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Every iteration of Silverdocs captures a slice of the zeitgeist. Being a documentary film festival, that’s one thing it should do.
But last year’s festival felt more zeitgeisty than usual. Two eventual Oscar contenders about war and the energy industry, Restrepo and Gasland, showed in Silver Spring. So did the widely touted—and then widely criticized—education-reform documentary Waiting for “Superman.” The festival opened with Freakonomics, an omnibus film with vignettes from some of the most notable directors of social-issue documentaries, and closed with The Tillman Story, about the death of U.S. Army Ranger Pat Tillman and its pseudo cover-up by the U.S. government. Silverdocs 2010 had plenty of lighter and more eccentric fare, but in a serious year the most visible Silverdocs selections were issue-focused and austere.
Say what you will about the national mood, but this year’s Silverdocs, which runs from June 20 to 26, is kicking off on a more soulful note: Its opening-night offering is The Swell Season, a sensuous and meditative film about the romantic and musical partnership between the Irish singer Glen Hansard and Czech newcomer Markéta Irglová. Documentaries about musicians abound, from the inspiring (Bob and the Monster, about the Thelonious Monster frontman Bob Forrest, a former heroin user who now counsels drug addicts) to the tragic (Better Than Something, about late garage-rocker Jay Reatard) to the bizarre (The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye, which follows an industrial-music pioneer’s quest to become pandrogynous). The Silverdocs slate also feels richer than usual in films about sports and food and the quirks of everyday life. We don’t often associate documentaries with escapism, but there’s plenty of it on offer at this year’s Silverdocs.
A number of Silverdocs selections concern themselves with law and order: Several grapple with the facts of grisly murders and possibly false convictions. One of Silverdocs’ most anticipated screenings—The Interrupters, the latest film from Hoop Dreams director Steve James—profiles a group of reformed Chicago gangsters who take the law into their own hands to stop street violence.
And then there are the social-issue films, fewer in number this year: urban decay and gentrification in The Pruitt-Igoe Myth; tort reform in Hot Coffee; the normalized cruelness of children in The Bully Project; and the future of transportation in Revenge of the Electric Car, Silverdocs’ closing-night selection.
That last film, with its amazing-race set-up and enthusiastic if sometimes bumblingindustrialists, might on first glance seem like an optimistic tonic to last year’s gloomy social-issue highlights. But if the world’s become a better place in the last 12 months, you don’t exactly get that vibe here. Revenge of the Electric Car looks to the future, but it closes this year’s Silverdocs with notes of forced cheer. —Jonathan L. Fischer
Plus: For a behind the scenes look at Silverdocs, read The Other Silverdocs by Benjamin R. Freed, a story about the business that happens at the annual festival, and the business that doesn’t.
Monday, June 20
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| The Swell Season** | 7:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
Tuesday, June 21
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| Bob and the Monster** | 1:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| The Price of Sex** | 1:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Love During Wartime** | 3:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Hula and Natan** | 4:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| When the Drum Is Beating** | 5:45 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| Donor Unknown | 6:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Give Up Tomorrow | 9 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
Shorts
|
Minka**
Mothersbane** Blue Rinse** Still Here** Night at the Dance** | 11 a.m | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
|
Vera Klement**
Kiss the Paper** Miracle on 22nd Street** | 1:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
Wednesday, June 22
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| When the Drum Is Beating | 3:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Page One | 5 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| The Green Wave | 5:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Better This World | 6 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| The Price of Sex | 6:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| The Interrupters | 7:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Position Among the Stars | 8:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Dragsonslayer** | 10:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
Shorts
|
Living For 32**
Bathing Micky** | 12 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
|
Minka | 3:45 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
Thursday, June 23
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| Grande Hotel | 10:15 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Sound It Out | 10:30 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Where Soldiers Come From | 12:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Our School | 2:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Give Up Tomorrow | 2:45 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| The Loving Story | 2:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Better This World | 5 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Position Among the Stars | 5:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| A Good Man | 8 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
Shorts
|
Guanape Sur**
Three Walls** Humanoids** Water** | 10 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
|
Tobacco Girl**
Without Country** | 12 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
|
Living For 32
Bathing Micky | 5 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
Friday, June 24
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| Fire In Babylon | 10 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| The Learning | 10:15 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Hula and Natan | 11:15 a.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History | 1 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Incendiary: The Willingham Case | 1:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| Scenes of a Crime | 3:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Catching Hell | 4:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles** | 5:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Grande Hotel | 5:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Hot Coffee | 7:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| The Loving Story | 7:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Never Make It Home | 8:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| Dragonslayer | 9:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
Shorts
|
Oil & Water**
| 12 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
|
Vera Klement
Kiss The Paper Miracle on 22nd Street | 3:45 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
Saturday, June 25
Openings
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| Scenes of a Crime | 10:45 a.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| A Good Man | 11:15 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| El Bulli: Cooking in Progress | 12 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Hot Coffee | 12:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Where Soldiers Come From | 2:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| The Team | 3 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Donor Unknown | 3:30 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| Age of Champions | 5:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Our School | 5:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Fire In Babylon | 5:45 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
| Bob and the Monster | 6:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Revenge of the Electric Car | 7:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Incendiary: The Willingham Case | 8:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Life In a Day | 10 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles | 10:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
Shorts
|
Oil & Water
| 9 a.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
|
Guanape Sur
Three Walls Humanoids Water | 1:15 p.m. | Discovery HD Theater |
Sunday, June 26
Schedule (Openings marked with **)
| Catching Hell | 9:15 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| At the Edge of Russia | 10 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Life In a Day | 11:45 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Never Make It Home | 2 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Age of Champions | 2:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| The Learning | 4:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| Revenge of the Electric Car | 4:15 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| The Swell Season | 6:30 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
| Love During Wartime | 6:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 2 |
| The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History | 7 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 3 |
| Sound It Out | 8:45 p.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |
Shorts
|
Tobacco Girl
Without Country | 9 a.m. | AFI Silver Theater 1 |