hebron.

It was a very good set of films throughout the festival. My thanks to AFI and to all the sponsors for allowing me to cover the festival.

Day 5 at AFI Docs

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Often when important events happen, those involved pay homage to the past by talking of standing on the shoulders of giants. (This actually goes back to before its attribution to Sir Isaac Newton, so there are obviously lots of giants.) Today’s films look back at a couple of those giants upon whose shoulders others have stood and may still stand. One is well known. The other will likely be someone you haven’t heard of.

Celebrities often take part in social causes. In Andre Gaines’s film The One and Only Dick Gregory, we get a look at a comedian, a civil rights and anti-war activist, and healthy lifestyle activist. His humor was often built around race. He could play a room full of white people and have them laughing while at the same time making biting commentary. He was a friend to Medgar Evers and Dr. King. He was arrested frequently. He was targeted by J. Edgar Hoover. It was not enough for him to be rich and famous. He wanted to change the world.

In the film his autobiographiy coauthor Robert Lipsyte says, “He had a mission to accomplish, and it wasn’t just making jokes.” Indeed, very little of the film deals with his comedy, which was impressive in its own right. That comedy opened the door for many more Black comedians (some of whom pay a bit of homage in the film). What we see over and over is a man who was committed to the causes that affected people—racial injustice, the war in Vietnam, and later nutrition.

I was aware of Dick Gregory as a comedian/activist, but was never really connected to his work. This film, gives a very full picture of a man who was indeed a giant in many ways. The One and Only Dick Gregory will be available on Showtime July 4.

“I want to see America be what she says she is in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. America, be what you proclaim yourself to be!”

When filmmakers Julie Cohen and Betsy West were making the Oscar-nominated RGB, they came across a citation that Ruth Bader Ginsberg had in her brief arguing for women’s rights before the Supreme Court. They thought it was worth finding out who this person was. My Name Is Pauli Murray is what they discovered. Fifteen years before Rosa Parks, Pauli Murray was arrested for not moving to the back of the bus. Decades before the Wilmington Lunch Counter Sit-In, Murray and other students desegregated restaurants in DC. Murray was one of the founders on the National Organization for Women. Essays Murray wrote were part of the arguments laid before the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education. Murray made the case that the Fourteenth Amendment could be used to protect women’s rights (as Ginsberg argued). And yet, so few of us have heard of Pauli Murray.

Murray was something of a polymath. She was an author, lawyer, poet, and eventually a priest. (Murray was the first Black woman ordained in the Episcopal Church.) You may note my lack of pronouns here. Murray was gender non-conforming, and in today’s language would probably identify as transexual. Murray often practiced confrontation by typewriter, writing letters to people of power. When writing to FDR, Murray would copy Eleanor Roosevelt, which lead to a friendship.

Much of the film is made up tape recording of Murray reading from an autobiography as it was being written. It is important that we can hear that story in Murray’s own voice. It is also important to hear the stories of people who knew Murray and who have continued build on that legacy. Pauli Murray truly was one of those unknown giants upon whose shoulders people are still standing seeing a future that can be made better.

For today’s shorts, I want to make special note of When We Were Bullies. Filmmaker Jay Rosenblatt coincidentally meets an elementary school classmate decades later, they recall a bullying incident they were part of. Rosenblatt tries to contact all those involved to see if they remember it. It’s a difficult thing to realize that one has been a bully. (I made that realization some time ago.) In a way, that may be a typical part of growing up. But does that absolve us of what we have done so long ago. An excellent short.

Other shorts for today include Lydia Cornett’s Party Line, which show scenes from the very long line on the final day of early voting in Columbus, Ohio, last year. Ohio law only allows one early voting site per county, and 117,356 people voted early in that county. We see lots of masked people waiting in the snow to take part in democracy. In Halpate, directed by Adam Piron and Adam Khalil, we see Seminole allegator wrestlers in Florida with a bit of background as to why they have done this.

Photos courtesy of AFI.

Day 4 at AFI Docs

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Today’s films range from the mundane to the worlds of power and money. Documentaries are ways to mark points in time, to see life in new ways, and to broaden our knowledge. That happens in these films.

The HBO Documentary Series Obama: In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union premiered the first two episodes at AFI Docs. Directed by Peter Kunhardt, this series focuses on President Obama’s life with special emphasis on the role race played in shaping his life and his politics. Part One of the series covers his early life through his election to the U.S. Senate. Part Two overs his run for the Presidency in 2007-08. The film relies on archival footage and selected interviews with people who have known him.

This is a very conventional telling of the President’s story. It lacks an intimacy and personal understanding of the events in his life. The first part never really asks questions about the events in his life. In the second part, as he runs for the presidency, there are more insightful comments made about the tightrope of being a Black candidate and being a candidate for all the people. Questions of too Black or not Black enough come up. There are times that Black commentators critique some of the things he said in speeches as not resonating with the Black experience. The series will add another perspective for those seeking to understand the historic nature oif Obama’s election.

We (Nous) from filmmaker Alice Diop is a look at life in the Paris suburbs. There is no through story, just looks at the mundane world. We see a mechanic as he works on a car and gets a phone call from his mother in Mali. We see the filmmaker’s sister as she makes her rounds as a visiting nurse to elderly patients. We see kids in a park. We visit a Holocaust museum. There are no contexts given, we simply observe.

A title card at the end of the film the filmmaker mentions having learned “to see and love what is before my eyes.” That is very much what this film is about. It’s not about the narrative. It is about seeing these little bits of life as they happen.

Never mind “Antique Roadshow”. Suppose that old painting you have is really a Leonardo DaVinci. That is the crux of The Lost Leonardo by Andreas Koefoed. It traces the history of a painting found at an obscure auction in New Orleans, that was later restored and attributed to (not without controversy) Leonardo. The price paid at the New Orleans auction: $1175. The Price eventually paid at a Christies auction: $450,000,000. And, oh, by the way, you can’t see it because the current owner, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, refuses to exhibit it.

The painting, “Salvator Mundi”, becomes the focal point for looking at the art world and how it operates. It’s not just about art and collectors, but about finance and even global politics. The film brings in many of those who were involved in the story of the painting as it advanced through the art world, but also some outside people, who add knowledge about other aspects, including a former CIA operative. There is a sense in which what the film is about is truth. What makes truth? Can we know the truth? Does truth become just a matter of belief? Or does $450,000,000 buy truth? The Lost Leonardo will arrive in theaters in August.

Shorts for today include The Game, directed by Roman Hodel, that shows a bit of a soccer game. We see the crowds in the stand, the TV control room, everything is ready to go. But it’s not the game we watch, but the referee. Having officiated high school football in the past, I know that no one goes to the game to watch the referee, but he (or sometimes these days, she) is a key part of what happens. Another of the shorts is Eagles (Águilas), directed by Kristy Guevara-Flanagan and Maite Zubiaurra. That film chronicles the work of volunteers who search the Arizona desert for immigrants who get lost, or to find their remains to bring peace of mind for their families.

Photos courtesy of AFI.