Docs, 4/11.

Via Chris Barsanti, Ivan Oransky introduces a Scientific American package on Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, Ben Stein's "Michael Moore-style documentary confronting a contemporary scientific status quo that harbors a zero-tolerance policy for the theory of intelligent design in scientific research and American classrooms," as Bruce Bennett puts it in the New York Sun. As you'd imagine, SA isn't nearly as sympathetic. Oransky notes that Michael Shermer is "dumbfounded by the movie's dishonesty," while John Rennie argues "that the movie's attempts to link the theory of evolution to the Holocaust are shameful." And there's a podcast, too.

Errol Morris picks up where he left off; much of his new entry, "Play It Again, Sam (Re-enactments, Part Two)," is a conversation with "Dan Levin, a professor of psychology at Vanderbilt University, who has been involved in various studies of continuity errors in film and otherwise."

Related: Ron Rosenbaum in Slate: "Slo-mo is virtually the standard operating speed of Standard Operating Procedure. I think there's a reason (and a revelation) inherent in its use, which I'll get to. But first let me talk about why I find slo-mo so seductive in the first place."

Bulletproof Salesman "introduces us to Fidelis Cloer, a war profiteer who sells armored cars to diplomats, journalists, and others working in Iraq," writes Chuck Tryon. "Bulletproof Salesman, like [Michael] Tucker and [Petra] Epperlein's two previous documentaries on the Iraq War, Gunner Palace and The Prisoner Or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair, avoids any simple political positions, instead choosing to introduce us to one face of a man who profits off of war. The film works, in part, because Cloer is a natural salesman, selling himself just as quickly as he sells bulletproof cars and vests, as well as other safety devices. In fact, as Variety reviewer Joe Leydon observes, there is an extent to which Cloer seems like he would be a charming dinner guest until you develop a full understanding of his occupation and its dependence on the continuation of the war, or perhaps of war in general."

In the New York Times:

• "Young & Restless in China, Sue Williams's latest documentary about that country, follows an assortment of youngish adults as they try to find places for themselves in a rapidly changing social and economic landscape," writes Neil Genzlinger. "[S]oon it becomes clear that everything about them is just like us: health insurance problems, environmental concerns, citizen protests, declining spirituality, the tug of war between work and family obligations. And that makes the film, which follows nine subjects from 2004 until relatively recently, kind of pedestrian." More from Carina Chocano (Los Angeles Times), Noel Murray (AV Club) and Michael Joshua Rowin (indieWIRE).

• "The teachings of the Buddha infiltrate a maximum-security prison in The Dhamma Brothers, a thinking-head documentary about finding answers within for those who can't get out," writes Jeannette Catsoulis. More from Andrew O'Hehir in Salon: "The Dhamma Brothers builds internal tension effectively, especially when you consider that its core 'action' consists of a group of men sitting on cushions in total silence." Related: For the New York Press, Amre Klimchack talks with co-director and co-producer Jenny Phillips.

"Adding to the rich tradition of family-friendly nature documentaries finding success on the big screen - Microcosmos, Winged Migration, March of the Penguins - Earth is possibly one of the most ambitious to date," writes Matt Riviera.

Posted by dwhudson at April 11, 2008 1:29 PM