los angeles film festival Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Before the pre-festivals press screening of Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story, the new documentary about the life and death of Republican political operative Lee Atwater, two separate Rolling Stones songs were running through my head. "Street Fightin' Man, " possibly inspired by Atwater's reputation as a dirty trickster of the higher order, and "Sympathy for the Devil," perhaps springing from Atwater's deathbed renunciation of many of the things he'd done; both associations sprang from the little I knew about Atwater. Thanks to the work of director Stefan Forbes, I now know a lot more; I now know so much, in fact, I'm not sure what to think.

Combining archival news footage with interviews from people who knew Atwater and some who, interestingly, only knew him through the public ramifications of his work, Boogie Man paints a complex portrait of a complex figure: A race-baiting political operative (Atwater may or may not have been behind the infamous 'Willie Horton' ad that cost Michael Dukakis the election in '88) who nonetheless loved to listen to, and play blues music; a man who sprang from the South who helped elect Eastern elites like George H.W. Bush; a man whose pupils in the modern political art of war, Karl Rove and George W. Bush (who worked with Atwater on his father's campaign) turned their back on him as he lay dying.

Watching Paper or Plastic?, the new documentary about the regional qualifiers and Las Vegas final of the 2007 National Grocery Bagging Competition, I was surprised to note the presence of something that's hard to come by in 2008: Sincerity. I don't mean just that Paper or Plastic? never mocks, knocks or condescends to the seven contestants from every corner of America the finale brings together -- although it never does -- but more that co-directors Alex D. da Silva and Justine Jacob not only found an event to observe but also a spirit to celebrate. The seven contestants we meet want to win; their friends and family support and surround them; they're part of a long tradition of competition. And da Silva and Jacob gradually, gently pull us into the world of competitive grocery bagging until, by the end of the film, I was literally at seat's edge watching a contestant race to beat the clock thinking Oh, God, don't forget the Life Savers ... they deduct points for that. ...

But while you're being entertained by Paper or Plastic?, you're also getting a fairly solid glimpse at modern life. One grocery executive notes that the "courtesy walk" taking a customer's well-bagged groceries still matters: "That's the last place Mrs. Consumer still has an impression of the store." And as freaky as the phrase "Mrs. Consumer" sounds in this day and age (all I can imagine is Donna Reed, with apron and pearls), you also realize he means it. Another grocery executive fan of the Championship notes "It's like American Idol; you never know where the stars are. ..." you realize that while what he's saying is a subtle comment on our modern celebrity culture, he, too, also means it.

Lionsgate has acquired domestic distrib rights to Amy Berg's Deliver Us From Evil, a documentary about a pedophile Catholic priest whose crimes were concealed by the Church for 30 years. I saw the trailer for this film shortly before the Los Angeles Film Festival, where it made its world premiere and scored the top doc prize, and it was heavy stuff for this ex-Catholic schoolgirl. The film is told from the perspectives of both victim and perpetrator, and if watching Ollie O'Grady, the jolly ex-priest with white hair and twinkling blue eyes, smile while describing how he finds young children in their underwear "arousing" doesn't turn your stomach, well, you're made of stronger stuff than I am.

Particulary wrenching is an interview with the parents of one of the victims, who was just five years old when O'Grady raped her. That the Catholic Church knew about O'Grady's crimes, and yet covered them up for years, moving him around from parish to parish where he could prey on fresh victims, is beyond reprehensible, and Berg's camera bravely shows the tragic effects of the cover-up.

Pic comes on the heels of Kirby Dick's Twist of Faith, another riveting doc about pedophilila in the Catholic church, which focused on the trauma of a now-grown victim who is re-traumatized when the priest who abused him years before moves into his neighborhood. Twist of Faith showed at Sundance in 2005 and was nominated for an Oscar later that year.

Deliver Us From Evil is slated for a Fall 2006 release.

We're not hanging out in sunny Los Angeles for the Los Angeles Film Festival this year -- although, looking at their lineup, maybe I'll lobby for someone at Cinematical who enjoys sun, glitz and Botox a lot more than I do to cover it next year -- but I thought I'd check in and see what other folks are saying about it.  Surprisingly, given that 60,000 people are supposedly descending on Westwood for this fest, I'm not finding a whole lot of folks writing interesting stuff about it. Maybe nothing interesting has happened yet, I don't know. If you're there, and you're blogging about it, drop me a line at kim@cinematical.com and let me know.

• Matt Dentler is still so excited about Brothers of the Head, the punk-rock mockumetary about Siamese Twin punk rockers, I'm beginning to regret not catching it at SIFF when I had a chance. If you're one of the 9 million or so people living in or around Los Angeles County, you might want to check it out. Film has it's L.A. premiere June 28 at the fest.