Protagonist R
What do a bank robber, a terrorist, a kung fu student, and a gay evangelist have in common? They're all just like you.
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DVD Details
- Rated: R
- Encoding: Region 1 (USA & Canada)
- Released: June 10, 2008
- Originally Released: 2007
- Label: Alive Mind
Performers, Cast and Crew:
Directed by | Jessica Yu | |
Edited by | Jessica Yu | |
Screenwriting by | Jessica Yu | |
Composition by | Jeff Beal | |
Produced by | Jessica Yu |
Entertainment Reviews:
Rating: 4.5/5 --
Yu's film may be challenging to synopsize, but it's thoroughly engrossing and wildly surprising.
Full Review
Los Angeles Times
Rating: 3.5/5 --
[Jessica Yu] combines the interviews with such skill that themes begin to emerge, a tangled thicket of men seeking to define themselves through strength, discipline and self-transformation.
Full Review
Paste Magazine
Truly artistic documentary about 4 men who led life at the edge and came back from the brink.
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rec.arts.movies.reviews
Writer/director Jessica Yu plays with the dramatic form itself in this experimental doc with a kinky cast that includes an "ex-gay" evangelist.
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Bay Area Reporter
Rating: 1/4 --
None of the talking heads is as interesting as [director] Yu thinks they are; and it's difficult to build sympathy for any of them.
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New York Post
Rating: 3/4 --
At first, the technique seems gimmicky, but finally it's as compelling a perspective as any to understand how these men passed through agony to some sort of peace.
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San Francisco Chronicle
Rating: 5/5 --
fascinating, troubling, and scathingly brilliant in both concept and execution
Full Review
Killer Movie Reviews
Product Description:
Filmmaker Jessica Yu explores human obsession and extremism in this riveting and provocative documentary. Yu interviews four men with seemingly disparate backgrounds, and then mirrors their experiences to what happens in a Greek tragedy by Euripides, THE BACCHAE. One of the men is Mark Pierpont, who tried to quash his homosexuality by becoming an evangelist and preaching about curing oneself of being gay. Pierpont travelled the world as a missionary and preached to audiences of thousands. Then there is Joe Loya, who as a child, was brutally abused by his father. When Loya came of age, he quickly funnelled his rage into robbing banks, until he was caught and sent to prison. Hans-Joachim Klein also suffered abuse at the hands of his father, after his mother--a Holocaust survivor--committed suicide. Klein went on to join a German terrorist organization, and was involved in the 1976 Entebbe hijacking and several arson attacks. Lastly there is Yu's own husband, Mark Salzman, who was constantly tormented and beaten by high school bullies. In order to gain back some control, he became obsessed with martial arts, and religiously attended the classes of an extremely off-kilter and sadistic karate instructor.
While each man's story is vastly different, they each travel the same path, wherein they find that their extreme methods ultimately lead them straight into a new kind of madness and pain. Yu manages to deftly weave together the narrative by using short scenes featuring some very striking wooden puppets, which function as a Greek chorus to really bring home Yu's theme: that at the end of the day, it is ultimately character that makes the man. Yu won the Oscar in 1997 for her documentary short, BREATHING LESSONS: THE LIFE AND WORK OF MARK O'BRIEN.
While each man's story is vastly different, they each travel the same path, wherein they find that their extreme methods ultimately lead them straight into a new kind of madness and pain. Yu manages to deftly weave together the narrative by using short scenes featuring some very striking wooden puppets, which function as a Greek chorus to really bring home Yu's theme: that at the end of the day, it is ultimately character that makes the man. Yu won the Oscar in 1997 for her documentary short, BREATHING LESSONS: THE LIFE AND WORK OF MARK O'BRIEN.
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Product Info
- Sales Rank: 106,621
- UPC: 718122514823
- Shipping Weight: 0.22/lbs (approx)
- International Shipping: 1 item