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5 Melbourne Documentary Film Festival Films I’m Excited To See

Film Festivals have had a hard go the last few years, having to adapt to the pandemic meant that a lot of them have had to move online. Over the last month I reviewed films for one of those festivals, the Sydney Underground Film Festival, but coming up throughout the month of October is the 6th Annual Melbourne Documentary Film Festival. 

Between the 1st and the 31st of October, the MDFF will be showing over 20 feature-length documentaries and dozens upon dozens of shorts. There’s so much on offer that it’s going to be a challenge to pick what to view… luckily for you, I’ve skimmed through the list and picked 5 documentaries that I’m most looking forward to in order to influence your decisions of where you put your money because that’s the kind of thing I do.

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Routines (2020) – Routine

Seen at the Sydney Underground Film Festival

Routines Info

Political Correctness is ruining comedy. That’s the phrase you will hear by a lot of comics who got really big in the 90s and haven’t changed their act at all in the 30 years since they started, expecting the same jokes that worked back then to get the same reaction now. You’ve undoubtedly noticed comics who get really upset that they can’t tell a joke that mocks a certain minority group but the truth is… well, maybe those comics just aren’t actually funny anymore and need to update their material. Routines feels like someone decided to take one of those comics and place him in a dramatic story of love and loss and it works – occasionally.

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Sweethurt (2020) – The 90s Are Back Baby!

Seen at the Sydney Underground Film Festival

Sweethurt

Back in the late 90s, there was a huge boom for comedies about teenagers behaving badly while also being kind of charming. Films like She’s All That, American Pie… basically, everything that would eventually be parodied by Not Another Teen Movie. It was this huge thing and these films were massive, to the point where their parody literally gave us Captain America. Of course, it’s been so long since this kind of comedy was a big thing that it feels like no one does it anymore… so thank god for Sweethurt bringing back that classic feeling.

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Peter Rabbit 2 (2021) – Fine Furry Family Fun

Released: 25th March
Seen: 7th August

Peter Rabbit 2 Info

In 2018 the film Peter Rabbit came out to a fairly mixed response. Personally I thought it was fine, James Corden hadn’t quite become full cinematic poison just yet (though he had just done The Emoji Movie, so he was getting there) and the film itself had enough silliness and charm to be fine for the little kids. It was cute but I was fine with it sticking to just a single film, a feeling I grew more sure of the more my general disdain for the lead actor grew (the man did Cats, Superintelligence AND The Prom within a year, a trilogy of performances that should end careers). Now having finally seen the sequel… It’s a bit of an improvement on the original, but I can also be done with this series at any point now.

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Fantasia Film Festival 2021 – Alien On Stage

Over on Soda & Telepaths, I’ve been given credentials to cover the Fantasia Film Festival so I have a lot of films that I’ll be going through this month. The first one is Alien on Stage, a documentary about the weirdest stage play you’ve ever heard of that’s just so damn charming. I’ll be posting a ton of these reviews over the next month so please go read them so Fantasia will let us do this next year

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9to5: The Story of A Movement (2021) – What A Way To Make A Doco

Released: 1st February
Seen: 22nd July

9to5 Info

The last year has not exactly been easy for anyone, but especially those in a regular nine to five job that found themselves suddenly unable to work and make the pittance they’d been making previously. Seems like finally this idea of barely getting by with a back breaking job has found a limit that can’t be ignored, since we now know that at any moment something can happen that will just force the planet to shut down for a year. What we’re seeing now, as things very slowly start approaching normal (APPROACHING, we are nowhere near normal again and stop acting like it) is workers have finally had enough of their low wages and poor treatment and are fighting back… a story that feels eerily similar to the one told in the documentary 9to5: The Story of A Movement

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Cosmic Sin (2021) – Nap Time

Released: 11th March
Seen: 21st July

Cosmic Sin Info
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNxsB6o6DJs

There was a time, long ago, when Bruce Willis wasn’t just a movie star. He was, without hyperbole, one of the most famous entertainers on the planet earth. He was the lead in Moonlighting, which was a global phenomenon, he starred in absolute classics like Die Hard, Pulp Fiction and 12 Monkeys. Hell, the man made two albums with the legendary Motown records and had a top 10 single with the Pointer Sisters as his backup singers, he was the definition of a global superstar… so why the hell is he still working now when he clearly stopped giving a fuck way back in the 2010s and hasn’t put in a decent performance since… what, Looper? He’s certainly not giving a decent performance in Cosmic Sin, but then again no one is.

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Arlo the Alligator Boy (2021) – Smile At This Crocodile

Released: 16th April
Seen: 18th June

Arlo the Alligator Boy Info

Back in the 90s and early 2000’s, Disney had this thing that they did where they would make a movie out of the first three episodes of an upcoming series in order to get people used to what was to come. This led to such films as The Return of Jafar, Mighty Ducks the Movie: The First Face Off and Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins among a whole cornucopia of other films. 

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Luca (2021) – Looka At This, It’s Cute (and a little bit gay)

Released: 18th June
Seen: 18th June

Luca Info

With all the films that are going to Disney’s premier service lately I’ve noticed a weird pattern regarding the films that they don’t throw a surcharge on the second it pops up… namely that they’ve been, largely, kind of bad. Sure there’s exceptions like Soul or Onward, but other films like Magic Camp, Stargirl and Artemis Fowl (a film that, no joke, didn’t pop up on their site’s list of original films when I went to look before writing this). Basically if a film skips cinemas and just pops up on Disney Plus I’m going to be going in with some trepidation… and then they just throw something like Luca up there and I wonder if they even know when they have a good thing on their hands.

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