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February 28, 2008 | 12:00 a.m. CST
For more on each movie, visit our True/False blog.
In its fifth year, True/False has accumulated an archive of titles. And, as you might expect when you get a hundred or so films together, similar themes are explored by different filmmakers. Vox scoured the old to bring you the new: Here are our recommendations for this year’s crop based on their similarities to our favorites of yesteryear.
Related ArticlesTouching the void
2004
In the first film to officially show at True/False, a two-man attempt to climb Peru’s 21,000-foot Siula Grande goes drastically wrong. After reaching the top, one climber falls and fractures his fibula, and the accident drives the bone through his kneecap. Thought to be dead and abandoned by his friend, the frostbitten and gravely injured man crawls back to his camp to survive.
Stranded
This year’s Stranded shares not only Touching the Void’s theme of survival but also its locale, the Andes. Its subject, however, is the Uruguayan rugby team whose plane crashed into the South American mountain range and who eventually — and infamously — resorted to cannibalism to survive. Even after more than 35 years (and countless book and film adaptations), this story continues to pack a wallop. (Check Adalante, published in the Missourian, on Monday for a Q&A with director Gonzalo Arijon.)
Mardi Gras: Made in China
2005
Director David Redmon used the Mardi Gras celebrations to explore the effects of globalization. By concentrating on the journey of the trademark beads from a small factory in China to the streets of New Orleans, Redmon is able to subtly contrast the stark working conditions of factory laborers with the ridiculous excess of the Bourbon Street festivities.
The Order of Myths
In her examination of Mardi Gras partying in Mobile, Ala., Margaret Brown also tackles a little-noticed side of the big celebration and views a long-held ritual through a critical lens. In The Order of Myths — whose title references Mobile’s oldest mystic society that still continues to parade — Brown uses the festival to depict the de facto segregation that still exists half a century after Jim Crow.
Street Fight
2006
An idealistic up-and-comer takes on an experienced political machine in this Oscar-nominated documentary depicting the 2002 Newark mayoral race. Incumbent Sharpe James, who since the film’s release has been charged with 25 crimes, tries to fend off challenger Cory Booker, and the result is rampant race-baiting and blatant sabotage of the newcomer’s political campaign.
Please Vote for Me
Take Street Fight halfway around the world and replace the two fiery politicos with 8-year-olds, and this film is what you get. In this documentary of a class election in China, some parents — many of whom, due to China’s one-child policy, place burdensome expectations on their sole offspring — take desperate measures to win, which include bribing their child’s classmates. However nasty the battles in Newark might get, this movie shows fighting dirty in politics isn’t limited to Americans — or even adults.
Zoo
2007
News traveled quickly — even Rush Limbaugh touched on the subject — after one Seattle man died from injuries resulting from his sexual experiences with a stallion. The scandalous act is recreated in the film but takes less than 15 seconds of screen time. Despite this earnest attempt to avoid titillation, the movie is still primarily known for the offending scene.
I Think We're Alone Now
The subjects of I Think We’re Alone Now may not transgress as serious a taboo, but they share with the poor man in Zoo a tendency to tragically misplace their affections. The consequences of their love might not be quite as severe — nobody dies here — but this tale of two people obsessed with ’80s pop star Tiffany likewise possesses subjects vulnerable to ridicule and directors who treat them with some much-needed empathy.
