The DOC10 Film Fest came back for the fourth year, showcasing ten of the best documentaries of the year so far at the Davis Theater in Lincoln Square. The Festival opened on April 11 with the critically acclaimed Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez documentary Knock Down the House and closed on April 14 with the Sundance hit The Biggest Little Farm. We interviewed several filmmakers at the festival. Here are capsule reviews with interviews coming. Check for where these films will be either streaming or at theaters near you soon.
This film is a must-see following candidates who won and lost making political history. It’s a revealing look at how grass root campaigns develop, showing graphically what works and what doesn’t. We covered the Q & A with filmmaker Rachel Lears (The Hand That Feeds) after the film was shown opening night. Lears and her husband took on the challenge of following the campaigns around the country for a year with their baby in tow. They present footage showing outspoken Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez a year ago dumping ice and mixing drinks as a bartender in New York and now she is in the House of Representatives. You understand who and what motivated her to take that giant step into the fray. Lears also followed three other candidates from different areas of the United States showing their passion, their reasons for running, how they went about drumming up votes, trying to set a new narrative for politics and democracy. As Ocasio-Cortez faces off against Democratic boss Joseph Crowley in New York City, we meet other “Justice Democrats”—diverse working-class outsiders, from a coal miner’s daughter in West Virginia, a grieving mother in Nevada, and a registered African American nurse in Missouri as they pound the pavement trying to shake up the establishment shunning corporate donors. This is an inspiring behind-the-scenes look at their journeys. Not everyone can win, but when they do, it’s amazing. In theaters and streaming May 1st on Netflix.
Mike Wallace is Here | Director: Avi Belkin | 94 min, U.S., 2019
Investigative reporter, Mike Wallace, was an actor/pitchman who became one of the most driven and difficult interviewers to get behind a microphone. He talked with and/or at every leader, politician, celebrity, and even despot of his time. We saw the film with Director Avi Belkin telling us by Skype what it took to put this film together. He went through 1700 hours of archival footage of Wallace’s interviews and his first edited cut of the film was 9 hours long. He whittled it down to an hour and a half, packed with fascinating back story and scenes showing him getting ready to do his signature pointed interviews. He was feared and fearless. You’ll see him interrogate everyone from Barbara Streisand to the Ayatollah Khomeini, Eleanor Roosevelt to Bill O’Reilly and Donald Trump, and show how, with 60 minutes Executive producer, Don Hewitt, he carved out a place and a reputation for getting right to the point and even being called a “prick” for his bull-in-a-China-shop style. Belkin also reveals Wallace’s insecurities about not being thought of as a respected journalist, the tragic loss of his son, and his bout with severe depression. He talks truth to power and “Fake news” which makes this study even more important today. Mike Wallace is a fascinating study. Even his son, Fox TV news commentator agrees that his Dad would have liked this film. Watch for our interview with Director Avi Belkin here.
THE 2019 DOC10
Hail Satan? | Director: Penny Lane 95min, 2018, U.S.
This film just might turn your head around. Director Penny Lane (Nuts:, Our Nixon) examines, somewhat tongue in cheek, first amendment rights, using the activities of The Satanic Temple as an example. It is funny, fearless irreverent, and thought-provoking, and we were able to interview Lane about why and how she made this film. She is not a member of this or any religion, but shows what the leader and members of the five-year-old organization have been up to. They have been described more as “political pranksters” than a cult-like religion which she re-defined in our interview. The statue depicting their idol or brand is more a symbol of their political activism trying to preserve separation of church and state. It started as a media gag to promote free speech when a tablet showing the 10 commandments was put in front of the Little Rock, Arkansas state house. The group put their Satanic Temple statue up next to it that drew media attention which has now spurned a Non-theistic movement that is spreading far and wide. Lane uses archival footage from movies including Charlton Heston in The 10 commandments and from Rosemary’s Baby, and segments about religion and religious propaganda from TV talk-shows and animated programs. You even find out how “In God We Trust” came about in 1952 at the suggestion from the Rev. Billie Graham! This film is being shown at Film Festivals at the moment, but look for it to come to a theater near you.
The Infiltrators | Directors: Cristina Ibarra, Alex Rivera 95 min, U.S., 2019
Talk about relevant! Immigration tops the news today. This film is more like a thriller than a straight documentary with a narrative that becomes all too frightening and human. It follows people who have been ripped from their families, put in detention centers, not knowing if or when they’ll be deported. We interviewed Director, Alex Rivera, at DOC 10, about this film which he started shooting in 2012 during the Obama administration. It is based on the true experiences of Dreamers working with the National Immigrant Youth Alliance who went undercover to expose the ICE and the government’s activities. Ibarra and Rivera interviewed real people who went through these trials and tribulations and had them talk with actors who then re-created, step-by-step what happened when they were picked up or turned themselves in, then put in detention. But it also shows the what the workers at the organizations trying to help them had to do to try to get them released. You’ll meet young Marco Saavedra as he gets himself arrested in order to save a Mexican father from getting thrown out of the country. Once inside the facility, he and covert counterpart, Viridiana Martinez, work undercover to get them out. You see how these people live in fear every day not knowing what will happen to them or their families. Sundance Film Festival award winner. Look for our interview with Director Alex Rivera here soon.

