True Films

Cave of Forgotten Dreams


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Master documentarian Herzog invites you to join his rhapsody as he examines very recently discovered 30,000-year-old cave paintings — the most intact and pristine old paintings we know about. This film will move you back in time while he connects you with the neolithic painters who worked their art. Despite the vast time shift, and the geographic relocation, and the inaccessibility of the cave, you will feel, as Herzog intends, that these were painted by your uncle just last week. They will make sense and you’ll feel you made a journey. (The original was filmed in 3D which may be worth seeking out.)

— KK

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Cave of Forgotten Dreams
Werner Herzog
2010, 90 minutes
$3, Amazon Instant Video rental

Official website

Read more about the film at Wikipedia

Rent from Netflix

Available from Amazon

Posted November 29, 2012 at 5:00 am | comments


Project Nim


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This is an amazing film. What would happen if you raised a chimp as a human in an ordinary home and taught it sign language from infancy? Would it learn language? A professor and his hippie girlfriends tried this experiment during the 1970s with a chimp named Nim. Everyone of the dozen of humans who raised and cared for the chimp, bonded and communicated with Nim as if he were human. Nim was raised by a free-love mother who never disciplined him. When he got too strong to handle he was sent off to an animal farm where a long-haired hippy befriended him, and hung out everyday with him for years; he and Nim often smoked joints together. The farm ran into financial difficulties so, despite the outrage of his human family, Nim the “talking” chimp was sold to a research center where he was the subject of “medical experiments.” Finally he was rescued. Amazingly, Nim was filmed for much of his life so the director was able to put together this fantastic visual biography. Woven together with interviews from all the principle characters in Nim’s life we get an intimate record of this grand but misguided adventure. A hundred questions are raised by the experiment and many are answered by this superbly crafted film. I recommend it highly.

— KK

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Project Nim
James Marsh
2011, 93 minutes
DVD, $9

Official website

Read more about the film at Wikipedia

Rent from Netflix

Available from Amazon

Posted November 22, 2012 at 5:00 am | comments


The Parking Lot Movie


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This small portrait of over-educated parking lot attendants in a college town is surprisingly entertaining. The guys profiled rank at the bottom of society’s status, but become the “Gods of the Corner Lot” and enter into a constant battle with the owners of expensive cars and SUVs. Their whole war with the “parkers” is all in their heads, and since they spend a lot of time sitting in their tiny shack doing nothing, they live in their heads. The great joy of this film is that it gets you into their big heads. Their tiny patch of sub-culture is charming and amusing.

— KK

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The Parking Lot Movie
Meghan Eckman
2010, 71 minutes
$3, Amazon Instant Video rental

Official website

Read more about the film at Wikipedia

Rent from Netflix

Available from Amazon

Posted November 15, 2012 at 9:32 am | comments


Bill Cunningham New York


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Bill Cunningham is the long-time photographer for the New York Times who, at 80 years old, still rides his bike around the streets of New York shooting street fashion — or folk fashion — what people actually wear. Today there are hundreds of blogs chronicling this vernacular fashion, but for decades Bill Cunningham was the only one. He is an odd, but sweet genius. He unfashionably has worn the same blue blazer for 30 years, works all the time, ignores money, lives by himself in a tiny closet of an apartment stuffed with his photo negatives, and is a man marching to the beat of his own drum. There is a legitimate zen quality to his style and manner. While his subjects may be swayed by wealth, celebrity, and the superficial, he seems immune to them. This film is not about fashion; it’s about someone who has successfully invented their own occupation, and their life. It is uplifting. I smiled the whole time watching it.

— KK

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Bill Cunningham New York
Richard Press
2011, 90 minutes
$3, Amazon Instant Video rental

Official website

Read more about the film at Wikipedia

Rent from Netflix

Available from Amazon

Posted November 1, 2012 at 2:36 pm | comments




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