TORONTO (djc) – The biggest sellout at Toronto’s Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival was a film about being stupid. One of the many lines that stood out in Albert Nerenberg’s Stupidity was how people “don’t want to talk about stupidity like they don’t want to talk about diarrhea.”
As two sold-out shows can testify, hundreds of curious Torontonians wanted to learn about idiocy, from a historical and intelligent perspective. The doc traced our fascination with stupidity back to I.Q. tests in the early 1900s, and to present-day silliness such as Jackass and boy bands. Quick-cut edits snazzed up the talking heads (Noam Chomsky and Bill Maher among them), and the visual playfulness only supported Nerenberg’s accusation that the world prefers its TV easily digestible. Like most of the thoughtful and entertaining documentaries that screened at Hot Docs last week (celebrating its 10th anniversary), Stupidity attracted attention because it provoked discussion on how we view the reality we take for granted.
Another highlight was My Student Loan, by debt-ridden Mike Johnston. Part of the Canadian Spectrum series, this 45-minute doc attacked the student-loan system and the administrators who don’t give a hoot about raising tuition. Johnston employed a guerilla filmmaking style, confronting politicians and university presidents with the aggressive — but honest — inquisitiveness. As expected, Johnston admitted in the film that he hopes the profits of his doc will help pay off his student loan.
One doc that stripped the veneer off an unspoken profession was Strip Club DJs , by Derrick Beckles. Probing the lifestyle of 20-year-veterans, and strip club rookies, the film approached the topic with tongue-in-cheek exposition: however crass and low-brow being a strip club DJ may be (they often break up fights between strippers), the job has its perks and laughs. Beckles also captured these DJs in moments that felt eerily familiar, especially to anyone who has frequented such bawdy houses. “Yeah, this job is basically babysitting,” one DJ mused, “and it really is, oh, hold on,” and he grabbed the mic, “yes, fellas, that was Crystal, give it up for Crystal.”
The Moon and The Violin deserved Hot Docs’ award for Best Canadian Documentary, if not for its candor than for its topic matter. Celebrated director Carole Laganiere followed a group of senior citizens living at the Chez-Nous des Artistes in Montreal. These forgotten painters, singers and musicians now flirt, dream, work and play Scrabble while they muse about the glory they once savoured. Laganiere beautifully captured the soul of each artist portrayed, allowing the camera to linger on a frown or a shaky hand. Her questions elicited the truths that counter the reality we take for granted, reminding us to think twice about that shuffling old man ambling down the street, singing softly to himself.
Also fitting was Hot Docs’ Outstanding Achievement Award for British filmmaker Nick Broomfield. Known for wielding his boom mic and disheveled hair, Broomfield established a reputation as a man unafraid of controversial subjects, no matter the setting. In the early 1970s, he made two films that took a critical stance against the British class system. Four of his latest films were screened to the public at Hot Docs and savvy doc-lovers would’ve been wise to absorb every Broomfield work.
His frightening and hilarious exposé The Leader, His Driver and the Driver’s Wife followed the leader of the neo-Nazi Afrikaner Resistance Movement in South Africa. Diving into this man’s life (without the sensitivity the racist requested), Broomfield found a more touching story in the inner conflict of the leader’s driver. The Brit — feeling like a fish out of water, jumping from the frying pan into the fire — was never baited into arguments about slavery and white superiority, instead throwing himself in front of the camera to document his many failed attempts to interview the neo-Nazi leader. By accounting the black beatings and interrogation the movement supports, this 1991 film detailed how the strength of ignorance overpowers the will of the weak, ultimately setting itself up for only short-term prosperity.
Another Broomfield doc worth noting is 2002’s Biggie and Tupac, a chronicle of the two hip-hop stars (Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur) who died mysteriously several years ago. Once again, Broomfield stepped in front of the lens to expose the shortcomings of the police system that was supposed to find the rappers’ killers. His documentary theorized that the Los Angeles Police Department, and Death Row Records founder Suge Knight, played a key role in the unsolved deaths. Broomfield’s verité style transformed a mournful dedication to an investigative powerhouse — without flinching, the filmmaker approached rogue cops and seven-foot bodyguards as if he belonged in the world of grimy hip-hop warfare. Biggie and Tupac is another example of how filmmaking transcends simple fact-display to become a credible avenue of in-depth investigation.
With such excellence coating this year’s Hot Docs, the screening team will be hard-pressed to find another round of 122 films that expose such delicious truths, evoke such depth and emotion. Yet they have found a way, for 10 years, to bring to Toronto high-quality documentaries from home and abroad — so the viewing public can only sit back, wait 12 months, and anticipate another explosive festival.
www.hotdocs.ca
