Wow…

Park City

Manda Bala... quite possibly one of the best documentaries I've ever seen. It's a deftly woven story of kidnapping, political corruption, plastic surgery and frog farming in Brazil. Eliciting nearly every emotion from the audience in its 85 minute running time, this film manages to not only tell an incredibly compelling and emotional story about the rampant crime problems in Sao Paulo, but also to weave together several seemingly disparate story lines into a single, cohesive piece of cinema. Not only is the film amazingly cut, but the cinematography is several steps above anything I've ever seen on a doc. Jason Kohn, the director, clearly spent a huge amount of time (five years, according to him) shooting and cutting the film, paying incredible attention to detail. He really approached it more like a feature, going above and beyond what most directors would do for a doc. Case in point - during a section featuring plastic surgery reconstructing a severed ear on a kidnap victim, Jason and his crew laid dolly track in the OR and set up a full lighting rig. He also managed to gain unprecedented access to key players in the story and allow them to speak their own perspective. It's really quite a remarkable film. I strongly urge you to check it out. However, I will warn that there are sections of the film that are quite graphic.