Documentary Features - 5 nominations

Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, Steve James, Mark Mitten and Julie Goldman

Abacus looks back at the financial crisis and mortgage fraud epidemic and examines a small bank, of service to the Chinese community in New York, who discovered and reported one of their bankers was guilty of fraud, only to find themselves the target of an SEC investigation.  Criminal charges were filed in the case. In the collapse of the economy, Abacus (the name of the bank) was the single bank in America to be charged with mortgage fraud.  All of the big guys were instead bailed out by the US without parameters that even required them to give up bonuses or extravagant expenditures.  This small family owned bank had a very compelling case, and one can't help but suspect that racism is the cause of this single bank being picked on and targeted.  It's an excellent film.

Faces Places, Agnès Varda, JR and Rosalie Varda

It's rare to get a fun, funny, adorable film into the top 5 documentary nominees, but this film is a breath of fresh air.  88 year old filmmaker Agnes Varda teams up with 33 year old photographer and muralist JR to travel around France transforming spaces into art pieces.  Their relationship is the sweetest part of the film, but watching them create art together, engaging the communities and the people that they capture is incredible.  Their work is sometimes heart wrenching and sometimes hilarious, and always impactful.  This was my favorite of the five films.

Icarus, Bryan Fogel and Dan Cogan

What an interesting time to be watching a documentary about doping during the Olympics, the very Olympics when Russia has been officially banned from state participation (although they made accommodations for athletes who have tested "clean").  As an observer of the Lance Armstrong scandal and so many others, it's hard to wrap your head around HOW these athletes and teams have been able to get away with it, when there are so many safeguards to the testing.  This film answers all those questions and more.  And to be honest, I'm much more cynical after watching the film.  Anytime you believe that the opposing team is up to no good and your team is the only moral, ethical one, you're most certainly deluding yourself or at least being willfully naive.  If this film doesn't challenge all of us to be more suspicious across the board, I don't know what will.  As an aside, every time I see anything about doping in sports, I recall the hilarious Saturday Night Live sketch for the "All Drug Olympics."  Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAdG-iTilWU  You're welcome.

The Last Men in Aleppo, Feras Fayyad, Kareem Abeed and Søren Steen Jespersen

The Last Men in Aleppo is the continuation of last year's winning Documentary Short, The White Helmets.  The devastation and destruction in Syria continues with the aid of the Russian military, more and more people try fleeing to Turkey, and the situation is even more dire than last year (although we didn't think that possible).  The movie gets more personal this time, with a deeper dive into the lives of these brave men who rush to the sites of bombings to help recover dead bodies, and to help save anyone trapped in the rubble.  These men know that if they stay in Syria they have no future.  They talk about their deaths as though they are just weeks and months away, knowing that Bashar Al Asaad will not stop until they are all dead.  These are the people who I think about when considering what it takes to get people to leave their beloved homelands - these men suspect they will die in Syria, but feel compelled to stay.

Strong Island, Yance Ford and Joslyn Barnes

Strong Island follows the story of the Ford family, desperate to understand how their beloved son and brother came to be murdered, and his murderers never charged by the Grand Jury rendering them forever without justice.  My friend Steve has a saying that I always think of with stories like this, "Understanding is the booby prize."  Never more true than here - no amount of understanding will ever bring back William Ford, and yet in this case, understanding is all they have left in this horrific tale where a young black man can be shot point blank and still have his white killer not convicted.  Yance Ford is the filmmaker and also the sister, and her vulnerability and her willingness to show her own devastation makes this film truly powerful.

The trailers:

Strong Island and Icarus are available on Netflix.