Movie Details
| Title: | TV Junkie | |
| Director: | Michael Cain, Matt Radecki | |
| Year: | 2006 | |
| Genre: | Documentary | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 03.11.06 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (0)
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 03.11.06 | Alamo South Lamar | This Screening is part of event: South by Southwest 2006 Next I headed over to South Lamar to catch TV junkie: a doc compiled from roughly 3,000 hours of footage. This dude has a lifelong habit of constantly videotaping himself and his life. Apparently he fills the tapes with footage and never watches them... so then filmmakers came along and went through it and constructed the story of his life told through footage that he shot. The dude's not dead, but his life does follow that familiar movie arc of having success, losing it all because of drug addiction, hitting bottom, and getting back on his feet with some sort of resolution. The difference with TV Junkie, and the reason why this film is absolutely riveting and unbelievably great, is that the footage itself tells the story with a level of honesty and emotion that I've never really seen before. I mean sure... I had a few memories of Grizzly Man go through my head, along with this documentary I saw on HBO where a struggling filmmaker ultimately kills himself and videotapes himself doing it (not shown in the doc of course), but for the most part I'm just sitting back watching this story that every biopic tries to tell done better than any biopic can ever achieve. Unfortunately, I was in such a haste to make it next door to catch the midnight shorts program that I missed out on the Q&A, where apparently the subject of the film had watched it with us along with his wife. I guess it was her first time seeing the film with an audience so it was a pretty unique and essential Q&A that I'm already sad I missed... but oh well, at least I got to see the movie. Speaking of the shorts, they were OK. The best one was directed by Bob Odenkirk and was the best one due in large part to Zack Galifinakis. There were lots of the directors there... and almost no questions for them. |
