dan sturman Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Snag This: Nanking
Filed under: Documentary », Independent », Home Entertainment », Cinematical Indie », Trailers and Clips »
The summer of 1937 brought the invasion of China by Japan. "By December 13th, they had defeated the Chinese army and invaded the nation's then-capital, Nanking," wrote Kim Voynar in January 2007, by way of introducing her review of the documentary Nanking, which played at Sundance that year. The film is now available for free online viewing, thanks to our friends at SnagFilms.
As you might expect, directors Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman use archival footage and interviews with survivors to flesh out the film, but they also include "staged reading of excerpts from journals and letters by a group of actors including Woody Harrelson, Mariel Hemingway, Rosalind Chao and Jurgen Prochnow," as described by Voynar. She observed: "The scripted reading actually works more effectively than mere voiceover would have, bringing to life the people who were a part of the events that happened in Nanking during that time. War and violence are never pretty, and this is not an easy film to watch -- there is brutal and gruesome footage of the death and destruction that happened there."
The subject remains controversial in Japan, with some disputing or downplaying what happened in Nanking. As Voynar noted, "Nanking doesn't offer any easy answers -- and is it even possible to truly comprehend the mind-boggling evidence of humanity's capacity to cause hurt and suffering?" We've embedded Nanking below for your viewing convenience. Please note that it's NSFW due to the explicit historical footage included. More information is available at SnagFilms.
(Full disclosure: Nanking was produced by Ted Leonsis, founder and chairman of SnagFilms, who also serves as Vice Chairman Emeritus of AOL, the parent company of Cinematical.)
Academy Shortlists 15 Docs
Filed under: Documentary », Foreign Language », Independent », Politics », Oscar Watch », Religious », Cinematical Indie », War »
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.
Sundance Review: Nanking
Filed under: Documentary », Independent », Sundance », Theatrical Reviews », Festival Reports », Cinematical Indie »
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.
Jeremy Renner Wants To Be An Avenger
Directors We Love: Jim Jarmusch
Indie Roundup: 'Sweetgrass,' 'Clarkworld,' 'Broken Embraces'
Shelf Life: Fight Club_thumbnail.jpg)
Watch: Famous 'Matrix' Scene Re-Created with LEGOs
_thumbnail.jpg)
