Today at 4:45, Independent Film Festival Boston presents the New England premiere of Point and Shoot. Tickets & trailer at brattlefilm.org or iffboston.org. * Winner – Best Documentary, Tribeca Film Festival * It’s safe to say that Matthew Vandyke’s girlfriend probably regrets the day she called him a coward. Upon finishing grad school, this shy, bookish Middle Eastern studies major, spurred on by too many video games and countless viewings of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, decided to give himself “a crash course in manhood.” First serving as an embedded reporter in Iraq, Vandyke later made himself over in the image of a forgotten Australian travel show host. Roughing it as a one man camera crew on a motorcycle trek across the Arab world, Vandyke battled a debilitating case of obsessive compulsive disorder, not to mention the logistical challenges of filming yourself on a bike in often unfriendly territory. This strange, fascinating journey ramps up upon Vandyke’s arrival in Libya, where fast friendships are forged and he finds himself fighting side by side with the people in the 2011 uprising against Gaddafi. Vandyke is quickly captured and placed in solitary confinement for almost six months. What happens next is even less expected. Two-time academy award nominated director Marshall Curry (STREET FIGHT, IFFBoston 2006; IF A TREE FALLS: A STORY OF THE EARTH LIBERATION FRONT, IFFBoston 2011) adroitly cuts together Vandyke’s footage, after-the-fact interviews and expressionistic animated sequences for this humorous and harrowing tale of transformation, about the differences between a life documented and a life lived in full. —Vincent Archer
Posted on: Sat, 26 Apr 2014 16:10:00 +0000
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