I enjoyed Kerslake's documentary on Joan Jett, Bad Reputation (2018) more than I anticipated. Jett is an iconic rock star who stared out as a punk-something that was relived in the 2010 biopic, The Runaways, starring Kristen Stewart. I would go as far as to say her first collaboration with producer Kenny Laguna is a classic. I was unaware of her career post 80s, which is where she is entrenched in most people's consciousness. However, she has continued to stay relevant and true to herself over the years-it's an informative and entertaining look at a rock-n-roll icon.
As something of a cinemafile I am a fan of the ground breaking films of Ingmar Bergman, so I was interested to see what director Margarethe von Trotta and Bettina Bohler had to say about the Swedish film legend in Searching For Ingmar Bergman (2018). Some of the coverage was impressionistic rather than informative. But I found the sections on the late career of Bergman spent in Germany the most fascinating since I was unaware of his financial exile. I am inspired to see some of his films made during this stage of his career since the only one I have seen to date was the 2003 comeback Saraband.
Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi won this year's award for Best Documentary at the Oscars for their film, Free Solo (2018), on free solo climber Alex Honnold's attempt to be the first climber to scale the daunting EL Capitan in Yosemite national park. It's an extraordinary sports documentary where the subject's life is in balance. There's also a meta-story of how the crew can capture the event without pressuring or distracting the climber. Those of us with vertigo can only cringe at the death defying prowess of the free solo climber.
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