Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine

So. This documentary was completed in time for its premiere at SXSW 2015, and I was in the first audience to see it. I wrote several drafts of this review on my iPad during SouthBy, each time, starting over from scratch. At one point, I was going to pen a long op-ed piece on the documentary’s place within Steve Jobs’ legacy, then scaled it back to being just a film review. I’ve decided to follow my original instincts and go back to writing about Alex Gibney’s documentary within the context of the topic it is about.

Gibney is quite an accomplished documentary maker, from Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, to Taxi to the Dark Side, to his last film about Lance Armstrong’s fall from grace, Gibney likes to tackle newsworthy subjects, exposé style. And with the aforementioned Enron and Lance Armstrong films, the scandals were a reason why their subjects were newsworthy. But in his new documentary Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine, Gibney seems to selectively sift through events and interviews for the most scandalous bits to support the damning judgment he ultimately makes about Jobs.

If you were to make a list of the interviewees from this film, it is mostly a who’s who of Apple critics: Yukari Iwatani Kane (author of Haunted Empire), Jason Chen (the Gizmodo editor at the center of the lost iPhone 4 prototype controversy), and Chrisann Brennan (an estranged former girlfriend of Jobs and mother of his daughter Lisa). Only Dan Kottke seems like he hasn’t got an axe to grind with Jobs. The film is noticeably devoid of interviews of people who have had close relationships with Jobs in the last 20 years. The personal anecdotes presented are also mostly vintage, including the episode of Jobs stealing Woz’s cut of the work he did for Atari. That was 40 years ago, but Gibney thought it was relevant.

Gibney says at the beginning of the film that he set out to discover why there was a worldwide outpouring of grief when Jobs died in 2011, and in the process of making the film, he concludes that neither Steve Jobs, nor Apple, Inc. are worthy of the admiration they get. Gibney concludes that Steve Jobs set out to find spiritual enlightenment only to miss the point of it by being selfish with his wealth and petty and horrible to people close to him. He also contends that as CEO of Apple, Jobs talks about the company’s “values” (which are not explored nor explained in the film), but that the company has fallen short of living up to those (unenumerated) values. The company is ultimately presented as a tax dodging, stock-options backdating destroyer of Chinese factory workers’ lives, and that the government and public have looked the other way because they love their iPhones.

It was clear during the Q&A afterwards that Gibney left many unanswered questions with the audience. There was a sense that there’s another side to the story, and this film is not going to explore it.

So, is this a good documentary film? You might think that because I am critical of the lopsided way the filmmaker covered their subject that I would automatically consider it not well made. However a one-sided presentation is not uncommon in documentaries. Documentaries that have a point of view, or are issuing a “call to action” frequently take the side of an argument. For example, the nature documentary Planetary is basically a call to action to fight global pollution and carbon emissions. It is not going to present both sides of the debate about the impact of man-made climate change, or perhaps the conflicting interests between modern industrial progress and environmental impact.

However, at the outset, that is not the purpose of Gibney’s film. We’re led to believe Gibney approached his subject with an open mind, but in his interviews finds Jobs a “man of contradictions” who is therefore ultimately undeserving of public praise or admiration. The recently published book Becoming Steve Jobs by Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli also makes a similar observation that Jobs is a man of contrasts, but whereas that is the starting point of their story of Steve Jobs’ personal and professional transformation, it is the summary conclusion of Gibney’s look at Jobs’ life. Did Gibney fall short in giving us a better understanding of Steve Jobs?

I believe so, and that is how I finally decided is the best way to review this documentary. Alex Gibney has interviewed the people most critical of Steve Jobs and Apple Inc. and unsurprisingly, came away with the conclusion that Jobs was spiritually bankrupt, and that Apple, Inc. fell short of the corporate citizenship standard Gibney thinks the company should be held to. No rebuttal is presented. Ironically, if Gibney admitted that he set out to create a polemic railing against (the myth of) Steve Jobs, I would have rated the film higher because it seems to accomplish that. But the one-sided presentation and concomitant premature judgments only leaves the audience asking more questions in their quest to truly understand the man and myth that is Steve Jobs.  6/10

Alex Gibney speaks at the premiere of Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine at SXSWFilm 2015

Best of Fantastic Fest 2013

I’m in Austin, TX attending Fantastic Fest 2013. I’ve attended in years past on a 2nd Half Badge, but I’m attending the entire festival this year.

The back half of the festival is less crowded, but still bustling daily with the influx of attendees with 2nd Half Badges. Second half badges give you the most movies for your money. It’s always during the week (M-Th), but if you go to every screening, you can see 19 or 20 films (depending on whether a movie is shown during the closing night party. You also get to attend one or two of the events including the closing night party and the closing night film. It’s about 1/3 the price of the normal fan badge.

I didn’t get into the big headliners–nor did I necessarily want to see those at the festival–since they are already going to be released by Hollywood studios later. This year’s headliners were Machete Kills, the Robert Rodriguez revenge movie starring Danny Trejo, and Man of Tai Chi, the martial arts film directed by Keanu Reeves and starring Tiger Chen. And this is a common sentiment among hard core film festival goers: see the movies that might never, ever otherwise be seen again. The rare gems. These films tend to be more art than mass market entertainment.

Noteworthy Films – New Talent

The Dirties – a pair of high school film geeks and Superbad-like BFFs (Matt Johnson, Owen Williams) self-document their slice of high school life, which centers around being humiliated by bullies, and making hammy send-ups of their favorite Hollywood movies for a student film class. Matt is the more assertive, loud mouthed idea man of the pair, and one day he convinces Owen that their next film project should chronicle their plot against their tormentors, whom they refer to as “The Dirties.” This movie tackles a very difficult and dark subject and it might even challenge the way you look at similar situations. This dark comedy from Toronto also has the odd distinction of being a movie that’s about the making of itself.

The Dirties Q&A with director/actor Matt Johnson

Coherence – part sci-fi, part fantasy, part Outer Limits. This movie is the perfect example of what talent can do within the constraints of a shoestring budget. Four couples come together for a dinner party, the lights go out and strange things start to happen. A knock on the door, but nobody’s there. A box containing photos of each person is found with numbers written on the back. And it only gets stranger from there. The film is taut, full of tension, creepiness, and dread, yet I was stunned to hear the movie was shot in just 5 days without a traditional script (just note cards given to each actor). Most of the dialogue is ad libbed, but trust me: it makes the strange situation the characters find themselves in all the more frantic and authentic. See it. It puts the “fantastic” back in Fantastic Fest.

Coherence Q&A with cast and crew

Chanthaly – a creepy ghost story from Laos. Chanthaly is a young woman who leads an isolated life with her father. She never leaves the gates of her homestead on account of her delicate heart condition, and her only friend is a neighborhood boy who has a crush on her. One day, she starts seeing apparitions of her dead mother, along with fragmented flashbacks of a childhood with her mother, including one of seeing her mother’s suicide. Her father insists that her mother died during childbirth and that Chanthaly can’t possibly remember anything about her. But the ghost and flashbacks persist. Are these messages from the beyond? Or a side-effect of the medication she takes? Chanthaly has the distinction of being the only entry in the festival from Laos, and only the ninth movie ever made in that country. Don’t miss it.

Chanthaly Q&A with director Mattie Do

Afflicted – I don’t know what’s in the drinking water in Toronto, but some awesome new talent in independent cinema is coming from there. Afflicted is a gruesome, violent horror show that puts a new perspective on an old idea. New filmmakers Clif Prowse and Derek Lee play a pair of young adults who decide to document their year-long trip around the world, using camera harnesses and Go Pros. But things go horribly awry when Derek is found unconscious with lacerations on his arm. With no memory of his attack, Derek find himself changing into… something terrible. The pair continue to roll footage and even stream it live to the family and friends, as their situation becomes more desperate. The VFX in this movie are top notch, and when used together with the “found footage” style cinematography, blend to create an especially energetic and shocking faux documentary.

Noteworthy Films – Mainstream

Grand Piano – a taut thriller about a washed-up pianist (Elijah Wood) who finds himself in the crosshairs of a rifle scope during his comeback concert. Starting with the words “Play one wrong note and you die” written on his sheet music, and a red laser dot pointed at his head, this film is a high stakes, high tension poker game between Wood and his tormentor (John Cusack). This movie evokes the manic paranoia and tension of classic Hitchcock, without missing a beat. Directed by Eugenio Mira.

Mood Indigo – A delightful “live-action-animated” French romance/fantasy from director Michel Gondry. Starry-eyed lovers Colin (Romain Duris) and Chloe (Audrey Tatou) meet, fall in love, and marry, but on their wedding night, a water lily enters her lung and makes her ill, and Colin searches for a cure. The tone of the first half of the film is upbeat, charming and whimsical, but the second half gets more and more bittersweet. I doubt general American audiences raised on happy endings will like this film. But a melancholy endings are totally fucking de rigueur for French cinema.

The Congress – A sci-fi fantasy about a faded middle-aged movie star (Robin Wright, playing a fictional version of herself) who agrees to sell the rights to her voice and image and be turned into a digital puppet owned by a Hollywood movie studio. That’s already within the realm of our current technology. But the movie jumps forward 20 years to an even stranger future dominated by an animated, drug-induced virtual reality. Fans of Stanislaw Lem should recognize these plot elements from the novel Futurological Congress, from which the movie is adapted. The movie deftly captures the philosophical themes and tone of Lem’s work. Directed by Ari Folman.

Ragnarok – This Norwegian monster movie is a love letter to Steven Spielberg. More or less a Viking-flavored version of Jurassic Park, complete with a single dad archaeologist, his two kids, and adventurous gal pal, running away from exceptionally well done monsters. From the pacing, cinematography, music, to the adventure story and narrow escapes, it is an exceptionally fun PG-13 grade monster movie that evokes fond memories of those summer blockbusters from the 1980s. Unlike JJ Abrams’ Super 8, Ragnarok isn’t merely aping Spielberg, but adapts it in very fresh, Norwegian way.

Noteworthy Films – Midnighters

Nothing Bad Can Happen – This ironically-named tragedrama (did I just invent that?) from Germany tells the story of Tore, a devout member of Jesus Freaks. Tore comes to live with Benno and his family in a low-rent neighborhood. At first, they seem ordinary, but Benno’s not a very nice guy, and neither is his wife. Petty and jealous, Benno takes his frustrations out on Tore in an escalating series of abuses, but Tore doesn’t leave, believing that Jesus sent him to save Benno. Worst fucking idea ever, Tore. The movie is heartbreaking, shocking, and nihilistic. Audiences at Cannes found it repulsive, but that means it’s just right for Fantastic Fest.

Nothing Bad Can Happen Q&A with Katrin Gebbe (dir) and Verena Graefe-Hoeft (prod)

Why Don’t You Play In Hell? – Two Yakuza clans, a pair of star crossed lovers, and a group of teenaged amateur filmmakers called “The Fuck Bombers” (that probably sounds awesome in Japanese), mix well and pour into a 35mm frame and bake for 90 minutes and what do you get? One hell of a tasty action comedy. This movie is a kind of love letter to Hollywood movies, with homages to every action movie you can think of. And there’s enough extreme blood and gore to keep genre fans happy.

Moebius – This Korean film isn’t the only one at the festival to include a violent castration scene, but it’s the only one that deals with its aftermath. An act of violence turns a family upside down, as a frustrated wife decides to eviscerate her teenage son in order to punish her philandering husband. And it gets more twisted as the husband, filled with guilt, goes to extreme measures to make his son ‘whole’ again. This isn’t a horror movie, nor is it exploitation sleaze. It’s something of a tragedrama, since the story revolves around the broken relationships between the various characters, all of whom seem to have mostly sexual gratification on their minds. Nothing can prepare you for Moebius, but don’t mistake it for trash: it’s an artfully made, fearless bold film with absolutely no spoken dialogue (not even caption cards), but only for those with a strong stomach. Directed by Kim Ki-Duk.