Awsome, I...Shot That! (dir. Nathaniel Hornblower)

At a concert at Madison Square Garden, the Beastie Boys handed out 50 High8 cameras to audience members to film the live concert. It sounded quite a crazy thing to do but actually it was pretty well organised. The chosen audience members were all given matching green tracksuits and an upbeat debriefing. There were some professional cameras filming the concert too so they weren't completely reliant on their fans and their jerky camera work. I wanted to watch this because I was interested to see how the concept worked, not because I'm heavily into the Beatie Boys. The image quality was very poor but it was very well edited and I guess with more than fifty shots to chose from, the editor was bound to find usable material. It did give a sense of being with the audience but not being so into the music, it became rather boring as it was visually quite limited. There was a whole lot of different camera angles, sharply cut to the beat but as there was not much theatrics or onstage visuals, after a while a bunch of guys jumping around with occasional shots of the crowd with their hands in the air just wasn't enough to hold my attention for the whole film.

Let's Get Lost (dir. Bruce Webber)

Shot in black and white, this documentary about Chet Baker begins on a beach in Santa Monica. Chet and friends act-out a perfect image of 'carefree': spinning, arms outstretched, that kind of thing. That put me off a bit. I'm not very good at carefree. The whole film is beautifully shot though and there are some pretty honest reflections on Chet by his ex's and children he rarely sees. Chet himself is pretty elusive, or forgetful, or both. He's only in his fifties (not long before he accidentally fell to his death from a hotel balcony) but he looks close to the end of his life already. The film itself and how Chet is revealed in this film has a nostalgic, romanticised feel, though maybe this is heightened by the beautiful filming. Like the contrast between black and white, the film contrasts the young Chet through some great archive footage of him looking beautiful with Chet now, ravaged by drug abuse. His voice, consistently ethereal and wonderful, is contrasted with the stories of his greedy, cheating, manipulative, destructive ways. However, for all the bad he has done in his life, everyone, including the director, seems weirdly to forgive him.

Trouble The Water (dir. Tia Lessin & Carl Deal)

This is an exceptional documentary. The filmmakers, having arrived in New Orleans to make a documentary about Hurricane Katrina in the aftermath, bump into Kimberly Roberts, a young local aspiring rap artists who wants to show them the footage she shot on her High 8 camcorder. Realising that despite the poor image quality and the shaky camera work, before them was remarkable footage and a remarkable person. Kimberly stayed in Orleans because she had no money to leave and there was no public transport provided for those that needed it. The have-nots were left to their fate. The filming Kimberly does on the day the hurricane is due to strike is filled with people oblivious or uncertain of what is headed their way. Kim keeps filming as they are forced into the attic of their home and the water keeps rising. Neighbours who were once enemies come together and those that can, help those that are stranded. The aftermath is horrific, of course the physical devastation to the place, but it's the slowness and lack of adequate care and support by the government that makes the treatment of these people horrific. Kimberly morns for her grandmother who was in a local hospital and not evacuated and amongst many other patients who died as a result. Her brother is released on bail from prison and tells how the day before the storm, the TV was taken away so they had no idea what was going on except suddenly these was no food or water and inmates took to eating paper or toothpaste in the following days. Her uncle's body is found in his home two weeks after the storm. Too little too late but Kimberly and her husband aren't blame mongers, their energy is directed towards surviving and probably always has been. One of the best moments in the film is when Kimberly sings along to one of her tracks where she describes the conditions of her young life but knows that these things just make her stronger and more amazing. Kimberly was lucky to have bumped into these directors and they were lucky to have her and her High 8 tape in their film. It is edited beautifully, mixing Kimberly's rough with the director's 16mm, on a tripod, seamlessly. It's a splendid rarity.

Joy Division (dir. Grant Gee)

I wanted to watch this Joy Division documentary because the first one I saw was so bad I thought it couldn't be worse so I was glad that it was pretty good. It was a straight forward chronological re-telling of the Joy Division myth but straight from the those closest to the music. They had lengthy interviews with band members, record producer, manager, Annik, Ian's girlfriend, and other industry people on the scene at the time and had a direct connection with Joy Division. Ian's widow wasn't in the film but extracts from her book were included. It was well researched, a bit graphic-heavy, but had a good pace, great archive footage and a good narration. I felt some of the graphics were unnecessary, especially the kind of solarised shapes moving over archive footage of live recordings of the band. It got in the way a bit. Most of it though was well produced and used to good effect. The story of Joy Division (well Ian Curtis really) is an interesting one, however, the film didn't go beyond what most TV documentaries do. It was pretty formulaic in terms of its structure and when you've watched too many 'factuals' on iPlayer in a short space of time, they tend to blend into one massive talking head.

Family (dir. Sami Saif and Phie Ambo)

This is a strange documentary. Something about it reminded me of a Hollywood movie. I think it was to do with the horrendous 'epic' music and editing which seemed like a conveyor belt to dramatic moments. It worked though. I cried at all the right bits. The film is about Sami (who directs the film with his girlfriend Phie) and his journey to find his father. When I read the blurb about this film, I wasn't particularly interested in this kind of story as it would seem a fairly predictable flowchart of possible outcomes. In this sense, it was predictable and despite Sami being pretty annoying (until he meets one of his brothers in Yemen) it was a moving story. Abandoned by his father at a young age, his older brother committing suicide, which was quickly followed by his mother's death, Sami and his girlfriend decide to make a film about his search for his father. A few long-distance phone calls later (Sami is Danish-Arab) and Sami is in Yemen where he meets countless relatives that are instantly and overwhelmingly loving. It was moving to see him with his older brother who was so warm and loving towards a doubtful and insecure Sami. It is infectious and Sami ends up comforting and supporting his older brother as he opens up about his own childhood experiences of their father. It's not a film I would ever bother watching again because there was nothing really beyond the description on the back of the DVD, but there were some lovely moments in the film.