We told you guys about it last week, but this year’s DOC NYC Fest is truly shaping up to be one of the premiere film festivals in the entire City. The programming is impeccable, on-point, and there is an almost giddy feeling in all of the recent screenings- whether it was watching the astounding doc about story-book creator and illustrator Tomi Ungerer (whose work turned towards pornography later in life) in director Brad Bernstein’s nspiring Far Out Isn’t Far Enough, or the brilliant homage to Wonder Woman and other great female heroines in recent pop culture in Kristy Guevara-Flanagan’s Wonder Women, to the plight of the New York City taxi driver in Joshua Z Weinstein’s excellent Drivers Wanted, to Treva Wurmfeld’s Shepard and Dark- the fascinating story of the forty-plus year friendship between actor and playwright Sam Shepard and pal Johnny Dark- which managed somehow to be incredibly exhilarating and haunting, simultaneously (no mean feat that!) Also of note: Girl and a Gun, Artifact, Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp, Rafea-Solar Mama, and Sweet Dreams…Not to mention a NYC-heavy rotation of wonderful documentaries-including Zipper, about the fate of Coney Island’s Boardwalk and park, the above mentioned Drivers Wanted, and Men at Lunch- the story behind the iconic photo of eleven steel workers casually having lunch while sitting atop a steel beam, precariously dangling 59 stories above New York.
The DOC NYC Fest ends this Thursday evening, (November 15th) with a gala screening of Ken Burns’ Central Park Five, which focuses upon the five African-American and Latino youths who were wrongfully imprisoned for the 1989 Central Park Jogger rape and battery case. Ken Burns and members of the cast will also be there in person.
The DOC NYC Festival must become a must-view for ANY film fan in the City. Get your tickets here- it is truly an embarrassment of riches just trying to decide what to see!
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