DOC NYC Fest: Werner Herzog's 3D doc 'Cave of Forgotten Dreams'

By Sarah Sluis

Werner Herzog returns to the documentary format in Cave of Forgotten Dreams, a 3D look at the recently discovered caves in Chauvet, France, which is open only to researchers. The film will be one of the gala presentations at the DOC NYC Fest. The Nov. 3, 7pm screening has already sold out--not surprising since it will include a Q&A with Herzog--but persistent viewers can always try standby.

First off: The 3D. Herzog's crew filmed in 3D, and the results are mixed. For the scenes within the cave, the 3D works effectively, adding a sense of hyper-reality and contours to the drawings. In other spots, it looks terrible--3D and shaky camera movements do not mix.

In his narration, Herzog lets us know what his crew was up against: just four of his crew could enter at one time, and cold panel lights were all that could be used to illuminate the paintings. The crew was restricted to a metal walkway, so as not to disturb the cave bear prints, bones, and other artifacts lying on the ground. While the limited access can be frustrating, in one case it works in the movie's favor. On a stalactite, a drawing of a woman's legs and pubic area is married with that of a buffalo, revealing a primordial sense of mythology that lingers today: the half animal, half person. However, the crew can barely access the area, giving us just a glimpse. Later, they return to get a better view with a camera attached to a pole, although it captures just slightly more detail. The sequence recreates the same feeling of unlocking a puzzle that the researchers themselves must feel. As we look with Herzog about the rest of the vast and remote chamber, which cannot be extensively explored because of the high levels of carbon dioxide, the audience senses the possibility of the unknown. It's not a "Cave of Forgotten Dreams," but of fleeting ones, with understanding and access just beyond our grasp.

Herzog seizes on these mystical aspects. At one point, he asks everyone in the cave to be quiet, leaving us with the sound of dripping water, echoes, and a heartbeat. This Herzog touch elevates the movie a step above documentaries of its type, but at times it can feel forced, as when he asks an interviewee rather contrived questions about his dreams concerning the cave.

Herzog's ambitious look at the Chauvet caves does not entirely deliver, but it's a worthy diversion that offers a peek into a little-seen artifact of human history.

DOC NYC Fest: Director Errol Morris' 'Tabloid'

By Sarah Sluis

Documentary director Errol Morris' Tabloid will be one of two gala presentations during the DOC NYC Fest, which runs from Nov. 3 through Nov. 9. Preceding its premiere at NYU's Skirball Center for the Performing Arts on Nov. 7 at 7pm, several of Morris' other films will be shown on the big screen, including The Thin Blue Line, A Brief History of Time, and Gates of Heaven are also scheduled for screening. However, maybe the festival should have done it the other way around, because Tabloid is so good it will make you want to revisit all of Morris' previous films.

Tabloid combines a sensational story (the "too good to be true" kind) with the narrative sensibilities of a master. A taste of the plot: In the 1970s, an ex-beauty queen, Joyce McKinney, goes to England to win back her "boyfriend," who she thinks has been brainwashed by a cult (Or is he just a Mormon on his mission?). She kidnaps him and chains him to a bed (leading to London tabloids screaming "Bondage!" and other salacious headlines), and more. Despite plans to marry (according McKinney), the Mormon disappears after their return to London, and she's arrested soon after on a host of tabloid-worthy charges.

Though the "Manacled Mormon" refuses to aopear on camera, McKinney is a star interviewee. A charismatic speaker, she reportedly has a genius-level IQ (she claims it's 160) and convincingly tells stories that Morris casts doubt on in other segments of the film. Indeed, as the publicity around the case reaches its height, all kinds of weird information about McKinney comes out of the woodwork. To top it all off, McKinney's story has a bizarre third act, which picks up some twenty years after the original story.

Under Morris' hand, Tabloid has moments that are laugh-out-loud funny and jaw-dropping incredible. Entire minutes can be spent with a jaw hanging open in disbelief. He sometimes uses incongruous stock footage to illustrate a situation, an excellent technique, and flashes words on the screen for a moment during interviews (Someone says "What word am I looking for?" and he flashes it on the screen instead of supplying it off-camera). He likes to suddenly introduce an entirely different angle of the story, so that watching the documentary becomes a kind of roller-coaster experience.

Tabloid has been making the rounds at film festivals. Though no distributor has picked it up, I predict it will be hitting theatres sometime soon. The story's just so good it's true.