Documentary – Page 4 – Movie Meister Reviews

August 29, 2022 leebutler Documentary, Netflix

Running with the Devil: The Wild World of John McAfee (2022) – Does Not Compute

Released: 24th August
Seen: 26th August

John McAfee was one of the most wildly fascinating people to ever walk the earth. His initial fame came from his work in computers, he’s the man who created the McAfee virus protection software that’s possibly running on the very device you’re reading this review on. so he has made a considerable impact on many lives… he was also accused of the murder of his neighbour in Belize, went on the run to Guatemala to avoid the charges, was extradited to the US, ran for president twice, was charged with tax evasion, fled the US and went to Spain in order to avoid those specific charges and was later found dead in his cell from an apparent suicide that may have been a murder or he faked his own death, who the hell knows. It’s a wild story that could make for a truly insane documentary… and Running With The Devil is certainly insane, just not sure how good it is.

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August 28, 2022August 28, 2022 leebutler Documentary

Diamond Hands: The Legend of WallStreetBets (2022) – Gamestonk

Released: 18th May
Seen: 25th August

For those who don’t know, Gamestop is a US-based company that specialises in brick-and-mortar stores that sell video games and gaming-related paraphernalia. There are subsidiary companies in other countries (EB Games, Thinkgeek, Etc) but the core business is these stores that used to do truly incredible business… until about 2016. That was roughly the time that gaming finally did what film and music had been doing for a while and moved mostly to online retail. That move triggered a domino effect that suggested that Gamestop was going to go the way of Blockbuster, just a matter of time before it would be a set of empty stores that no one visited anymore. This status as a dying store caused the Gamestop stock to hover under 5 bucks a share, and that is how the insane story of the Gamestop short squeeze began.

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July 10, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino (2021) – Watch This For Mother

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino was seen as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino Info

In the history of film, there have only been 3 women who have won the Oscar for best director. Only 3, and all of those have been within the last 12 years. This isn’t shocking when you realise that, due to rampant sexism, women haven’t really been able to get a chance to be directors since pretty much the invention of the studio system. Indeed there was a period in the 40s and 50s where there was precisely 1 female director who was a part of the directors’ guild, that singular sensation being the legendary Ida Lupino, the woman who is the central focus of the documentary Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino (the film taking it’s subtitle from the greeting given at the start of directors’ guild meetings because the room would be full of hundreds of male directors and Ida Lupino)

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July 9, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

Ice Ice Baby – Hip Hop’s 1st Global #1 (2022) – Stop, Collaborate and Listen

Ice Ice Baby – Hip Hop’s 1st Global #1 was seen as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

In 1990 the single Play That Funky Music by an unknown rapper known as Vanilla Ice was released to almost no real fanfare, the song just washed over a mass audience who didn’t really care for the attempted cover version of a legendary Funk Rock classic. This would’ve probably been the extent of the Vanilla Ice story were it not for one radio disc jockey named David Morales who decided to play the B side of the record.

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June 7, 2022June 7, 2022 leebutler Review

The New Corporation: The Unfortunately Necessary Sequel (2021) – Business As Usual

Released: 11th March 2021
Seen: 5th June 2022

In 2003, the documentary The Corporation was released. It remains one of the most fascinating examinations of corporate culture because it took the common idea that a corporation is a person and asked the question “If Corporations are people, what kind of person would they be?”. Spoilers for a 20-year-old documentary but the answer was a psychopath. It didn’t come to this conclusion lightly either, it literally took the psychological profile of a psychopath and proceeded to show how the world’s biggest corporations ticked every single box with incredible ease. Since The Corporation came out though, the world has changed dramatically so the question The New Corporation: The Unfortunately Necessary Sequel asks is “How have corporations changed?” and turns out, they’ve gotten worse.

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May 17, 2022May 17, 2022 leebutler Review

You Cannot Kill David Arquette (2021) – Wrestling With Greatness

NOTE: Here is my review from Soda & Telepaths that was posted back on September 6th, 2021

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May 14, 2022May 14, 2022 leebutler Review

Our Father (2022) – Terrifyingly Real

Released: 11th May
Seen: 13th May

Donald Cline, the villain that the entire Our Father documentary revolves around, is one of the vilest human beings to walk this earth and that is not a statement made lightly. Specialising in infertility treatments, Donald Cline worked on multiple women who came to him either to have help with a fertility issue involving their husband or who were going to use a sample from a sperm bank… and for many of those (we have no idea how many) Donald Cline would use his own personal semen sample to impregnate these women and he would’ve gotten away with it too if it wasn’t for his own meddling kids getting a 23 and Me test.

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May 12, 2022May 12, 2022 leebutler Review

Downfall: The Case Against Boeing (2022) – Plane and Simple

Released: 18th February
Seen: 11th May

Downfall: The Case Against Boeing begins on 29 October 2018 when Lion Air Flight 610 took off from the Soekarno–Hatta International Airport heading for Depati Amir Airport, both of which are in Indonesia. The plane, a Boeing 737 Max 8, left the ground at 6:20 am with 181 passengers and 8 crew members on board.

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