Tabloid (***1/2)

It happens that I saw this when, aside from the economy, the month’s two biggest news stories have been a young woman’s acquittal on charges of murdering her daughter and a British newspaper’s alleged phone hacking. The stranger-than-fiction story that unfolds here is a reminder that stories of young women, especially attractive white ones, have long captured public attention, and that British newspapers have never been shy about pursuing their own version of the truth.

The events that took Joyce McKinney from Wyoming beauty pageant contestant to English headline-war fodder took place in 1977. Her looks have faded, but she seems to be the same person whose magnificent obsession with her Mormon boyfriend (or fiancé, maybe) inadvertently turned her into a celebrity across the ocean. And Errol Morris, who has made biographical documentaries about serious things (The Fog of War) and entertaining things (Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control), provides just the right approach to telling her story. While relying heavily on his own interviews, he splashes his screen with old Hollywood footage and splashes pull quotes from his subjects across the screen in giant, old-fashioned letters. Even the background music is melodrama worthy. This approach can seem heavy-handed in a serious documentary (see Michael Moore’s work for examples, or even some of Morris’s), but underscores the humor. And, for certain, there’s more humor here than in most Hollywood comedies.

McKinney might be a tragic figure but seems to see herself more as a survivor. She certainly has a way with a phrase; she compares the unlikelihood of the accusation against her to “putting a marshmallow into a parking meter.” And she has already denounced Morris’s film as a “celluloid catastrophe,” though gently mocking is about the worst that can be said of the director’s presentation. I felt there was a sincerity to her even when I wasn’t sure I believed her version of events.

The one thing thing that hampers Morris’s storytelling is the lack of participation of key principals, either because of death or unwillingness to participate. (The only documentary I can compare this to would be Crazy Love, which tells a more complete story.) McKinney tells the bulk of the tale, and she appears to be an unreliable narrator. And yet the ambiguity that remains is also part of the appeal; the element of mystery is that which nearly all of the greatest tabloid stories have. Morris may not have resorted to illegality, and he is, McKinney’s objections notwithstanding, presumably more scrupulous than The Daily Mail about fairly portraying his subjects (his 1988 film The Thin Blue Line helped free a falsely accused prisoner), but he clearly understands the attraction of what the tabloids are selling.

IMDB link

viewed at Ritz 5 and reviewed 7/18/11

Religulous (***)

Religion is “detrimental to the progress of humanity,” says comedian Bill Maher at the outset of this comic documentary. After a short look at his own religious history, including an interview with Mom and early standup clips, he spends about 90 minutes ridiculing its defenders. The movie is directed by Larry Charles, whose experience directing Borat must have come in handy. (In each case, Charles arranged interviews without explaining the viewpoint, or in this case identity, of the person doing the interview.)

There’s Protestants, Jews, Mormons, and Muslims, who get the roughest treatment. No Hindus or Quakers. There’s the actor playing Jesus at Orlando theme park, and creationist Arkansas senator Mark Pryor. There’s a rabbi displaying inventions that essentially employ technicalities to get around rules relating to Sabbath prohibitions. What can it mean that all of these people are so certain about beliefs that contradict each other? (Unfortunately, Maher doesn’t make this point.) Catholicism, perhaps, comes off best, thanks to Maher’s interview with a hilariously skeptical Vatican historian who dismisses many aspects of the faith as, essentially, opiates for the masses. But the movie doesn’t really engage with the ideas of those who are able to reconcile religion with the modern world, and science. The closest it comes is an interview with scientist Frances Collins of the Human Genome Project, who admittedly seems a little fuzzy explaining his beliefs.

Maher ranges from skeptical to disrespectful to smug, not unlike on his HBO show. Typical of the smug Maher is his explanation that he disbelieves the story of Jonah and the Whale because “I’m not ten.” His shorthand for a literal interpretation of Genesis is “a talking snake.” Humorously inserted among the interviews are on screen subtitles that contradict what the interviewees are saying, and cheesy film clips on which the producers obviously spent a bundle. (Apparently nothing was left to edit out all the visible boom microphones.) A Flintstones clip, for example, illustrates the idea that humans coexisted with dinosaurs.

Those looking for an amusing look at some of the unusual ways people express their spirituality and aren’t offended by Maher’s derisive views toward religion will find the movie funny. But if we take his argument seriously, as he means us to, there are flaws. For one thing, he spends way too much time with fundamentalists and biblical literalists. It’s overstating it to call this a straw-man argument, because such people are a significant part of the American religious scene. And from a humor standpoint, a dinosaur with a saddle, found in Kentucky’s Creation Museum, is more amusing than an anecdote about Gandhi. But if you’re making an argument that religion generally is a force for bad, and Maher does, then you need to come to grips those who take more nuanced views. If you show religious fanatics, like the Muslim rapper in this movie who seems to defend violence, then you need to argue their actions outweigh those of people who have been inspired to good by religion.

It’s an issue I’ve wrestled with myself; I have the same view as Maher, that it makes no sense to believe something on faith alone, but I can’t say for certain that the world would be a better place if everyone agreed. To use the obvious religious metaphor, Maher is preaching to the converted, who will have lots of fun. The movie’s too scattershot, and too disrespectful, to be seen as a serious attempt to convince believers that they’re wrong, but they won’t be watching anyway. What he does want is for the faithless to go public. Given polls showing that fewer Americans would vote for an atheist for president than even a Muslim, this makes sense and justifies the movie’s existence on some other ground besides comedy.

IMDB link

viewed 9/25/08 at Ritz Bourse (screening)

September Dawn (*3/4)

This is causing some controversy among Mormons because of its implication that Brigham Young, who first led members of the Church of Latter Day Saints to Utah, bore ultimate responsibility for the Mountain Meadows Massacre, an 1857 event in which 120 men, women, and children perished.

As Young, Terence Stamp probably gives the most forceful performance, but he’s actually a minor character in a soapy romance set against the backdrop of the events leading up to the massacre. The main heavy, the bishop of the Mormon community in the story, is played by Jon Voight. The other two stars are Trent Ford, as the bishop’s son, and Tamara Hope as the proto-feminist daughter of a wagon-train pastor bound for California. The pastor’s flock had sought refuge on Mormon land because they were nearly out of food and water, though, by the looks of things, their supply of hair-care products remained bountiful.

Ford, looking fit and ready for the cover of Teen People, meets the virginal-looking Hope, and the sparks fly. The Hallmark-card dialogue, on the other hand, lands with a thud. “I’ve loved you from the moment I saw you,” says he. The movie Pearl Harbor looks like social realism compared to this. Voight, meanwhile, lends presence to a one-dimensional villain, but gets saddled with lines like “You don’t belong here. You’re not one of us.”

Part of the context of the massacre was the deep suspicion with which the church was regarded, which we can see even today if recent polls are to be believed. In other words, the church elders may have been paranoid, but that didn’t mean there weren’t people out to get them. (The church had clashed with the United States government over polygamy and other issues.) This early history of persecution is represented by giving Voight some ephemeral flashbacks, amounting to perhaps 30 seconds of footage.

Director Christopher Cain (Gone Fishin’, The Next Karate Kid) sees a parallel in the story with current religious extremism, and while that may exist, this sheds little light into the mindset of people who would use God to justify their atrocities. While the particulars of the massacre itself appear to have been rendered accurately (as far as is known), the movie overall is shallow.

IMDB link

reviewed 8/23/07