“Fuel” won the Best Documentary Audience Award at Sundance 2008, under the title “Fields of Fuel,” but director Josh Tickell’s report that the eleven-years-in-the-making agit-doc examination of alternative energy was substantially re-edited afterwards, including the addition of material about the environmental costs of biofuels. Teeming with green sentiment, much information is dispensed economically along with celebrity endorsement in polemical fashion. Earnestness tips at times into self-congratulation but complex material is handled with admirable clarity, and the tone is hopeful, optimistic, worthy and even prescriptive. It’s not a wrist-slasher like too many nonfiction surmises of the future. With Richard Branson, Barbara Boxer, George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Sheryl Crow, Larry David, Laurie David. 115m. (Ray Pride)
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
Heart: A Review of Soul The real world is soulful, too, in Pixar's bountiful life of the mind.
Seeing The Elephant: A Review Of Babylon The boisterous, brawling yet melancholy "Babylon," is a variation on film history, but more drawing for drama. It's gaudy and mean, celebratory and sorrowful.
Uncanny Ally: A Review Of M3GAN "M3GAN" sells itself in its first handful of seconds in how it introduces the handiwork of roboticist Gemma (Allison Williams, "Get Out") and her present product, PurrPetual Petz from Funki.
Spawn Sacrifice: A Review Of The Creator "The Creator" is richly detailed, punchy, pulpy, punkish entertainment that still has highly serious subjects in mind, without growing didactic and with substantial heart.
A Drag Getting Old: A Review Of Indiana Jones 5 In the protracted opening couple of reels, a very young, computer-crafted Harrison Ford plays a younger cultural marauder who first encounters the dull MacGuffin of the title.
Fine Line: A Review Of Shortcomings It's a season for the comeuppance of a curmudgeon in Randall Park's smart, biting "Shortcomings," adapted by Adrian Tomine from his graphic novel of the same name.
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