Categories One-by-One: Documentary Film

[Mister Tee]

I was honestly pretty bored by All That Breathes. It was one of those movies I felt I should care about, but I just couldn't work it up.

A House Made of Splinters seems to be trying to latch onto the Ukraine War zeitgeist -- it is set in the country, after all. But, though the shelter's situation has no doubt deteriorated since the conflict began, there's no evidence of it in the film, and the subject matter is pretty far removed from it. That said, the film is still quite emotionally engaging, whether giving the audience the relief of seeing one little girl's life seemingly work out, or the horrible feeling that Kolya is going to be self-sabotaging his entire life (which makes you want to shake some sense into his mother). Nothing ground-breaking here, but a surprisingly powerful piece of filmmaking.

Since voting opened up to full membership, we've had a few critics' favorites triumph in this category, something that rarely happened during the must-see-all-five years. It had thus puzzled me why there seemed so little traction for All the Beauty and the Bloodshed this year, despite its sweeping the classic NY/LA/National circles. Having seen it, I can understand better. The critics (and I) appreciated the complexity of the film: that it celebrated not just an individual victory (getting the Sackler name removed is pretty small potatoes in that department, anyway), but the whole of Nan Goldin's life, in being willing to fight unpopular battles, settle for tactical wins, and move on to the next; Oscar folk would be happier with one, big, concerted and outsize win. I also rather suspect Academy voters, who no doubt think of themselves as rooting for outsiders, prefer those outsiders to be more bourgeios-adjacent than Goldin -- they'd rather an Erin Brockovich, who fights for basically mainstream (if anti-corporate) causes, than a lesbian/East Village/punk rock AIDS activist who's never got closer to bourgeios life than cashing foundation checks. I don't think she's the hero they're looking for, and this is why the film has been floundering in the Hollywood stage of the race. I don't 100% rule out its winning, but I definitely view it as running 3rd.

As I said in the review thread, I had issues with the narrator in Fire of Love, but even I found the central relationship compelling, and the volcano footage pretty impressive. Anyone who didn't have my difficulty will probably like the film even more. The film is clearly in the running.

But Navalny appears the favorite, for its in-the-moment relevance, its admirable-though-not-sainted protagonist (this is a hero Oscar voters can get behind), and its engrossing narrative, especially including the cat-and-mouse phone trickery used to expose the plot. Not a great documentary, but probably the most in the Academy's wheelhouse, and I'd say it's the way to bet, even without its successes in precursor voting.

[anonymous1980]

The nominees:

All That Breathes
All The Beauty and the Bloodshed
Fire of Love
A House Made of Splinters
Navalny

It's one of the toughest categories to predict of the night: All The Beauty and the Bloodshed won the Golden Lion at Venice and picked up a lot of critics prizes and is directed by a former Oscar winner in this category. Fire of Love won the DGA. Navalny won the BAFTA and the PGA. The un-nominated Good Night, Oppy won the CCA Documentary award (but both Fire of Love and Navalny were runners-up in this one). WGA nominated none of these nominees so that's not going to help. So what wins? Personally, I would go with Fire of Love but Navalny feels more immediate with the Russian-Ukraine war in the headlines. But All the Beauty... has that artist angle so...I have no idea. I think you can eenie-meanie-maynie-mo between the three of them.

Personal preference:
01. Fire of Love
02. All That Breathes
03. Navalny
04. All The Beauty and the Bloodshed
05. A House Made of Splinters

Chances of winning:
01. Navalny
02. Fire of Love
03. All The Beauty and the Bloodshed
04. A House Made of Splinters
05. All That Breathes