Documentary filmmakers deserve much more love and attention than they receive. One way to get more attention is to make the list of 15 documentaries short-listed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Variety has this year's list and cites three Iraq War-themed films as being "center stage": Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro's Body of War, Charles Ferguson's No End in Sight (which Cinematical's Kim Voynar gave high marks when it played at Sundance) and Richard Robbins' Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience.

Kim is a self-styled "documentary dork" -- her words, not mine -- and wrote a column two months ago about films she thought "have (or ought to have) a shot at Oscar gold." She included No End in Sight, as well as the following docs that all made the short list: Sean Fine and Andrea Nix-Fine's War/Dance, Michael Moore's Sicko, Daniel Karslake's For the Bible Tells Me So, and Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman's Nanking. Kim was pulling for Logan Smalley's Darius Goes West, which sadly did not make the list. Other notable exclusions included David Singleton's In the Shadow of the Moon and Seth Gordon's The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.

Here are the remaining eight that did make the list. First, the ones we've covered so far: Tony Kaye's Lake of Fire, Richard Berge and Bonni Cohen's The Rape of Europa, Weijun Chen's Please Vote for Me and Peter Raymont's A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman. Next, the ones we haven't seen yet: Steven Okazaki's White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (which has played on HBO), Alex Gibney's Taxi to the Dark Side (due for release in January), Bill Haney's The Price of Sugar and Tricia Regan's Autism: The Musical.

Now the Academy's Documentary Branch will review the 15 films and narrow the list still further to the final five nominees, which will be announced on January 22.

One of the more fascinating films that premiered at this year's Tribeca Film Festival was Live! Written and directed by Bill Guttentag and starring Eva Mendes, Live! is a fictional narrative that follows the behind-the-scenes of a reality show's struggles to make it on the air. What's different about this show versus anything that's currently airing on TV is that its premise is incredibly daring. Basically, six people compete for a chance to win $5 million. There's one gun, one bullet and each person holds the gun to their head and pulls the trigger. Survive, and you win the money. Not only is the show itself risky, but the film's main character (as played by Eva Mendes) is a ballsy network executive who's convinced our nation is ready for something like this. On the other hand, she also wants to be the one responsible for making television history. Essentially, we hate her for supporting this type of show -- but at the same time, we wind up rooting for her to succeed.

For Guttentag, this is his first feature narrative as a director. In the past, he's directed episodes of the hit HBO documentary series America Undercover, as well as Law & Order: Crime and Punishment and one of the more recent controversial docs, Nanking. Basically, if anyone should be directing a film like this, it's him. I recently sat down with Bill to talk to him about the film, how it came about and whether he thinks a show in which real people play a game of Russian Roulette on live television could ever exist. Check it out:

Cinematical: Realistically, in your opinion, do you see a show like this ever existing?

Bill Guttentag: The film is, of course, a satire. But like any satire, you don't want to go completely out there with something that will never happen; you want to go a little bit farther than what would be out there.

Cinematical: This is your first narrative feature as a director. Talk about how the project came together; what about this idea sparked your interest?

BG: I'd been a showrunner for a show called Law & Order: Crime and Punishment, and I've been to a lot of network meetings where a lot of crazy stuff happens. I thought to myself that this would be some pretty good stuff to build a film around -- coupled with the fact that it would allow me to address a comment that I really want to make; one that the events from the last few weeks have tragically pointed out. And that is that we're a nation obsessed with guns. This is a gun culture, and I think the country pays an enormous price for that kind of culture. So this was something I thought was important; something I wanted to comment on.

Not long ago I was having a conversation with my friend about our constant craving for more reality TV. At one point, my friend turned to me and uttered a line I had heard several times before: "Ya know, pretty soon they're going to take this reality thing too far and start killing people on live TV." I'm sure you've either said or heard the same thing, but never gave it a whole lot of thought. Sure, we live in a violent world, but is a network stupid enough to approve of a show that kills people? And why even entertain the idea of bringing something like that to the FCC? Well, writer-director Bill Guttentag must have had that same conversation, though he didn't laugh it off and move onto another topic. Nope, he made a movie out of it. In fact, the inciting incident in Live! happens in the exact same way I just mentioned. But instead of two ordinary people having a conversation, we're taken inside a network boardroom where several creative types are trying to brainstorm the next great reality show idea.

Live! is a pretty easy film to sum up: Essentially, a television executive (Eva Mendes) trying to make a name for herself decides to run with an absurd idea brought up, as a joke, by one of her colleagues. What she wants to do is create a show in which real people compete in a game of Russian Roulette on live television, with the survivors taking home a sweet $5 million payday. While a documentary crew follows her around and films her every move, Katy (our ballsy TV exec) takes on the mission of convincing her network, their lawyer, their advertisers, the FCC, the media and the viewing audience that America is ready for a show like this. With ferocious stamina and her eye on the prize (which, in this case, means greater ratings than the Superbowl), Katy uses her brain -- and one tight skirt after another -- to seduce her enemies into thinking that this crazy idea might just work.

In August of 1937, the Japanese army invaded China. By December 13th, they had defeated the Chinese army and invaded the nation's then-capital, Nanking. The events that followed, referred to as "the rape of Nanking," are documented in the film Nanking, showing at Sundance in the US Documentary competition. The structure of the film was put together largely through the journals and letters of a small group of missionaries, professors and doctors -- and a Nazi businessman, John Rabe -- who refused to evacuate the Nanking when the Japanese army invaded, choosing instead to band together to establish a "safe zone" within the city in order to protect the civilians who lived there.

Like Schindler's List and Hotel Rwanda, Nanking tells a tale of war-time horror through the story of people who tried to help. Directors Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman (with a script co-written by Elizabeth Bentley) bring the events of the invasion of Nanking to life through vintage footage, interviews with survivors, and a staged reading of excerpts from journals and letters by a group of actors including Woody Harrelson, Mariel Hemingway, Rosalind Chao and Jurgen Prochnow.

According to Production Weekly, David Krumholtz has found a way to spend his summer break from Numb3rs. Originally slated to be hanging out in Paris with Michelle Williams and Woody Allen, the actor suddenly found himself with a whole lot of free time when Allen dumped that project and headed back to London. Now, though, word comes that Krumholtz has landed on his feet, albeit with a slightly smaller budget: He's going to star opposite Eva Mendes in Live!, an indie thriller from Oscar-winning short-subject documentary director Bill Guttentag.

The movie is a mockmentary that follows Medes' character, an "ambitious president of [television] programing," as she tries to raise ratings with a reality show in which people play Russian Roulette for a "Yay, you're alive!" prize of $5 million. Gee, think someone's seen 13 (Tzameti)?

The movie begins filming in LA later this month.

[via MovieWeb]