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Reviews
Road Songs: A Portrait of Robbie Robertson (2001)
Robbie is wonderful, documentary editing awful
I traveled to the Maine International Film Festival just to see this documentary on Robbie Robertson. I could listen to him talk about anything. I enjoyed hearing his thoughts and seeing him speak about his old hang-outs in Toronto. Unfortunately, the CBC documentary is completely full of itself in that it is like watching a demonstration tape of someone who just bought their first video editing system and want to show you absolutely everything it can do! The producers ego seems to know no bounds attempting to overshadow poor Robbie with every frame. One error I caught is they are talking about "Music From Big Pink" and show footage of the pink house in Saugerties, NY and then jump, without comment, to video of the band recording their second album at Sammy Davis's house in California leaving the viewer with the impression they were still inside the pink house in NY.
Chain Camera (2001)
Finally a REAL "reality" show!
Finally a REAL "reality" show! One Marshall High School student (in Los Angeles) is given a camera and a week to film their life then pass the camera on to a classmate. The resulting 10 vignettes create a compelling reality documentary. It is 100% human, thus it is often loving and compassionate, sometimes chilling, and sometimes extremely funny. The audience applauded loudly at the end. It makes one realize how phony the current "reality TV show" rage is.
El rey de rock 'n' roll (2001)
Fascinating to watch even if one dislikes Elvis impersonators.
I truly dislike anything having to do with Elvis impersonators. Yet, I found this documentary movie about "El Vez", the Mexican Elvis, bizarre but absorbing and ultimately pretty well done. The sound quality ranges from mediocre to almost unacceptable as does the video quality. El Vez's take on some of the Presley classics can be very funny.