LAFF 2013: TAPIA

Johnny Tapia in Tapia.

Sparring with life

By John Esther

Like most professional boxing champions, Johnny Tapia came from a very poor neighborhood where kids loved to fight. Although Tapia was a relatively small guy -- as an adult he stood around 5'6" 114 lbs -- he was extremely quick, strong and, more importantly, a naturally smart fighter. He knew how to psyche out his opponents while pumping up a crowd, especially if it was a local crowd. While I am not much of a fan of boxing, Tapia's boxing skills are very entertaining.

Unfortunately, for director Eddie Alcazar, they are about the only entertaining elements in his documentary, Tapia, which made its world premiere last night at the Los Angeles Film Festival to a semi-filled theater. (Reports of a sold out crowd for the screening are an exaggeration.)

Raised by his grandparents after his father was murdered when Tapia was in the womb and his mother brutally raped and murdered when Tapia was 8, Tapia grew up on the toughest streets of Albuquerque, New Mexico. At a very young age it was clear he was a natural fighter. He beat everybody in his weight bracket (sometimes larger guys, too). But just when his career was about to really take off cocaine held him down.

After rehabilitating himself, Tapia got back into the ring, rose through the ranks, eventually earing five world championships before retiring. He won three of them in different weight divisions.

Yet the sadness and anger over his mother's vicious death (other family members would die along the way) coupled with his addiction to cocaine would keep pulling Tapia back down into a whirlpool of despair and near death experiences. He was declared clinically dead five times.

While such trials and tribulations will probably help Alcazar's upcoming feature adaptation of Tapia's life (Shiloh Fernandez will play Tapia), Tapia's religious, determinist attitude in the documentary gets boring after a while. Tapia keeps going on and on about his purpose in life as if there was some great creator fashioning some important grand narrative on earth and Tapia was merely playing his part. Tapia also talks about how he does not want to hurt anyone one moment then makes it clear how violently he would respond if he ever met his mother's killer. And, of course, he is a boxer. Pugilists do not win fights by not hurting another human being.

Simpleminded and tedious after a while, Tapia may have benefited from interviews with others who knew Tapia or perhaps a few psychiatrists. Then there is the issue with his father's supposed murder. That gets raised and dropped way too quickly in the documentary. A thorough examination of his death may have helped, too. Death by heart failure at 45?

There are some big questions here, but Alcazar does not subject audiences to any truths behind the basic bouts of this boxer in and outside the ring.

Tapia screens at the Los Angeles Film Festival: June 19, 7:40 p.m., Regal Cinema. For more information: Tapia at LAFF 2013.

LAFF 2012: THE INVISIBLE WAR

Lieutenant Elle Helmer in The Invisible War.

Through the looking glass

By Miranda Inganni

The Invisible War, the latest feature documentary by Kirby Dick (Outrage, This Film Is Not Yet Rated), exposes the harsh and disturbing reality of what many military women (and men) face – sexual assault and the government’s reluctance to do anything about it. Through honest, heart wrenching and tear-filled interviews, Dick tells the horror stories of victims while shedding light on an overlooked and rampant problem.

The victims interviewed all have one thing in common: they took great pride in their military duty. And they were all greatly debased, in the most horrendous way. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other long-term effects lay waste to lives of otherwise productive members of society. But where is the justice?

A civilian rape victim has a police force and lawyers who are (supposed to be) impartial when dealing with a crime, but military personnel must turn to their commanders, usually a colleague or friend of the alleged perpetrator or the criminal him/herself. Unfortunately, and unfairly, this, more often than not, leads to retaliation at worst and long, drawn-out response (usually not in the victim’s favor) at best. Careers, marriages and, too often, lives are ended as a tragic result.

Dick is able to capture the pain and trauma the victims have suffered, interview and expose the misogyny and hypocrisy of high-level military personnel and members of the government and document the stories and statistics of a grossly underreported problem.

The LAFF screening of The Invisible War is free.

Highly recommended.

The Invisible War screens  at the Los Angeles Film Festival June 16, 1:30 p.m., Regal Cinemas.  

LAFF 2011: SEX CRIMES UNIT

Natasha Alexenko in Sex Crimes Unit.

Victimized and victorious 

By John Esther

Two days and one day before the HBO premiere on June 20, the Los Angeles Film Film Festival screens Sex Crimes Unit, an insightful yet flawed look at a group of dedicated city employees working to bring rapists and other sexually violent perpetrators to justice. 

Before the Sex Crimes Protection Unit was formed in 1974 by Manhattan District Attorney and father of five daughters, Robert M. Morgenthau, victims of rape had very little legal recourse. Marital rape was not considered a crime (and good luck with prosecuting acquaintance rape or date rape cases). It was subject to statues of limitations. And more importantly, it was, and still is to a considerable degree, a victim-precipitated crime. In other words, a woman had it coming to her -- even if she was married, at home, sober, in bed asleep and the assailant broke into the house and sexually violated her. (Some of the reasoning behind this latter part, especially when it came to women holding this point of view, are some of the more interesting moments in the documentary.)

Today, sexually-violent crimes still persist but now there are 53 people handling sex crimes in Manhattan. Not only do they go after fresh cases, thanks to the removal of the statue of limitations on rape, they go after cold cases such as Natasha Alexenko. 

On the eve of her first anniversary in her New York apartment, Alexenko was raped at gunpoint in her apartment hallway by Victor Rondon (a particularly cowardly young man who has no idea what it takes to be a man in any legitimate or dignified sense.)

As Sex Crimes Unit follows new cases, as well as Alexenko's, we get a sense of not only the challenges incurred getting justice but also the victimization and victories between the time of the assault and actual sentencing. 

However, on a couple of occasions, the documentary takes a bit of an ironic tone, as it feeds right into those who are prone to be dismissive of women crying rape. The Zambrano case discussed early in the film is one example. Based on the information provided in documentary, it seems any decent defendant attorney should have been able to fight that one. In another scene a DA has a talk with a group of medical examiners that borderlines on coaching a witness -- albeit before the fact(s). 

And what about those times when the DA fails to prosecute a guilty defendant? The documentary leaves the impression that the accused, at least those who are arraigned (40 percent of rapes go unreported), will be sent to prison for a very long time. 

Yet despite these editorial/directorial flaws, Sex Crime Unit is an inspirational piece of filmmaking about a group of individuals addressing a prevalent problem in American society.

SFIFF 2011: TABLOID

Joyce McKinney in Tabloid.

Thrash trash that talk

By Don Simpson

Former Miss Wyoming and S&M call girl with an IQ of 168 and a penchant for cinnamon massage oil, kidnaps and rapes a rotund Mormon. Years later, she clones her dog…creating five new Boogers! Boy, it sure does not get much better that that. That is the stuff that tabloids -- and Errol Morris’ Tabloid -- are made of!

By way of McKinney (it turns out that you just need to point a camera at her and she will run and run and run with her story), the snarky and sardonic documentarian Morris unearths a subject that allows his off-kilter sense of humor to run rampant. As is typically the case with Morris, Tabloid reveals that his technique is not malicious (unless you’re a Mormon, then you will certainly take offense); Morris allows his subjects to dig their own graves, as he frequently catches the various interviewees flagrantly embellishing their stories and contradicting each other.

This brings us to the favorite subject of the 2008 recipient of SFIFF's Golden Gate Persistence of Vision Award: the truth. In Tabloid, thanks to all of the contradictions and untrustworthy commentary, Morris is unable to reveal an absolute truth. Instead it seems that the truth does not really matter in the context of this documentary (though if you want it, the truth is probably located somewhere in between the interviews). Here, Morris is more interested in how truth can be mediated and distorted. It is often apparent that McKinney’s version of the story is not true, yet she appears to believe her story completely. As McKinney explains, “You can tell a lie for long enough that you believe it." She is not talking about herself, though the statement certainly fits her as snug as her see-through blouse.

Morris is a documentarian, but first and foremost he is an entertainer. No matter how serious his subject, Morris has proved time and time again that he possesses an obvious knack for comedic timing and punctuation -- as with the flashes of words like “Spread-eagle!” and “Barking mad!” on screen in order to further accentuate his interviewee’s verbal flourishes. His other strong suit is his utilization of humorous archival material, which often features quirky film clips from the 1950s and 60s. In Tabloid, Morris utilizes clips from The God Makers (1982), an animated film that takes a highly critical view of the beliefs of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

McKinney certainly proves that people with a sensational sense of self are engagingly entertaining, but what makes a documentary about McKinney any better than a reality show about the Jersey Shore? Is McKinney’s story strong or meaningful enough to justify a 90-minute documentary about it? Is there anything to be learned from Tabloid? (Besides the obvious “fact” that Mormon’s are incredibly silly!) Is Tabloid a vessel for Morris to comment upon gossip rags, tabloids and “reality” entertainment? Or is this all just for shits and giggles? (Admittedly, I shat and giggled simultaneously when McKinney stated that her raping a man would be like “trying to stuff a marshmallow into a parking meter.” Uh, what?!)

In case you are wondering, the infamous manacled Mormon, Kirk Anderson, declined to be interviewed for Tabloid.

Tabloid screens May 3, 9:30 p.m, Sundance Kabuki Cinemas; May 5, 2:45 p.m., New People. For more information: Tabloid.