I Think We’re Alone Now

Perhaps featuring one of the more random choices of subject to follow, “I Think We’re Alone Now” follows two die hard fans / stalkers of 80’s pop star Tiffany, who memorably promoted the single, whose title the documentary shares by touring malls, rather than more traditional venues and something which was also memorably parodied in “How I Met Your Mother” with Robin Sparkles “Lets All Go To The Mall”.

The first of the two subjects we meet is Jeff Deane Turner, who is also the more appealing of the two and whom in the 80’s had a 3 year year restraining order placed against him by Tiffany, after he tried to present her with a katana and five white chrysanthemums, something he explains as being a very high honour in Japanese society. Needless to say was not the same way it was interpretated at the time by her security, as especially highlighted in one of the many newspaper cutting that Jeff keeps along with essentially anything else associated with his idol. A lot of his more random behaviour can be attributed to the fact he has been diagnosed with Asperger’s and while well read and able to talk at length on his favourite subjects, lacks any form of social cues and hence never realises that perhaps not everyone is as interested in his random facts about Tiffany that he is able to reel off on whim as he is. Ultimately he is shown as being a friendly if frequently misunderstood guy, whose other interests extend to conspiracy theories and Radionics a random pseudo-science which he believes him to telepathically communicate with Tiffany’s soul.

The other subjects here is Kelly McCormick, who lacks the likablitity of Jeff and in many ways his polar opposite, as she is a depressed introvert, which also makes her a harder person to initially connect to, even more so when she speaks in such droning tones. Born intersex McCormick is still in the process of tansitioning toward becoming female, taking a dresser top full of various medications to further the process. However despite this she is frequently referred to as being a “He” or “Him” by those close to her such as her gay room mate, even though McCormick frequently refers to herself as “her”.

While Turner’s interest seems to be more grounded in a friendship he believes that he has with Tiffany, McCormick’s interest it would seem is more of a romantic one, as when she is not running or talking about her training regime, she is lusting over her, covering the walls of her apartment with photos of her idol, while frequently conducting interview segments from her couch with a framed photo resting on her shoulder, while ultimately believing her only chance at happiness lies with being with her idol and often acting like a scorned lover whenever denied a chance to see her, as especially highlighted by her failed attempts to get into one of Tiffany’s club gigs which leads her instead to a nearby off licence so she can drink her frustration away.

Despite the fact that Tiffany only had two number one singles, before sinking pretty much into obscurity, doesn’t seem to matter to either of the two subjects, who would both seemingly be under the impression that her career was bigger than it was, with both McCormick and Turner in their own way believing that they share some kind of special connection to her, which the other fans don’t have. Ultimately while sold on the premise of following two of her stalkers, something which essentially only refers to Turner, the documentary more interestingly provides us a fascinating insight into “Erotomania” were the affected person believes that a person is in love with them and reciprocating the feelings they have for that person, which would especially be the case for Turner, who frequently gives many of his encounters with Tiffany an alternative spin, while proudly showing of his collection of books on the subject.

Director Sean Donnelly doesn’t go for anything too flashy here, especially when title cards represent nothing more than names written on cardboard seemingly held in front of the camera. Shot on handheld camera, here he chooses to let his subjects do the talking, especially with no voice over or narrative cards to help tell the story of what fuels their obsession. Equally interesting is the noticeable lack of music or stock Tiffany footage, no doubt the result of licensing costs. Still she does still turn up here in several scenes though never interviewed by Donnelly, as the times we see here is during a couple of awkward encounters with both McCormick and Turner, with her encounter with Turner at an erotica convention being one of her clearly at ease, even more so when he acts as if they are lifelong friends.

While perhaps ill advised to encourage his subjects to further their obsessions, Donnelly also finds himself in what could have very much proved to have been a perfect storm, when McCormick and Turner meet up in Las Vegas to share a hotel room while attending a Tiffany concert and forming a kind of stalker version of “The Odd Couple”. Ultimately though it is a situation which doesn’t occur and instead leads to more of a disagreement than the kind of situation you would expect from two stalkers room sharing.

At only an hour run time, doesn’t overstretch the material, while ending on a positive note for both McCormick and Turner who seem to have grown from the experience as we leave them both heading off in new directions and ultimately more positive directions with their lives. This is a strange, yet surprisingly also a moving documentary to say the least  so why not take an hour out of your routine to watch something different.

Bully

Shot in a style similar to Nick Broomfield’s early documentaries such as “Soldier Girls” and “Chicken Ranch”, in that there is no narration with the subjects of this documentary instead being followed and generally being left to tell their own story, which certainly makes for an interesting viewing experience, especially with no title cards to fill in the background information on his subjects it can also at the same time unfortunately make for a frustrating viewing experience.

Focusing on five different cases of bullying over the case of the film including the openly gay Kelby, whom has been outcast in her town due to her sexual orientation and Mississippi teenager Ja’Meya, whose bullying experiences lead her to pulling a loaded gun on her school bus. Amongst these cases aswell is Ty  and Tyler whose bullying experience sadly resulted in them both committing suicide rather than continue to endure the bullying anymore.

However the one case which the film chooses to follows most closely is that of Alex, who is your stereotypical bullying target, due to him being a socially awkward loner, who throughout the film is showing on the receiving end of both physical and verbal abuse, starting with a student responding to Alex’s cheerful quip of “Your my buddy” with a stream of abuse which includes threats of violating him with a broom handle! In fact so much is Alex targeted over the course of the film that the film makers are finally are forced to step in and alert both Alex’s parents and his head mistress of what is happening to him, which is also one of the few times that we actually see the schools trying to counter their bullying problem, while the rest of the time it seems like the parents can only make fruitless efforts to try and highlight the issue of bullying, while members of the school board uncomfortably make excuses for their lack of action.

While Alex is a great showcase for the sort of bullying which the film is trying to highlight, he is far from the most interesting case here, with perhaps alittle too much time dedicated to his happy home life and general bullying footage. Sadly as a result of this we get to see less of the case which are more interesting to watch such as Kelby, whose bullying is not limited to just her fellow students, but also comes from teachers aswell, were she comments that she has been forced to sit through classes, were teachers have been preaching about “Fags burning in hell”. Still the scenes with Kelby are certainly amongst the strongest her, as she remains determined to not let them beat her while equally and quite rightfully so feeling no shame for her lifestyle choices, even if it has resulted in her being treated like an outcast in her hometown.

Equally interesting here are the scenes with a former self-confessed bully who saw the error of his ways, which seem to link the reasons for bully’s behaviour being less about the much assumed broken home life or low self esteem, but instead more rooted in the desire to be popular and main that status by picking on those further down the social pecking order. It is a fascinating insight and one which helps give a full insight into the roots of the issue, even if the scene is so clumsily dropped in, that to the more casual viewer could just as easily be overlooked.

While seemingly set out with many big ideas on exposing the shortcomings of how bullying is being dealt with, the end result is sadly one which left me feeling largely indifferent, especially as the film has no real heart, thanks largely to Hirsch keeping his distance from his subjects and firmly keeping himself in the position of an observer. Equally frustrating is the documentary style which Hirsch has chosen to use here, as a narration would have been sorely welcome, especially with the film being low on facts and more a focus on personal experiences of his cases looked at over the film, which does in many ways prevent the films from being as hard hitting as I expected, while leaving me with the feeling that my time would have been better spent watching videos from “It Gets Better Project”, which honestly does more for the cause than I felt this film did, even if its focus is more on helping the youth of the LGBT community. Perhaps if used as a lecture tool this documentary would be more effective or just by adding a much needed narrator would benefit this documentary greatly. Until then it remains at best a talking point for dinner parties but far from the must see documentary you would hope it to be.

The Backyard

Professional wrestling the pre-determined, soap opera styled cousin to the more traditional roman-Greco style, this documentary opens with informing us is the #1 rated show on cable networks and while tens of thousands will attempt to make it in the industry few will ever make it. For some though they choose to show their love for the sport in a whole different let alone more violent way. Welcome to the world of “Backyard Wrestling”.

Directed  by Paul Hough for whom this remains to date his sole documentary, here sets out with a mission to discover more about the wrestling fans who are not only obsessed with imitating their favourite wrestlers, but also frequently compete to up the violence stakes as they use light tubes, barbed wire, stapes and fire.  The competitors often risking serious injury as they compete with no kind of wresting training and zero attempts at working under any kind of health and safety.

Embarking on a road trip across the states it soon becomes clear that the cult of backyard wrestling is not limited to just certain states as Hough notes that every town he travels to has atleast one federation, with seemingly no end of young wrestling fans eager to put their bodies on the line, most carrying delusions of these backyard brawls being their ticket into the big leagues of the WWE (or WWF as it known back then). Even the UK doesn’t seem to be free from the appeal of the backyard as Hough meets a group in east Norfolk, who unlike their American counterparts are critical over the use of the more extreme weapons such as barbed wire. At the same time they see this as nothing more than a form of entertainment and not one which would take them any further into the professional wrestling. It should be noted that since the film was released in 2002, the British wrestling scene has grown considerably, so whether this opinion would remain now is unclear.

Throughout his trip Hough meets a large number of colourful characters such as A.D.D. Dave, Bongo and Scar, named so due to the large amount of scar which cover his body from childhood operations and who we find out at the end of the documentary would later break his back while backyard wrestling, yet from interviews he gave following the documentaries release was still keen to wrestle one more match despite now having a 16 inch metal rod in his back. It’s also during his segments that we meet Chaos the self-proclaimed leader of “High Impact Wrestling”. An ultra-violent federation who pride themselves on their own version of realism, as they utilise various homemade weapons, including more randomly a barbwire brick!

While the documentary features numerous interviews with wrestlers from the various feds he chooses to meet, these often come off laced with the bravado of youth, while seeing the likes of Chaos making homophobic statements or comparing the joy of backyard wrestling to “Gay bashing” makes it hard to warm up to many of these characters, let alone take what they are seemingly trying to achieve seriously. More so when these so called matches seem like nothing more than an excuse to wail on each other with weapons under the guise of wrestling.

The redeeming aspect of this documentary comes surprisingly in the form of “The Lizard” who at 26 is one of the oldest competitors and despite stating in the commentary that he’s afraid of heights is frequently shown hurling himself any high object he can find. Hough first meets him wrestling for “Modesto Championship Wrestling” run by the self-proclaimed Vince McMahon of backyard wrestling Josh James, though over the course of the documentary follows his repeated attempts to break into the mainstream, first via the WWE talent search “Tough Enough” and later attending wrestling school before finally making his professional debut with the independent wrestling federation “Supreme Pro Wrestling”. While perhaps not the sharpest tool in the shed as further confirmed by his contributions to the commentary track, he truly does love the sport and it’s hard not to admire the dedication he has to trying to make it, even being prepared to sleep in his car to make the auditions for “Tough Enough”.

Unsurprisingly the violence throughout the film is very heavy with participants more than happy to beat themselves to a bloody pulp or set themselves on fire, often for a crowd often no bigger than a handful of people. The response to how worth such risks to their personal health often resulting in further chest beating and tough guy snarls as they regard those who can’t hack it as being “Pussies” or “fags” with only a few that Hough’s meets such as those of the upstate New York based MTW or the UK backyard wrestlers realising that there is a line to be drawn on how far things should be taken. For many though it’s really a case of seeing how much more extreme than everyone else they can be. If anything the few moments of wrestling that these competitors do actually do could be better classed as garbage wrestling, often coming off amateurish and certainly undisciplined with the lack of training these wrestlers have showing in their awkward falls and slams.

As you watch this car crash style footage, you can’t help but wonder if the parents know what their kids are doing, which surprisingly it seems that a few actually do and even more surprisingly even support what their kids are doing with one of the teacher even comparing these matches confusingly to “The Three Stooges”. This however is not the case for all, as we see the tearful mother of “The Retarded Butcher” crying for her son to break up improve match he has arranged with Scar over the internet, before taking matters into her own hands.

Sadly my attempts to try and get any update on the wrestlers featured found nothing but a bunch of broken Geocities pages and little to indicate if any made it out of the backyard much less managed to survive the scene without suffering some kind of serious injury. At the same time it is hard to tell if the backyard scene really still exists especially with the industry largely moving away from the hardcore style these federations were trying to emulate.

An interesting insight into the world of Backyard Wrestling, it is however hard to really feel attached to most of the wrestlers finished due to their frequently immature and often short sighted views, with what they claim to be wrestling no doubt coming off frustratingly amateurish to the established wrestling fans, while for some the violence might be hard to stomach for others.  Still as a curiosity watch or for those who’ve aware of the trend this is certainly worth giving a look, though lacks anything to warrant a second viewing.

Bronies

Back in 2010 Hasbro was looking to relaunch their iconic “My Little Ponies” line after the success of re-envisioning “Transformers”. This forth generation of ponies would become “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic”. Okay so far nothing unusual there as franchises as we all know frequently go through changes and revamps over the years following their initial release. What could not be expected would be the popularity of the show with guys aged 13 to 35, a group who would soon come to identify themselves as “Bronies” but one the makes of the show would soon quickly embrace as they brought out a line of merchandise to target these fans. This documentary sets out to meet some of these fans and to find out what it is about these adorable ponies which appeals to them so much, let alone for some of these fans form the basis of their own artistic tributes ranging from artwork through to laser shows and even dance remixes.

“Bronies” or to give the documentary it’s full title “Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony” started life as a Kickstarter campaign with a modest target of $60,000 and one which it achieved within three days of the campaign. In the end $322,022 had been pledged making it the fourth most funded film project on Kickstarter. As a result of the extra budget the film grew from focusing on the 2012 “BrodyCon” convention to the truly in-depth look at the Bronies phenomenon that it now is.

Narrated by John de Lancie who “Star Trek: The Next Generation” fans will know for his role as “Q” and here keeps a fun tone to the film, especially with his musical interludes where he voices a pony lecturer providing the history elements for the franchise. De Lancie originally became involved with the show when he voiced the character of “Discord” a character who was essentially a send up of “Q”. Dismissing the project inititally as another small role, it would only be months later that he would be caught by surprise when he began receiving e-mails from fans of the show and even more that a lot of them were from full grown men and so marking his first encounter with Bronies. Rather than going for sheer shock tactics and hunting out oddballs within the Bronie community, the film instead genuinely seems to have been made with the intention of trying to shed light onto these fans and why adult men are so obsessed with a show originally intended for little girls, let alone the fact that it is written and animated with such overwhelming cuteness, that watching it is like being clubbed with a sack of kittens.

 Over the course of the film we meet a handful of these fans, all who could be considered to be normal everyday guys.  So here we get to meet a redneck Bronie who proudly displays his pony love on his car, only to soon find himself the target of less open minded locals who decided to trash his car and even pulled a rifle on him after believing his love of the show meant in some way he must also be gay.  The film also goes international to meet a British fan traveling to a UK convention for the first time, having previous put due to suffering from Aspergers, a condition which he also believes the show has helped him with aswell as dealing with society and challenges it presents someone with his condition.

 One of the main stories featured here though is of the young teen who enjoys the show but is worried about sharing this love with his conservative father. He of course get his opportunity to expose his father to this world when he takes his parents to “Bronycon” where he also gets help from De Lancie who is sympathetic to the boys’ cause especially when he came from a similar stand point as the father currently views the show from. What follows is a touching series of meetings at the con as the family not only meet with De Lancie who comes off just as nice a guy as he seems in his interviews, while he also introduces the father to the father of another boy whose own father was once in a similarly reserved view point regarding the show.

 Aiming to provide a positive overview of the community, the film chooses to gloss over some of the more extreme aspects and warped visions that some fans have chosen to express their love for the series via. In choosing this path the film keeps things fun and upbeat  and ultimately goes a way to proving that just because these guys like a show for little girls does not make them freaks as most would choose to view them. Ironically in researching for this review I did come across a whole heap of Brodies complaining about these aspects not being covered, while generally blasting the film for not representing them correctly which is a view I still can’t get my head around seeing how I left this film with a positive view of their community, if none the wiser as to what it is about the show which hold such appeal with these fans.  I guess this goes to prove once again that you really can’t please everyone.

 Overall this is fun and colourful documentary and one which really helps to shed some light on this little known and frequently misunderstood fanbase. Packed with colourful animation, insightful interviews and fun songs, you really get the feel for the show due to being shot in the same style as the show itself, something only further reinforced by the numerous clips also included. So if your curious about the show or just the fanbase in general this is a great place to start while making a curious evening viewing for the rest of us.

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters

It is a well established fact that to be the best at something, that it requires sacrifice and the men who the focus of this documentary are no stranger to sacrifice with many giving up hundreds of hours of their life, as well as time with their friends and family, with many clearly looking like their have also sacrificed several other things such as taking showers and the generally any form of human contact…..ladies and gentlemen please allow me to welcome you to the world of competitive classic video gaming!

At the centre of this documentary is the rivalry between two champion gamers and their battle to hold the world record score on “Donkey Kong”. On one side we have self proclaimed “Sauce King” of Florida Billy Mitchell, the current reigning champion whose score of 874,300 has remained unbeaten since he first set it back in the 80’s and who has on the back of this celebrity for this score build a successful line of homemade sauces. Now stepping up to the challenge we have high school science teacher Steve Wiebe and manages to beat Billy’s high score with a new record of 1,006,600 points unwittingly sparking a rivalry between the two men as they now battle to be the King of Kong.

Inspired by a Time Magazine article featuring the top players of the early 80’s and their scores on 12 of the top arcade games at the time, which included such classic games as Missile Command, Pac Man and the all important Donkey Kong, games which were never designed to be beaten and unlike games today required piles of quarters and countless hours of practice to master, as these were games without the  unlimited lives and replays of modern games, especially as many never even had ending screens, but rather “Kill Screens” instead were the game either appears as random computer code or even more randomly just kills your character.

When director Seth Gordon set out to make this documentary he had originally intended to make it about the holders of these top scores, only to disregard the idea when he met Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe, to men who play “Donkey Kong” at the highest level, knowing that he had found his story. The two men at the heart of the documentary are almost polar opposites to each other with Steve Wiebe shown as the everyman who after being laid off from what should have been a lifelong career at Boeing had set himself a goal of beating the top “Donkey Kong” score after randomly stumbling across “Twin Galaxies” website which is recognised as the official scorekeepers for Classic Video Game High scores. Wiebe here is shown as a figure of continuous misfortune with friends noting several occasions in the past where he has come up short, from his childhood as a Star Baseball pitcher who failed to pitch at the State Championships due to injury and a talent drummer in an early grunge band who failed to get any recognition with every accomplishment his has had always taken from him at the key moment.

Billy Mitchell on the other hand is shown as unashamedly arrogant and cocky without an ounce of self doubt, as he continually peddles his own personal life philosophies and willing to do anything he can to retain his championship title, while frequently coming across like a bad villain from an 80’s action movie, which is ironic seeing how this is a documentary about video games from the same period and while it could be argued that this persona is the result of how the film is edited, despite Gordon going on record to say that Mitchell was “so much worse than we painted him out to be,” and that he only included scenes necessary to tell the story as well as stating that the film would have been much darker if he hadn’t, which is only made more believable when fellow documentary film maker Morgan Spurlock, caught up with Mitchell several years after the films release for a follow up interview for the “50 Documentaries To See Before You Die” countdown were the film charted at #41. In this interview Mitchell almost seemed to not really care what he did as long as he was able to retain his legacy, while frequently seeming aloof during the interview especially when he was questioned about various parts of the documentary.

Mainly following Wiebe as he sets about beating the score only to soon find himself battling more than Mitchell and his score, as he finds his own score under scrutiny from members of the “Twin Galaxies” officials board, which Mitchell is more baffling a member of, while also being the realm of Chief Referee Robert Mruczek and Mitchells self styled protégé Brian Kuh who are both unscrupulous in theirs bids to discredit Wiebe’s scores, even at one point breaking into Wiebe’s garage to examine his “Donkey Kong” machine. Still despite this opposition Wiebe continues to fight to get his scores recognised, while trying to arrange a live battle against Mitchell to find out who truly is the champion.

Although it’s a documentary about Classic Video Games and their more obsessed fans, the documentary still also has a lot of heart and manages to rise way about what could have been a clip show of your stereotypical nerdy gamers, but here they are shown on the same level as Olympian athletes as Gordon attempts to understand what it is about these games and more importantly the World Record Donkey Kong score, a battle which has all the feeling of a heavy weight title fight at these two titans battle to claim the top spot. Aswell as this main title fight we also get to meet a lot of interesting characters from the Classic Video Game scene, such the world’s oldest video game player Doris Self and “Twin Galaxies” founder Walter Day who frequently finds himself in the crossfire throughout the film especially as the battle lines are drawn. We also get to meet the equally colourful Roy Shildt a self styled fitness guru and pickup artist who high score on “Missile Command” has frequently brought him into conflict with several of the “Twin Galaxies” officials in particular Billy Mitchell, with Shildt’s scenes in the film being amongst my favourites, much like one gamer taking his frustration out on his car. Shildt’s scenes are also especially interesting as he frequently provides the sole counter argument to how “Twin Galaxies” is run.

Since the films release the record has since been broken again by Plastic surgeon Dr. Hank Chein with a record score of 1,090,400 points, while “Twin Galaxies” have continued to hold Video Game contests including their Iron Man contest to see if any game could be played for 100 hours straight, a challenge which remained unbeaten despite gamer James Vollandt playing “Joust” for 67½ hours frequently using dangerous techniques to stay awake including blasting himself in the face with Freon and all subject matter which would make for a great follow up documentary, even though Director Gordon seems currently set on making the follow up as a feature film focusing on how the documentary changed their lives and how the rivalry has continued, which personally I would love to see, but for now it’s fun to get lost in the nostalgia this film provides, while being one of the most surprisingly entertaining documentaries ever made.