The One

Every year at True/False, Monkey and I immerse ourselves in the doc film world. Ten to twelve movies each festival give us plenty to think about afterward. Each year we try to determine which films we liked most and least. Sometimes we disagree. This year, we are in total agreement.

Of course, to say one film was the "best" is perhaps incorrect, or, at best, imprecise. Each of the films was excellent in its own way, and, paradoxically, the one film we both ranked as our favorite is probably the one we'd be least likely to want to see again.

Restrepo was the most moving, intense, awful, amazing film we saw. It deals with a unit in a most dangerous front line position in Afghanistan. As a piece of journalism, it follows a long tradition of front line reporting, but it is told by the soldiers, and effectively interspersed with interviews done several weeks or months after the soldiers had finished their deployments. This gives the film a sense of immediacy and thoughtfulness, as the men who experience what you are witnessing then reflect back upon it. It is haunting and heartbreaking. It is an awesome piece of film, and terrible in its beauty. I recommend it to everyone, not because you need to be entertained by this film, but because you need to be enlightened by it.