Documentary

Pumping Iron (25th Anniversary Special Edition)

A documentary about the subculture of bodybuilding, with suspense about who will win the titles of Mr. Universe and Mr. Olympia.
Genre: Documentary
Rating: NR
Release Date: 11-NOV-2003
Media Type: DVD

Arnold Schwarzenegger works the crowds, plots strategies for defeating multiple opponents, shares his parents' values with the press, and inspires legions of admirers with his resolute optimism about the future. And all of this long before he decided to run for governor of California, in 1977's hit documentary, Pumping Iron. Larger than life, though not necessarily larger than his rivals for the Mr. Universe and Mr. Olympia bodybuilding titles (especially a young Lou Ferrigno, hot on Arnold's competitive trail but much less interesting), Schwarzenegger still comes across, at age 28, as a consummate politician, smart, likable, and crafty about exploiting others' psychological weaknesses. The film still feels redundant (there's only so much beefcake the human eye will tolerate), but the emotional dramas--the unrewarded hard work, the unanswered hopes--are compelling. Complete with a revealing 2003 interview with Schwarzenegger and a reunion of the film's bodybuilders and director. --Tom Keogh

Addiction

The feature length documentary film ADDICTION brings together the nation's leading experts on drug and alcohol addiction with a collection of award-winning filmmakers to shed light on addiction its causes and the latest and most prominent developments in treatments. Its focus is on case studies and new medical treatments. A supplementary series of 13 short films delves deeper into the various dimensions of addiction.Running Time: 86 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. Rating: NR UPC: 026359403224 Manufacturer No: 94032

This groundbreaking HBO series teams some of America's foremost experts on the vexing problem of addiction with some of the most talented documentary filmmakers working. The result, Addiction, is a riveting pastiche of short spotlights on the deep wounds, scars, and battles affecting the growing numbers of people plagued with addictions, especially to drugs and alcohol. In A Mother's Desperation by Grey Gardens co-filmmaker Albert Maysles and Susan Froemke, a Pittsburgh mom is wrung nearly dry in her frantic attempt to keep her daughter alive through her horrifying addiction to opiates. At one point, she resorts to having her arrested: the ultimate in tough love. Other segments look at the devastation wreaked by alcohol, that most sanctioned of social drugs, and how people in varying social and economic strata have tried (and in some cases, failed) to overcome their heart-breaking diseases. A lot of emphasis is given to medical solutions and research, and less to some methods with very established success records (notably, Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step groups). But the filmmakers may have felt the work of A.A. has been explored deeply over the years, and also doesn't necessarily work as a film subject. The ones they have chosen to focus on, including struggling teens, insurance lapses, workplace stigma, etc., are gripping enough.

The set comes with even more intense and deeply reported footage (more than four hours' worth of extras) including interviews with addiction experts, and fascinating brain research that shows how the flawed addict brain reacts. There's also a helpful paper guide to the series, with talking points, which can make the series a useful tool for health professionals, teachers, 12-step groups, and even families who are desperate to understand this often baffling condition. It's not a breezy experience, but watching Addiction will surely change hearts and minds of those touched by one of the most destructive conditions in modern life. --A.T. Hurley

Magnificent Desolation - Walking on the Moon (IMAX)

Only 12 have walked on the moon. You're next! Presented and narrated by Tom Hanks Magnificent Desolation: Walking on the Moon is an IMAX documentary film that transports the viewer to lunar surface where they can walk alongside the 12 extraordinary astronauts who have been there experiencing what they saw heard and felt.Running Time: 40 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. UPC: 026359332128

Tom Hanks continues his love affair with space that began with Apollo 13 and his miniseries From Earth to the Moon with this compelling IMAX adventure, Magnificent Desolation. Fans of space fact and fantasy will not want to miss this engaging docudrama, which combines actual footage of lunar walks and interviews of the few men who've trod there with dramatizations of scenarios both exciting and terrifying.

The true way to experience this film, of course, is in its IMAX splendor, but home-theater buffs won't be disappointed. The footage takes the "lunar visitor" along moon's craters and potholes, with nothing but the vastness of space all around. Unseen film shows close-ups of terrain as well as technical infrastructure that may well be models for future moon-living. One particularly scary scene thankfully has never happened on a moon mission, and involves the sudden loss of breathing apparatus. Scuba divers will recognize the "buddy system" of sharing a single air source--and viewers with any kind of claustrophobic issues may want to fast-forward. But overall, the thrills of space travel are made as real as possible for us mere mortals who will only experience it from our comfy chairs. Roger that.--A.T. Hurley

When It Was a Game - Triple Play Collection

This HBO documentary is based on a highly original idea: tell the story of baseball from the Great Depression era through the late 1950s using footage from home-movie cameras shot by fans and players. The result is a marvelous look at baseball in America as seen from the ground--the culture of stadiums, the ritual of afternoon games, the spiritually sustaining rivalries. Among the truly unexpected sights is color footage of the 1938 World Series, not only from inside the stadium walls but from the street as traffic cops, crowds, and vehicles amassed. It also covers World War II's impact on the game, and, of course, the heroes, often caught in relaxed, unselfconscious moments.

Arguably more defined and even more lyrical than its predecessor, When It Was a Game 2 moves from a general celebration of baseball culture in America to a specific focus on various facets of the game's history, including the special relationship between game announcers and fans and the farm-team system during the 1930s, '40s, and '50s. Brooklyn's assimilation of the Dodgers into their community identity is covered quite winningly as is the heartbreak of the team's desertion to California. Last, the film takes us on a tour of some of the game's legends and presents a touching tribute to the extraordinary Babe Ruth. --Tom Keogh

When It Was a Game 3 focuses on the 1960s, a time of change for all of America. Through sharp, incredibly clear color footage of players and fans, the film shows how Major League Baseball slowly but surely evolved from pure sport to moneymaking entertainment. Covering the mighty Yankees, the western expansion of both leagues, the increasing inclusion of black players, and the rise of free agency and increased salaries, the film shows the growth of baseball from adolescence to adulthood. --Rob Lightner

Stomp Out Loud

Stomp is a rhythmic, musical extravaganza that has stunned audiences across the globe. If you weren't lucky enough to catch them in your hometown (or you did and you crave more), now there's Stomp Out Loud, a special HBO performance that will bring the unusual musical feats right into your living room. You might just find yourself grabbing a broom or even your remote control to keep time. "It's comedy, it's theater, it's very physical, it's energetic, it's occasionally quite terrifying," says one performer. Taking their show from the theater to the streets, this astonishing troupe can make music out of just about anything and just about anywhere. The opening sequence shows them dangling by harnesses across the back of a Manhattan billboard drumming on hubcaps, pipes, street signs, and plastic garbage pails, all the while swaying and keeping in perfect time. You know how you like to groove along to the radio while driving? Stomp doesn't need a radio--they use their hands to make their own music while cruising the streets of New York. Using just basketballs in a steamy alleyway, the troop creates an incredibly intricate dance and sound with the street, brick walls, and Dumpsters. Included in the program are the push broom, garbage can, and pole dances, just a few of their best-known sequences. Stomp Out Loud showcases the performers in the theater, out about town, and in short humorous vignettes (love the recurring card game!). All in all, they amaze. This well-produced video also includes a trailer and a special behind-the-scenes look at the making of Stomp Out Loud. --Dana Van Nest

When the Levees Broke - A Requiem In Four Acts (Documentary)

Examines various perspectives on the integral events that preceded and followed Katrina's passage through New Orleans, with personal accounts from survivors.
Genre: Television: HBO
Rating: NR
Release Date: 19-DEC-2006
Media Type: DVD

Director Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke is the definitive document of the unmitigated disaster that was, and is, Hurricane Katrina. It's also a contemporary manifestation of an ancient tradition: an oral history, told by the people who lived it, with no narration and only the occasional use of archival cable and broadcast news footage in addition to Lee's own film. And a grim tale it is, an "American tragedy" subtitled "a Requiem in Four Acts," each of them about an hour long ("Act V," appearing on the third of the set's three discs, is a lengthy epilogue with new material not included in the original HBO broadcast) and focusing almost exclusively on New Orleans, as opposed to the Gulf Coast region in general.

Act I sets the scene; as the hurricane nears the Crescent City, some residents leave town, while others stay behind, figuring they'll just ride the storm out (Mayor Ray Nagin's "mandatory evacuation" order rings fairly hollow, as there's no public transportation provided for the many who don't own vehicles and thus couldn't get out even if they wanted to). The real problems begin after Katrina makes landfall on August 29, 2005. Displaced New Orleaneans crowd into the Superdome, soon to become a living hell for those stuck there; the incredibly poorly engineered levees break, flooding some 80 percent of the city; and people start dying by the hundreds, victims of drowning, lack of food, water, and medicine, and other causes. And so it goes. Act II finds the survivors struggling to keep it together while the federal, state, and local assistance they've been promised fails to show up; Act III traces the dispersal of these so-called "refugees" (as one man puts it, "Refugees? You mean they took away our citizenship, too?") all over the country, not knowing where their families, friends, and neighbors are, or even if they're still alive; and Act IV deals with the slow rebuilding of the city while insurance companies refuse to pay claims and money keeps going toward the Iraq war effort instead.

Several themes predominate here. One, of course, is the appalling performance of authorities on nearly every level, who ignored specific warnings about the levees and then professed ignorance after the fact; Lee doesn't have to go out of his way to make George W. Bush, FEMA chief Michael Brown, and other members of the Bush administration (not to mention his own mother) look bad, as they do an excellent job of that themselves. Another is the shameful ineptitude of the response; it's hard not to be disgusted when it's pointed out more than once that while we were able to provide supplies and assistance to Indonesians within two days of the 2004 tsunami, American citizens were virtually ignored for five days or more. Most of all, When the Levees Broke (which includes optional commentary by Lee for all four acts) leaves us feeling the sheer rage of the poor and dispossessed of New Orleans, where the population is 70 percent African-American. Confronted with the ignorance, arrogance, and callousness of the people whose job it was to protect them, they can point to just one cause: racism. --Sam Graham

Dare to Dream: The Story of the U.S. Women's Soccer Team

From their meager beginning in the 1980s as "the red headed stepchild" of sports through four World Cups and three Olympic games Dare to Dream examines how Mia Hamm broke through as a media phenomenon why Brandi Chastain's celebratory moment stirred so much controversy and how Julie Foudy Michelle Akers and Joy Fawcett overcame daunting obstacles to help the team step into history and in the process lift the aspirations of all young women.Running Time: 80 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. UPC: 026359322228 Manufacturer No: 93222

Do You Believe in Miracles? The Story of the 1980 U.S. Hockey Team

You don't need to know anything about hockey to be moved by this hourlong documentary about one of the greatest upsets in sports history: the United States' defeat of the vaunted Russian Olympic hockey team at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York. The film recounts the David vs. Goliath matchup between the Americans (essentially a group of college kids molded into a team by coach Herb Brooks, also the U.S. hockey coach in the 2002 Olympic games) and the Russians, professionals who had won four straight Olympic golds. The story is retold in interviews with the people who lived it, including Brooks and several of the American players, sportscaster Al Michaels (who uttered the title line as the game ended), and key Russian players. Do You Believe in Miracles? is a solid blend of sports and history that focuses on the human element in one of the great underdog victories of all time. --Marshall Fine

The Iceman Interviews

An abused young man. A hair-trigger temper. A trail of dead bodies. What makes a cold-blooded killer tick? THE ICEMAN AND THE PSYCHIATRIST is now available for the first time on DVD. Renowned forensic psychologist Dr. Park Dietz gets up close personal and even confrontational with psyche of one of the most dangerous men alive. Bringing together the earlier THE ICEMAN TAPES: CONVERSATIONS WITH A KILLER and THE ICEMAN: SECRETS OF A MAFIA HITMAN with the newly released Dietz interview this new special edition THE ICEMAN INTERVIEWS is the ultimate compendium of the mind of a murderer. Includes Richard "The Iceman" Kuklinski's riveting on-camera confession exclusively for HBO of the murder of police officerPeter Calabro. Making news in February 2003 Kuklinski accepted a plea bargain for a concurrent 30-year term to his 60-year prison sentence and implicated Sammy "The Bull" Gravano in the crime. THE ICEMAN INTERVIEWS - this new special edition is guaranteed to run chills up and down your spine all over again.Running Time: 150 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. UPC: 026359215926

Dear America - Letters Home from Vietnam

All the confusion, pain, despair, and even hope of the men and women who served in Vietnam is captured in Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam. Read by dozens of actors such as Harvey Keitel, Matt Dillon, and Kathleen Turner, these letters show a more human story of the war than we see in most media outlets and reveal real people in real situations trying to explain or understand. The footage, some newsreel, some shot by the servicemen and servicewomen, reveals a tension between the soldiers' actual experiences and the presentation their loved ones received from television. The soundtrack weaves the songs of the 1960s with the readings to create a compelling aural snapshot of the time, which complements the video exceptionally well. While it's not a "feel-good" movie, the viewer does get a sense of the indestructibility of human dreams. --Rob Lightner

This classic HBO documentary features reenactments of actual letters written by soldiers during the Vietnam war. In each case, a famous celebrity voice (Martin Sheen, Michael J. Fox, Robin Williams, and others) reads the letters to us.