Some people liked Narco Cultura, also the legend of shorty.

I'll check them out. Thx.

I watched Precinct 75 (AKA The Seven Five) over the weekend - highly recommended. Hard to believe what the main protagonist thought he could get away with (and successfully did so for a considerable amount of time).

Sample quote from the internal affairs commission:

Commission: "Did you consider yourself to be a NYC cop or a gangster?"

Defendant: "Both".

Be sure to watch some funny stuff during the ending credits outtakes.

Deep Web

This is about the Dread Pirate Roberts/ Silk Road/ Ross Ulbricht case. Anyone who followed the news stories as this case unfolded wouldn't learn anything new. It was basically just a summary of what happened, and not a very detailed one at that.

Then there was a few clips of some group of a dozen or so guys in london sitting on the floor of what looked like an abandoned building with laptops and a hijacked wifi connection. One of the guys rambles on about freedom and not trusting the government or something. But there was no story behind these guys or what exactly they were trying to accomplish. I guess the viewer is supposed to be excited and intrigued about some super kewl super secret clandestine operation. Too bad it falls flat because the filmmakers were too lazy to actually find out more about them.

2/5 stars. Would not recommend.

Shame to hear. That case was completely nuts. Even though I read a lot about it, it'd be nice to see a decent documentary laying it all out.

I just rewatched Meru with my brother, who's not seen it. Still great.

Just been looking at some of Renan "Biggest Badass Ever" Ozturk's artwork. It's probably not to everyone's taste, but I really like it.

An Open Secret

This is about sexual abuse of child actors in Hollywood by agents, managers, publicists, investors etc. Pretty heavy and heartbreaking obv. The most disturbing thing being that none of the pedos profiled in this doc are in prison. Most are still working as usual and have child clients, even after being convicted and having to register as sex offenders.

4/5

There is a documentary showing on NGC now about the expedition to summit Myanmar's highest peak that Renan was on. I guess this is the full documentary, but it seems short:

This is the story: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2...-hkakabo-razi/

Here's a really good two part article on this story:

https://www.wired.com/2015/04/silk-road-1/

Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson

No doubt a unique figure in sports during the early 20th century. A must see for boxing fans.

A Ballerinas Tale

I'd never heard of Misty Copeland before, but apparently she's famous for being a great ballerina and the first black person to be hired by a major company or something. And she's kinda hot. It was a pretty good biographical doc.

The one part I thought was dumb was when a journalist started talking about how all these black kids love ballet now just because of her. It reminded me of the (99% white) golf media in the late 90s talking about how all the black kids in the ghetto love golf now just because of Tiger Woods. No they didn't, and don't. Golf is still an expensive country club game. Ballet is still lolballet. I mean its nice to have some diversity in everything but don't make those bull**** exaggerations.

3.5/5

I really enjoyed Keep On Keepin' On. Had never heard of Clark Terry nor Justin Kauflin before. Very cool.

Prescription Thugs

Made by Chris Bell, who also made Bigger Faster Stronger. This one is about the abuse of prescription drugs. It has a very anti-big-pharma bias, and not as good as his first doc, but worth watching.

3/5

Requiem For The American Dream

Unsettled documentary about the power of the super wealthy elite, based on interviews with the great Noam Chomsky.

I saw that on a torrent site but didn't bother with it. Is it standard Chomsky stuff, or would someone familiar with Chomsky hear something new?

I guess reasonably standard, but based on interviews over the last 4 years, so all more recent stuff.

My Beautiful Broken Brain

A woman in the UK suffered a cerebral hemorage out of the blue one day. The part of her brain responsible for recognizing words was damaged. She had to completely relearn how to read, write, and identify things using words. She decided to film her treatment and life. Then a few months later she had a severe siezure, possibly as a result of experimental electro-shock type of treatment.

She got to meet David Lynch at the end. I think she was a screenwriter or producer or something, and she loved Lynch and sent him a bunch of videos and letters during her treatment.

3.5/5

Rubble Kings

Street gangs in the Bronx in the 70s. They all wore douchey cutoff jean jackets and went around killing eachother. Narrated by John Leguizamo.

3/5

The Pierre Woodman Story

A biography of french pornographer Pierre Woodman. Produced by HBO Hungary. It's mostly about how he built up his business and how he gets girls to say and do stuff they didn't think they would. Guy has some elite PUA skills.

4/5

Gnarr

The 2008 financial crisis hit Iceland pretty hard. All of the major banks had to be bailed out/nationalized. Massive corruption was uncovered. Icelandic people were overwhelmingly outraged with the political establishment.

Icelandic comedian Jon Gnarr decided to start a party called the Best Party, and run for mayor of Reykjavik, as a joke. During his campaign he promised things like building a disneyland and a zoo with free admission to all citizens, and a drug-free parlaiment by 2020. He said he'd refuse to work with anyone who didn't like the show The Wire.

And then he ended up winning...

5/5

Holy hell, that sounds amazing. Netflix?

I dunno where you can watch it legally...

Angel Of Nanjing

The Yangtze River bridge is the most popular place to commit suicide in China. In 2003, Chen Si began patroling the bridge on a scooter, looking for people who are thinking about jumping and talking them out of it.

5/5

Los Angeles Plays Itself

I'm far from enough of a movie buff to fully appreciate this, but I certainly loved hearing the analysis, learning about the history of Los Angeles, seeing the architecture, recognizing landmarks and the role they played in several movies, etc. Kind of made me wish something like this existed for other cities as well.

5/5