2021 documentary project wrap up

 So I spent a year consuming a documentary a week and what did I learn? So much. I will be an excellent party guest, once we get back to having parties again. I have lots of interesting talking points at my disposal now. How did I pick the documentaries, I will pretend like someone asked. Many different ways, sometimes I recognized the subject would be interesting to one, or more, of the humans who live in my house and that turned into conversations and debates, which is always fun, when done correctly. Other times I gravitated to what was popular at the moment or what trailer happened to pique my interest. I would make time to mindlessly scroll, to catch up with what was being offered on the various streaming platforms I subscribe to. 

I guess the next question, no one asked, would be; which documentaries were my personal favourites. In particular order they were;

Tread - About the guy that built himself a tank and drove it through his town, targeting those places he felt wronged by. 

Barkley Marathons - An absolute fever dream of an event (trail run), that has a secret entry process, a secret start time, a ridiculously number of finishers and an incredibly unique guy who manages it all.  

There Are No Fakes - Kevin Hearn from The Barenaked Ladies bought an original Norval Morriseau painting that turned out to be a fake. This doc follows the trial as well as touching on Morriseau's story and the world surrounding his paintings both real and fake. 

Secrets of Whales - This is just a lovely collection of episodes that are beautifully shot. The beluga episode is my personal favourite, but they are all visual stunning and interesting.

My Octopus Teacher - Another beautiful one to watch. And the story is quite touching as well.

Posting these reviews, which I fully admit I am not the best at, was a way to keep my ontrack to hit my goals, but also encouraged conversations both in person and online about what I was watching. Interesting to me, the documentary that garnered the most interaction was Miss Americana about the one and only Taylor Swift. There are a lot of Swifties out there my friends, as there should be.... in my opinion anyway.

So that's my 2021 Documentary Project wrap up, I am already on to 2022's project and hope to be catching you up soon. I've already watched some great ones!

54/52 - Count Me In

 

Count Me In (2021) - I am not musically inclined in any manner, meaning I play no instruments and I can't carry a tune in a bucket, but I am a very enthusiastic fan of music. We listen to music a lot as a family and recently invested in a turntable and are collectively building, what I feel to be, a kick ass vinyl collection. I love to discuss lyrics and meanings behind songs, which we do a fair bit over family dinners, so this documentary with drummers discussing their craft was right up my alley.

I really enjoyed this documentary. The interviews from are entertaining and interesting. My favourite part is listening to them talk about what the admire or recognize about other drummers. As a person with little musical knowledge/ability I really enjoy having why something is great explained to me in a manner I can understand. This documentary features lots of the greats; Ringo, The Police's Stewart Copeland, Foo Fighters' Taylor Hawkins, and Queen's Roger Taylor to name a few. It was a fun and interesting watch. I'd recommend it to any music fan!

I watched this on Netflix.

53/52 - Schumacher

 

Schumacher (2021) - Given how much I enjoyed the F1 docu-series, Drive to Survive earlier this year this documentary about seven time F1 World Champion Michael Schumacher seemed like a good one to check out. There is a wealth of personal pictures and footage of Schumacher to go along with the interviews from the who's who of the F1 world. There's also great interviews with his wife and children. Michael Schumacher does not appear in this aside from archival footage. He hasn't been seen in public since his skiing accident in 2013.

Ultimately this was an enjoyable watch, but for someone like me who is an extremely casual F1 fan there was a lot I feel this documentary took for granted in terms of my knowledge on the topic. I have seen criticism online that there is very little time devoted to Schumacher's accident, but I can understand his family desiring to protect his legacy and privacy. This documentary portrays him as both a guy dearly loved by his friends and family, but also incredibly aggressive in his approach to racing, which some reviews suggest should have been analyzed a little more for this production. Overall, for me, this was just okay. I didn't feel like a big enough fan of the sport to be truly engaged with this. Legitimate Schumacher fans will likely feel different.

We watched this on Netflix.

52/52 - The Super Bob Einstein Movie

 

The Super Bob Einstein Movie (2021) - When the Barenaked Ladies posted on Instagram that they'd written the song for the end title credits, there was no question we'd be tuning in on drop day. The Super Dave show was an absolute staple in our house in the 80's. Bob Einstein played the title character, Super Dave Osborne, an accomplished stuntman who never seems to successfully perform a stunt. The failure of these stunts was always catastrophic and hysterical. Einstein played Super Dave to perfection. Recently Einstein is probably best known for his role as Marty Funkhouser on Curb Your Enthusiasm. He's also brother to Albert Brooks.

Bob Einstein passed away in January of 2019 and this documentary is really a celebration of what a comedic genius he was. This doc has great interviews with Einstein's younger brother Albert Brooks, Jerry Seinfeld, Dave Letterman, Larry David and the rest of the Curb cast. It goes over all the great Super Dave bits and the Marty Funkhouser highlights. Einstein was obviously well loved and respected and as these interviews can attest. I really enjoyed hearing the breakdown of how Bob Einstein made his characters so funny. If you're a Super Dave or a Marty Funkhouser fan, this feel good doc is for you.

We watched this on Crave.

51/52 - 'Twas The Fight Before Christmas

 

'Twas The Fight Before Christmas (2021) - A Christmas themed documentary seemed the perfect addition to our family time holiday viewing schedule this year. A family who just loves Christmas is moving into a new neighbourhood and is hoping to bring their huge Christmas decoration extravaganza that draws hundreds of visitors to their street along with them to the new house, the Home Owner's Association, however had other ideas.

I kind of thought this was going to be a light-hearted documentary about a goofy guy who really loved Christmas, but this one got dark. Saying he really loved Christmas is something of an understatement, this guy is irrationally obsessed. Of course, he doesn't see it that way, but that can all be sorted out in a court of law. Which is his favourite threat, mainly because he's a lawyer and has the ability to make what are typically idle threats a reality without the financial burden that the general public would face to do so. To be fair there were mistakes made on the HOA's side of things as well, but it quickly got exponentially out of hand from there. I'm still shaking my head over it, to be honest. It is a wild and uncomfortable ride. Last I heard the case was still ongoing.

We watched this on AppleTV+.

50/52 - Who Are You Charlie Brown?

 

Who Are You Charlie Brown? (2021) - Watching The Charlie Brown Christmas Special is one of my favourite holiday traditions. Year after year it never disappoints. So, you could argue that pure nostalgia drove this choice, as I watched right during the holiday season. This documentary was directed by Michael Bonfiglio and is narrated by Lupita Nyong'o  and features interviews with Charles Schulz's widow Jean Schulz, cartoonist Lynn Johnston, actors Kevin Smith, and Drew Barrymore and lots more Peanuts fans.

This documentary delivers a Charles Schulz that is just as warm and lovely as you would hope he would be. Even more interesting was how he layered the world around him into his comic strips. Things like having strong girls in the strip, having Charlie Brown deal with his own insecurities and the introduction of Franklin after a teacher wrote him in 1968 urging Schulz to add a Black character. In between the interviews and the archival footage is a new cartoon with Charlie Brown trying to write an essay for his teacher about who he is. I enjoyed every minute of this one, my only complaint is at just under an hour, it felt too short.

I watched this on AppleTV+

49/52 - The Comedy Store

 

The Comedy Store (2020) - As I have mentioned we are fans of stand up comedy so this docu-series was a no brainer for me. Nobody else here was interested in watching, so I went alone with this one. This series is about the famed Comedy Store comedy club in Los Angeles. It's hosted by Mike Binder and features lots of interviews with the best of the best talking about their time at the Comedy Store.

I did really enjoy hearing from the likes of Dave Letterman, Jimmy Carrey, Whitney Cummings, and Marc Maron to name a few, but to me they seemed like random podcast type conversations then really telling the tale of the club, if that makes sense. I mean I still enjoyed it, but I feel like I came away with an appreciation of comedians telling their stories about performing hanging with other comedians and they also just happened to be at the Comedy Store. And truly if you are fan of stand up in general the interview list is killer. There also seemed to be more focus on the sensational types of stories like the passing of Freddy Prinze and Sam Kinison for example. It is a good one if you are a fan of comedians in general.

I watched this on Crave.

48/52 - Tig

 Tig (2016) - We are a family that enjoys stand up comedy, so when my daughter and I stumbled across this, we were certainly game to check it out. I didn't really know much about Tig Nataro outside of her bit about Taylor Dayne I'd heard and quickly came to appreciate her dry style of delivery. Not long after a string personal tragedies she was diagnosed with breast cancer which led to her incredibly honest stand up show she did just days after being diagnosed. That show at Largo was billed as being funny, heart breaking and brave and it made her suddenly famous as she began the fight for her life. 

This documentary tells the story of how Tig got here and then what happens next as she attempts to have a child, falls in love, write new material and grieve her mother. It was a touching and funny watch, which seems very true to Nataro's stand up. It was an interesting view into the things that make up a life, the funny bits, the hard bits, the bits you think you won't be able to get through. Made Tig Nataro fans out of both myself and my daughter.

We watched this on Netflix.

47/52 - Class Action Park

 

Class Action Park (2020) - A documentary about the most dangerous water park and it's collection of poorly designed water slides, ridiculously fast go-karts and faulty brakes on the Alpine coaster all run my barely supervised teenagers? What could go wrong?

A lot, obviously. Action Park was in operation in New Jersey from the late seventies until the mid nineties, which seems way way too long. I mean once you watch it, you have to wonder why no one shut it down almost instantly. Remember being a kid and thinking a loop do loop in a water slide would be a great idea, but with age and experience you realize that physics just won't allow for it? Well these guys went ahead and built one anyway and offered staff $100 each to test it out. Early riders had teeth knocked out, the second wave of testers cut themselves on those very same teeth that ended up embedded in the ride itself. 

The founder of the park, Gene Mulvihill, bought two ski resorts in New Jersey and figured a good way to make money in the off season was  to open a water park, but not to worry too much about properly designed attractions, or safety or insurance, he created his own fictitious insurance company in the Cayman Islands and refused to settle suits brought against the park by injured parties, instead dragging them out in court until they gave up. All of this builds to the eventual loss of life in several tragic cases, the Mom of one victim does appear in this documentary. It's unfortunate such a casual disregard for public safety had to lead to this.

We watched this on Carve.

46/52 - Untold - Breaking Point

Untold - Breaking Point (2021) - Another one from the Untold series and another tennis doc. I am not a huge tennis fan, but I will watch a match if there is a lot of buzz around it. I hadn't heard of Mardy Fish before, but like the other documentaries in this series it was very well presented with great interviews. Having watched the Naomi Osaka documentary previously and followed her withdrawal from the French Open, this was an interesting watch.

Mardy Fish came up through the tennis ranks as a teenager with Andy Roddick. The two were close friends and Fish even lived with Roddick's family for a time. Fish was on the edge of the pro-circuit for years when things seemed to come together for him and his career really began to gain some traction. As he achieved success on the court the pressure began to build and he began to have panic attacks until he eventually had one in the middle of a match. And ultimately he decides to pull out of his match against Roger Federer at the US Open in 2012 because of his Severe Anxiety Disorder. 

If a player is sidelined due to physical injury that seems to read fine, but if mental health is cited as the cause it makes you weak or that you simply don't want it bad enough. We definitely saw a lot of that type of reporting when Osaka and Simone Biles withdrew from their respective competitions. I just don't understand that stance. The interviews in this give you a good idea of the mental toughness you have to have to be at the top of the game and there is no way it isn't taking a toll on them each and every day. The window of opportunity in professional sports is small, but after that passes these people still have a life to live and enjoy away from that stress and pressure, why would anyone feel comfortable calling into question what an individual's limit is? Mind boggling.

I watched this on NEtflix.

44/52 - Britney vs Spears

 

Britney vs Spears (2021) - I watched this one hoping for a deeper piece than the Framing Britney doc from earlier this year.  There's been a lot of comparison between this documentary and the latest New York Times one, Controlling Britney Spears as they were released within days of each other, but having only seen this one of the two I can't personally comment. 

This documentary does dive a little deeper into the legal moves that were being made in regards to the conservatorship. A lot of information comes from previously unreleased court documents that were obtained from an anonymous source. Those legal moves are disheartening. The claim is made that Britney has dementia, but she is still able to work and when you add all that into her fear of losing visitation with her kids, the financial benefits and motivations for the conservatorship it's just an awful terrible mess to be in, but more importantly how is she ever supposed to be able to get out? Obviously at this point we know that her father has been removed as her conservator, but how terrible it even needed to get to this point. Off the top of my head I can name a handful of men who's behaviour, publicly has been, at the very least, as concerning as Britney Spears' was deemed to be and never once have we seen such maneuvers. 

I watched this on Netflix.

43/52 - Untold - Deal With the Devil

 

Untold - Deal With the Devil (2021) - I am not a boxing fan, but you know I just can't say no to a sports documentary. Additionally I knew this one would land well with my husband. This Untold series reminds me of the 30 for 30 series by ESPN, interesting stories, well researched and great interviews! Not being a boxing fan, I really didn't know who Christy Martin was nor had I heard her story, so I appreciated being able to hear it straight from her, but I'm not really sure who advised her ex-husband to agree to be interviewed. I'm guessing it has a lot to do with ego.

Christy Martin was one of the most influential female boxers in history who won 36 of her first 39 fights in the early 90s. She ended up married to her trainer, Jim Martin despite a significant age difference becoming the most successful female boxer with sold out fights, big contracts and media appearances . Behind the scenes was a different story, one of substance abuse, denied sexuality and an abusive relationship. It all came to a head one night when Jim Martin stabbed her, shot her and then left her for dead. His interviews are conducted from prison where he is serving 25 years for his crimes. This was a compelling and heart wrenching watch. I can't help, but wonder if she'd simply been allowed to be herself if that would have changed everything?

We watched this on Netflix.

42/52 - Funny Tweets

 

Funny Tweets (2018) - I was in search of something light  to watch and found this while scrolling around. Personally, I don't bother with twitter, I used to, but it became too much of a time suck. Will I always read curated lists of funny tweets on just about any subject? Yes, yes I will. I do appreciated a well crafted joke and twitter is full of them once you get past the all the other garbage.

I really expected this to be more fluff than it was. I mean it is about twitter, so it's not exactly hard-hitting, but there was enough to keep this interesting. From tweets that turned into storylines on shows like Simpsons and Family Guy, to the guy who went from being funny on twitter for free to writing jokes for a living. It's not all glamour though, sometimes the jokes just don't land, sometimes they outright offend, and sometimes the trolls come out. The internet can be a dumpster fire. This one was short, but fun with no shortage of great tweets.

I watched this on Crave.

41/52 - LulaRich

 

LulaRich (2021) - I really hadn't heard of LuLaRoe (the leggings or the lawsuits) before I saw the trailer for this documentary, but once I did I knew it was great one to watch with my daughter who'd recently finished an elective on cults. This four episode documentary tells us the story of multi-level marketing company LuLaRoe that sells brightly patterned leggings, dresses and tops via home and facebook live parties. 

This series blew my mind right from the beginning. LuLaRoe founders DeAnne and Mark Stidham sit for extensive interviews, why they agreed to this is beyond me. I mean on one hand you have these interviews that read, very much, like they don't get what the big deal is and on the other you have footage from their depositions which is often in contradiction to what they are saying in their interviews. These are people with very little self awareness. From them we have more interviews with former LuLaRoe employees, sellers and reporters who have been covering the company.

If you happened to get in early there was money that could be made, few sellers and limited editions patterns created a real interest in the product, but as their popularity grew the focus shifted to recruiting new sellers and early adopters were making big money from their "downline". It stands to reason then that as the company grew bigger and the market became saturated with sellers, it became increasingly difficult for those that came in late to make money. that right there is a wild ride and we haven't even gotten into the problematic messaging LuLaRoe sellers were getting from the company. The whole story is a wild ride and it's hard not to feel sorry for those ladies who got caught up in this mess.

We watched this on Amazon Prime Video.

40/52 - Miss Americana

 

Miss Americana (2020) - I love Taylor Swift and I make no apologies for it. I think she is an incredibly gifted song writer and I love just about everything about her, so it was surprising to me that it took me this long to watch this documentary. 

I have said this a bunch in watching the Britney Spears documentary and This Changes Everything, the double standards that exist for women in the media is completely bonkers.I truly believe that if we were talking about a man, well he'd be a God. Heck, Taylor even wrote a song about this very thing and it's a bop. Have it on my daily play list. It's just super easy to take shots at some one. It literally doesn't seem to matter what she does, she gets hate for it. If she's dating, she should be dating less. If she's nice, well that's clearly fake. She's too pretty, too thin and on it goes. Again, shouldn't we be better than this by now? Not a Swiftie? How about scrolling on past or skipping that song on the playlist and just live your life? It's free to be kind friends.

Rant aside, I did love the behind the scenes stuff in this one, specifically in the recording studio. Not being musically inclined myself, I love to see musicians do their thing. I find it absolutely amazing. I feel the same way listening to Jerry Seinfeld explain how to craft a joke. It's a treat to see people being the best at what they are the best at. Loved this one.

I watched this on Netflix.

39/52 - Turning Point 9/11 and the War on Terror

 

Turning Point 9/11 and the War on Terror (2021) - I missed my opportunity to watch the National Geographic documentary 9/11: One Day in America, so I settled in to watch this one in it's place. 

This docuseries was interesting as it went beyond the attack that day and took us all the way back to the "beginning" and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. To get to that point there you have to first watch through the footage and the interviews and recordings from that day, which are heart wrenching, just as a word of caution. It's really kind of an ugly and disheartening story from there to present day. What may have seemed to be helpful at the time, driving the Russians out of Afghanistan, for example, created a situation for the Taliban to thrive and while they may have gotten rid of warlords, they also trampled all over women's rights. And on and on it goes with a seemingly endless back and forth. 

This was not an uplifting watch, but it was informative and gave me lots to think about.

I watched this on Netflix.

38/52 - John & Yoko - Above Us Only Sky

 

John & Yoko - Above Us Only Sky (2018) - Funny story, my daughter loves the band, The Barenaked Ladies, who have a song called Be My Yoko Ono, which led her to ask who is Yoko Ono, which ultimately led to her being a newly minted Beatles fan and us watching this documentary. 

It was an interesting peek behind the curtain as John and Yoko work on the release of Imagine thanks to their own personal footage. It features interviews with Yoko herself as well as Julian Lennon. My daughter and I found it quite interesting how many people just seemed to be hanging out during the recording of this album and it was surprising to both of us to see George Harrison sitting in on some recordings. Another interesting twist to the story was John meeting with a Vietnam vet who had an over developed interest in Lennon. Instead of calling the police, Lennon shares a real moment talking with this man which is totally wild taking into consideration he ultimately died at the hands of an obsessed fan. 

This was a hit with both of us. We watched it on Netflix.

37/52 - Untold: Malice at the Palace

 

Untold; Malice in the Palace (2021) - Another sports documentary, what can I say..... I like them. My husband likes them too, so this was an easy sell. This documentary go over the story of the blowout between the Pacers and the Pistons after a foul on the court "inspires" a fan to throw a drink at Ron Artest at which point he storms into the stands and chaos ensues. 

The reaction to this skirmish was predictable, the blame was placed on the players, unprecedented suspensions were handed out and careers were tainted. The filmmakers were able to get access to the security footage from that night and it shows a fuller picture. The focus of the TV coverage being the players, obviously, the security footage, however, lets you see what was happening with the fans and the lax security. We both enjoyed this one, the interviews were great.

We watched this on Netflix.

36/52 - Naomi Osaka

 

Naomi Osaka (2021) - Personally, I am not a naturally inclined sports type person, but I do love a good sport's documentary. I'm not really sure why I find them so ridiculously appealing, but I do. I will watch all the sports documentaries you throw my way. Before watching this I had a vague notion of who Naomi Osaka is, but she wasn't super on my radar until she was on everyone's radar.

This documentary was directed by Garrett Bradley, who's Oscar nominated documentary Time, I watched earlier this year as part of this project. There has been a lot said about Naomi Osaka this past year, a lot of opinions put forth, by some with big platforms, about how they feel she should behave. This docu-series was a real peek behind the curtain about what it takes to compete at the top level. 

There is a lot of talk these days about how important the work life balance is for every single human, so I find it interesting and disheartening to see the media take shots at a young woman who is trying to find just that. I truly felt for Naomi Osaka through out this documentary as she clearly works so hard to find peace in her life amid her own ambitions, responsibilities and vulnerabilities. I'll be cheering for her to find it.

We watched this on Netflix.

35/52 - Elizabeth & Margaret - Love and Loyalty

 

Elizabeth & Margaret Love and Loyalty (2021) - Having watched The Crown and the media surround the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, including the Oprah interview, I had one daughter here very interested in the history of the current Royals, so she suggested watching this one. 

Having been a big Princess Diana fan back in the day (who wasn't though?) I have a pretty okay working knowledge of the current Royals, but I didn't really know a ton about Princess Margaret, so I was curious to see how the stories in this documentary stood up against the stories told in The Crown. It was interesting to me, to see just how a Royal's position diminishes as time goes on and how quickly it happens, once children and grandchildren and then great grandchildren arrive on the scene. You end of being kind of stuck. You are forced to play by the etiquette rules while your Royal position drops steadily down the ranks. You can't help, but notice the parallels between Prince Margaret and Prince Harry and perhaps be able to understand why Prince Harry made the decisions he did.

We watched this on Netflix.