documentary films
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More Music Documentaries, Please!
Let’s continue our dive into music documentaries, snapshots of musical process and lasting impact from notable musicians. On deck today: Little Richard and 90s band Morphine. Little Richard: I amEverything is well-titled. Gay. Black. Visionary. Check. Check. Check. But was Richard the king of rock? More on that later. The film explores his career chronologically… Continue reading
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One Documentary, One Concert, One Night of Rapturous Viewing!
Get your toes tapping and your soul soaring with these music documentaries. Starting with the elephant in the room, The Elephant 6 Recording Co. documentary takes an inside look at the 90’s rock collective most famous for Neutral Milk Hotel’s mythically held greatest-album-of-its-decade: 1998’s In the Aeroplane over the Sea. But as Robert Schneider, creative/spiritual leader… Continue reading
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Women’s History Through Film
Every so often, we like to remind folks about the incredible wealth of content available through the Library’s streaming databases, such as Kanopy. And what better way to celebrate Women’s History Month than watching a series of documentaries about inspiring women? For those wanting to learn more about Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected… Continue reading
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The Story of Film Part 15: Cinema Today an Tomorrow
We’ve now come to the end of our journey through Mark Cousins’ The Story of Film, following cinema’s early beginnings to the advent of the digital age. But before we ring down the curtain, we have a few more stops on our tour of cinema history. As digital effects began to strip the “realness” from mainstream… Continue reading
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Documentaries for Pride
Even though Pride events and in-person festivities are cancelled this year, it is still possible to celebrate LGBTQ resilience from the comfort of your home – and the Library can help with that! Aside from going out to protests and engaging with written content by queer authors, there are also lots of video resources available… Continue reading
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Escapism Through the Documentary
Documentaries gives us a peek into the window of someone else’s reality, and in these very unusual times, a glimpse into a place where the real world is not upended and devastated by a global panic sounds quite comforting. While during “normal” times, one might escape through fantasy, sci-fi, or a very engrossing drama, during… Continue reading
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Wheedle’s Groove: Seattle’s Forgotten Soul of the 1960s and ’70s
On June 2nd, as a part of the African American Film Series, we will be screening the documentary Wheedle’s Groove: Seattle’s Forgotten Soul of the 1960s and ’70s. This documentary, directed by Jennifer Maas, and distributed by local record label Light in the Attic Records, captures some of the heyday of Seattle’s soul, funk and R & B that… Continue reading
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Movie Mondays: A Dozen Documentaries to Devour
~posted by Frank It’s fall, and the days are getting shorter and darker. For those of you who are underwhelmed with feature films and unable to commit to another TV series, I offer you a list of a dozen recent documentaries to fill the void. Continue reading
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Movie Mondays: Movies about Movies
Last week, we looked at pictures about pictures — films about art and artists — and this week we look at movies about movies – documentaries about individual films. These four documentaries — two about classic films and two about films that were never made — are required viewing for cinephiles. Continue reading
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Labor in Film: We Are Wisconsin
In late winter of 2011, while the Middle East was deep in the midst of the “Arab Spring,” United States workers in the state of Wisconsin found themselves embroiled in a take-down struggle with Governor Scott Walker and the Wisconsin Legislature to preserve their collective bargaining rights. Continue reading
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Documentaries from SIFFs gone by
As I pore over the hundreds of screenings at the Seattle International Film Festival every year, I find myself focusing on two categories – documentaries and Scandinavian films. Here are some of my favorite documentaries from SIFFs gone by. Every Little Step is about the making of “A Chorus Line” on Broadway. Yes, it’s about actors… Continue reading