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      ‘Jurassic Punk’ Review: Making Digital Dinosaurs Walk

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      This documentary looks at the computer animation innovator Steve Williams.It is hopefully not to gross a generalization to point out that animators are different from you and me. And this holds whether the animator works in hand drawing, stop-motion, or computer graphics. Obsessiveness that goes beyond dedication to work is a common trait. As is social awkwardness.The Canadian-born computer animation innovator Steve Williams was and remains so overtly brash that he inverts the latter characteristic into the kind of awkwardness that, well, can often get you fired. Williams is the guy who enabled the effects team at Industrial Light and Magic to build many of the dinosaurs for the 1993 film “Jurassic Park” inside a computer.Directed by Scott Leberecht, “Jurassic Punk” tells the very juicy story of pioneers, naysayers and professional hierarchies that made Williams both the Necessary Man and an eventual outcast. Frankly admitting that he’s not a diplomat, Williams makes clear his skepticism concerning revered visual effects figures. Among them Dennis Muren, the I.L.M. department head who took home a lot of Oscars while Williams labored in a section of the company known as “the pit.”In that space, Williams figured out how to execute previously unattainable visions for James Cameron’s “The Abyss” and “Terminator 2” before “Jurassic.” And his work on Spielberg’s film resulted from Williams directly not doing what he was told. “Don’t even bother” trying to make a computer-animated dinosaur, he recalls Muren instructing him.In contemporary interviews, the stop-motion animator Phil Tippett, whose whole livelihood was threatened by Williams’s innovation, displays the most affinity for Williams’s disruptive way of thinking. The documentary was conceived as a tribute, but Leberecht happened upon Williams at a dark time in his life: divorced, unemployed, alcoholic and convinced his work has ruined movies. This movie ends with the artist marking eight months sober and finding some fulfillment in teaching.Jurassic PunkNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 21 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Apple TV, Google Play and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. More

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      ‘Nelly & Nadine’ Review: An Unlikely Love, an Unlikely Record

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      A family archive provides intimate records of a love affair that began between two women imprisoned in the Ravensbrück concentration camp.For most of Sylvie Bianchi’s life, the records of her grandmother’s time as a prisoner in the Ravensbrück concentration camp seemed too painful to examine. Sylvie kept her grandmother’s letters, diaries, photographs and home movies in the attic of her family’s French farmhouse for decades. The documentary “Nelly & Nadine” captures the story as Sylvie finally opens dusty boxes, unearthing a surprising tale of love and resilience.Sylvie learns that her grandmother, Nelly Mousset-Vos, was an opera singer turned spy with the French Resistance. She was imprisoned at Ravensbrück in 1944, and there, Nelly met Nadine Hwang, who had worked in literary circles in Paris and likely participated in resistance efforts. The pair fell in love. They were separated, but after the war, Nelly and Nadine moved together to Venezuela. They lived as a couple until Nadine’s death in 1972, and Nadine documented their lives together in home movies that are shown in the film. In informal, pensive interviews with the director Magnus Gertten, Sylvie reflects that she remembers Nadine, but Nadine was only ever referred to as her grandmother’s friend and housemate.It’s an astonishing love story, all the more notable for the sheer amount of documentation that is shown onscreen. Gertten first identifies Nadine in newsreel footage of refugees arriving in Sweden after the liberation of the camps. This footage alone, which captures hundreds of joyful faces — and Nadine as a solitary somber figure in the crowd — would be noteworthy. But it’s equally miraculous that Nelly and Nadine’s records were preserved by Nelly’s family — an archival kindness that is, historically-speaking, not frequently afforded to women who love other women. The film is moving for the intimacy it depicts, an archive as unlikely as the love story itself.Nelly & NadineNot rated. In French, Swedish and Spanish, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 32 minutes. In theaters. More

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      What We Learned From ‘Harry & Meghan,’ Part Two

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      The second collection of episodes of the couple’s Netflix docuseries landed on Thursday. It dives deep into mental health and royal drama.LONDON — The second and final installment of “Harry and Meghan,” the highly anticipated Netflix docuseries, was released on Thursday, capping a week in which the couple’s personal lives were once again catapulted into the spotlight.The first three episodes of the series, released last week, dove into the makings of the couple’s relationship, their ongoing battle with the news media, the details of Meghan’s challenging family connections and more. Three more episodes were released Thursday.Love them, hate them or simply can’t live without them, people tuned in. The first set of episodes earned a staggering 81.5 million viewing hours, the most of any documentary in a premiere week, Netflix said on Tuesday. More than 28 million households had seen a part of the first collection of episodes in the first four days, the streaming platform added.Episode four picks up at Harry and Meghan’s wedding in May 2018 and quickly tackles a number of matters, including Meghan’s connection to Queen Elizabeth II, the barrage of negative headlines she faced and her mental health challenges.If you don’t have time to watch, or if you enjoy spoilers, here are the main takeaways from the latest episodes.The wedding was a family affair, although it was an international spectacle.The fourth episode kicked off by reliving the couple’s star-studded wedding in May 2018. Although thousands of people were on the street hoping to catch a glimpse of the couple, and perhaps billions more were watching on television, the couple described it as a family affair, with numerous personal touches that seemed to make all the difference.Harry chose the song (Handel’s “Eternal Source of Light Divine”) that Meghan walked down the aisle to. “It was so beautiful,” she said. It was also revealed that Charles, Harry’s father, who was the Prince of Wales at the time and is now king, helped choose the orchestra for the ceremony.More on the British Royal FamilyBoston Visit: Prince William and Princess Catherine of Wales recently made a whirlwind visit to Boston. Swaths of the city were unimpressed.Aide Resigns: A Buckingham Palace staff member quit after a British-born Black guest said the aide pressed her on where she was from.‘The Crown’: Months ago, the new season of the Netflix drama was shaping up as another public-relations headache for Prince Charles. But then he became king.Training Nannies: Where did the royals find Prince George’s nanny? At Norland College, where students learn how to shield strollers from paparazzi and fend off potential kidnappers.Because Megan’s father, Thomas Markle, did not attend the ceremony, she asked Charles to walk her down the aisle. “Harry’s dad is very charming,” Meghan said. “I said to him like, ‘I’ve lost my dad in this.’ So him as my father-in-law was really important to me.”Meghan’s connection to the queen seemed to be strong, normal even.The episode dwells on Meghan’s first official royal engagement with the queen, about a month after the wedding. She and the queen took the royal train to Cheshire, England.“I treated her as my husband’s grandma,” Meghan said, remembering her private time with the queen. “When we got into the car in between engagements, she had a blanket,” Meghan said, and that the queen placed the blanket also over her knees. “I recognize and respect and see that you’re the queen, but in this moment I’m so grateful that there’s a grandmother figure, cause that feels like family,” Meghan said.The constant and negative tabloid headlines had a dramatic effect on Meghan.The fourth episode also underscored the mental health challenges and suicidal thoughts Meghan had, in part because of negative headlines shortly after they wed and during much of her pregnancy.“All of this will stop if I’m not here and that was the scariest thing about it — it was such clear thinking,” Meghan said.Doria Ragland, Meghan’s mother, recalled an emotional conversation in which Meghan expressed suicidal thoughts. “That’s not an easy one for a mom to hear,” she said, wiping away tears. “And I can’t protect her. H can’t protect her.”Harry said he was devastated by the toll the negative press coverage took on his wife and said he didn’t deal with it well.“I had been trained to worry more about what are people going to think,” Harry said. “And looking back at it now, I hate myself for it. What she needed from me was so much more than I was able to give.”The couple’s war with the media reaches a fever pitch.The fifth episode begins with the couple’s continued war with the news media and efforts to dodge paparazzi photographers while spending Christmas 2019 away from the royal family.The headlines about Meghan appeared to be incessant, pushing the couple to a breaking point. “I realized that I wasn’t just being thrown to the wolves,” Meghan said. “I was being fed to the wolves.”The couple described creating a plan that they hoped would bring them both safety and peace of mind. “The toll was visible, the emotional toll that it was having on both of us, but especially my wife,” Harry said. “We’re going to have to change this for our own sake.”They described plans to relocate to New Zealand or South Africa before they ultimately settled on Canada. They later moved to California.Harry said his grandmother, the queen, was aware that he and Meghan were having difficulties with their public roles and made plans to discuss it in early January 2020 when he returned briefly to Britain. However, that plan was thwarted, they said.“I remember looking at H and going, my gosh, this is when a family and family business are in direct conflict because they’re blocking you from seeing the queen, but really what they’re doing is blocking a grandson from seeing his grandmother,” Meghan said.Strained family ties take center stage.In a family meeting to discuss the couple’s decision to reduce their roles as working members of the royal family, Harry said he was presented with several options but quickly realized no agreement would be reached.“It was terrifying to have my brother scream and shout at me, and my father say things that simply weren’t true and my grandmother quietly sit there and sort of take it all in,” Harry said.Harry described that meeting as hard and said that it finished without a solid action plan.“The saddest part of it was this wedge created between myself and my brother so that he’s now on the institution side,” Harry said, acknowledging Prince William’s perspective.The couple announced in January 2020 that they were stepping back from their royal duties. The decision sent shock waves around the world and drew headlines that seemed to blame Meghan for the split.“How predictable that the woman is to be blamed for the decision of a couple. In fact it was my decision,” Harry said.The queen later said she was “supportive” of the couple’s decision.This story is being updated. Check back for more. More

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      ‘Make People Better’ Review: Clear Science, Confusing Storytelling

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      This muddy documentary dives into a complex story of genomic discovery, biomedical ethics and covert dealings.When the Chinese scientist He Jiankui announced in 2018 that he had successfully taken human embryos with genetically edited DNA and implanted them in a woman’s uterus, it sparked international controversy among scientists and stoked deep-seated fears of normalizing “designer babies,” which would allow the wealthy to buy the ability to choose the genetic characteristics of their offspring. In the documentary “Make People Better,” the director Cody Sheehy dives into this complex story of genomic discovery, biomedical ethics and the covert dealings of the Chinese government.The film chooses its experts well. Antonio Regalado, a science writer, and Benjamin Hurlbut, a biomedicine historian, discuss the scientific and ethical concepts around Dr. He’s work in accessible and engaging language that one doesn’t need to be a genetics expert to understand. Yet a glut of animations and B-roll footage makes the film’s visuals feel convoluted, and a flat narrative structure further muddies the waters.As the repressive Chinese government does severe damage control in the wake of the experiment, Dr. He’s fate hangs in the balance. But just minutes in, Sheehy clumsily reveals what that fate is, deflating the film’s dramatic tension with so little fanfare that the information’s premature landing barely registers.Perhaps the most baffling miss here is that the film omits some major developments that have happened in the story since 2018. Most notably, Dr. He’s release earlier this year from a three-year prison sentence ought to have at least been mentioned in an epilogue.Make People BetterNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 23 minutes. Available to rent or buy on Apple TV, Google Play and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. More

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      ‘See You Friday, Robinson’ Review: Dear Godard

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      In Mitra Farahani’s film, Jean-Luc Godard and the Iranian writer-director Ebrahim Golestan undertake an epistolary dialogue, puttering and pondering at their homes.In “See You Friday, Robinson,” Mitra Farahani orchestrates a freewheeling correspondence between Ebrahim Golestan, the Iranian director and writer, and Jean-Luc Godard, who spent 60-plus years reinventing cinema. The playfully profound film connects the pair through word and image, as they exchange emails, putter, and ponder, one in Sussex, England, the other in Rolle, Switzerland.Farahani marries homebody scenes to a Godardian style of compressed reflections and audiovisual flourishes. Golestan, a retiring figure in a Gothic mansion, puzzles over Godard’s sometimes nutty-sounding koans, which arrive with attachments such as Goya’s “Saturn Devouring His Son,” a clip from the dolphin-dog friendship film “Zeus and Roxanne,” and selfies.Godard is by turns merry and moody, with intimations of mortality in his ruminations; a touching camaraderie emerges when both men weather hospital visits. Godard’s laundry-draped domesticity is endearing, and his hands-on approach to working with images — watching and making them — remains invigorating.Golestan, a key figure in Iran’s pre-revolutionary cognoscenti linked to the poet Forough Farrokhzad, yields the perspective of a monumental exile: impressed by Godard but readily skeptical. “It’s fine if he’s saying something brilliant that I don’t get,” he says, musing on Godard’s Christian upbringing and whether he has a female companion. His letters sound more traditionally discursive than Godard’s, suggesting a greater contrast between modernist sensibilities.With Godard’s recent death, Farahani (who co-produced Godard’s film “The Image Book”) also gives us a fond remembrance, like a drink with an old friend who never stopped thinking onscreen.See You Friday, RobinsonNot rated. In French and Persian, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 36 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Pelosi in the House’ Review: Keeping Her House in Order

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      This HBO documentary, directed by Nancy Pelosi’s daughter Alexandra Pelosi, goes behind the scenes with the House speaker.For “Pelosi in the House,” the documentarian Alexandra Pelosi had what is surely unprecedented access to film her mother, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. But that didn’t necessarily make things easy. “You’re a tough nut to crack,” Alexandra says about half an hour in, noting that Nancy is always on message. “If that’s what you want to do,” the speaker replies. “Crack your mom.”So what does this long-gestating, obviously affectionate, obviously politically simpatico account of Nancy Pelosi’s career, including her rise to and tenures as the first female House speaker, have to offer? For a start, it provides an unusual opportunity to watch Pelosi negotiate legislation and rally votes. She’s seen working the phone in 2009 and 2010 trying to drum up support from caucus members wavering on the Affordable Care Act.Footage of Pelosi at home inevitably has a light touch. At one point, Alexandra shows her parents making simultaneous phone calls; with their voices competing for attention, Paul Pelosi, who was attacked with a hammer in late October, discusses mundanities about their house while Nancy talks about the approach to a Trump impeachment inquiry. At the beginning of the pandemic, it appears even Nancy Pelosi had to prop up her laptop with a crate and cushions to get video interview eyelines right.The movie also shows Pelosi reacting in the moment to the events of Jan. 6, 2021. (Some of the material, showing congressional leaders at a secure location trying to determine whether they could return to the Capitol, was shared earlier this year by the House select committee investigating the attack.) HBO announced an air date for the documentary less than two weeks after Pelosi said she would not seek another term as the Democrats’ House leader. That floor speech is excerpted during the closing credits.Pelosi in the HouseNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 49 minutes. Watch on HBO platforms. More

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      How ‘Peter Pan’ Inspired Richard Branson

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      The businessman and subject of a new documentary series is a fan of “Mare of Easttown,” “Sharkwater” and letting his grandchildren beat him at chess.In the opening moments of the HBO documentary series “Branson,” Richard Branson looks into the camera to say goodbye.“It’s always strange recording something when you’re alive and healthy,” he said, “knowing the only reason this video will be seen is if something has gone awry.”Branson, a serial entrepreneur whose businesses include the aerospace company Virgin Galactic, has bid farewell before when he thought he needed to prepare for the worst — “I’ve written letters to my children and my grandchildren on a number of occasions,” he said in a phone interview last month — but in this case, it was 16 days before he tried spaceflight.Even though that 2021 trip was a success, the footage didn’t go to waste. It made its way into “Branson,” a four-part series that covers his life and career, including his founding of the Virgin empire. Talking about his life, he believes, is part of the mission.“Your life is not wasted if you’ve learned a lot and you’ve shared it,” he said in the documentary. “If you’ve learned a lot and you don’t share your life, I personally feel that your life is wasted somewhat.”Here, Branson shares the people who have inspired him, the books he returns to and why he keeps losing at tennis. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1. “Peter Pan” I found the “Peter Pan” story as a kid and thought it was a magical story. Being able to just flap the arms and fly has been my most recurring dream.2. Forgiveness It was an honor to be able to spend quite a bit of time with Archbishop Desmond Tutu. And one of my favorite books is Nelson Mandela’s “Long Walk to Freedom.” I think that the overriding lesson that the two of them taught the world was the importance of forgiveness. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission that they set up in South Africa was completely and utterly remarkable.3. Grandchildren The best present I ever received was when my grandkids put on a show for me, which they performed in the middle of the dining room table. Shows from kids, and then grandkids, are often the best presents.4. “Biko” I was in South Africa with Nelson Mandela when they unveiled a statue of Steve Biko, a Black activist who was killed in a prison cell by white people during apartheid. After Mandela made his speech, I managed to get the microphone off him and handed it to Peter Gabriel and suggested that he just sing his song, “Biko,” without any instrumentation. The streets were filled with people, and every one of them sang along with him.5. “Swallows and Amazons” As a very young kid, I loved the Arthur Ransome novel “Swallows and Amazons.” It’s about a group of children having adventures in England. Now I read it to my grandkids. It’s a beautiful book.6. “Mare of Easttown” Kate Winslet ended up marrying into our family — married my nephew. I think her best performance ever was in “Mare of Easttown.” It’s extraordinarily powerful that she can do a Philadelphia lady and do it so well. I hope she makes a follow-up on that.7. “Sharkwater” A strong documentary can really wake one up. There’s a brilliant documentary called “Sharkwater,” which the late Rob Stewart made to campaign against the mass killing of sharks and other species in the ocean for things like shark fin soup. After I saw it, I started spending a lot of time campaigning to get sharks protected.8. Joe’s Stone Crab I’d rather swim with the fish than fish for fish these days, even though that sounds a bit “Godfather”-ish. When my wife, Joan, and I are in Miami, we like to eat at Joe’s Stone Crab. It’s got the best fish and crab and a lovely atmosphere as well.9. Chess I play lots of chess. And I like chess boards, which you’ll find around every corner of our home. I like boards to be simple, not the Balinese pieces where I don’t know which one is the queen and which one is the king. I started playing with my grandkids when they were quite young, and I let them beat me all the time to keep them interested. But my 7-year-old grandson has been taking lessons, and it was tough going recently, so I decided to beat him. I think he’s now at an age where he’ll want to come back for more.10. Tennis I play every morning and evening with a tennis pro. It’s a good way of being humble because I get beat, morning and evening, every day. More

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      ‘Loudmouth’ Review: Portrait of Al Sharpton as a Young Man

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      A stirring new biographical documentary about the Rev. Al Sharpton revisits a racially divided New York City and offers a critique of the news media then and now.In the sympathetic documentary “Loudmouth,” the Rev. Al Sharpton recounts the time Coretta Scott King admonished him for his rhetorical excesses. The film’s writer-director, Josh Alexander, cuts between the Sharpton of now — svelte, measured — and, using archival footage, the young man he was in the 1980s: rotund, passionate and plying his skills as a preacher to harness the anger and grief of those African Americans gathered at churches, rallies and marches in a time of heightened racial violence.“Loudmouth” is equal parts time capsule, media critique and authorized biography. Each of those examinations has its own flaws but also offers insights into the man, the moment (the current one but more pointedly New York City of the 1980s and ’90s) and the news media.Thirty years ago, Sharpton’s dramatic tactics earned him (along with the lawyers Alton Maddox and C. Vernon Mason, who was later disbarred) incendiary headlines and a warm seat on the daytime talk circuit. For Sharpton, who sees himself in the tradition of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Scott King’s chiding invited a reconsideration of that lightning rod approach. Another epiphany came after he was stabbed in 1991 in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, while preparing to protest the sentences in the case of Yusuf Hawkins, the Black 16-year-old who was and shot and killed by a white mob in the neighborhood two years earlier.One of the documentary’s most salient cautions might be that members of the news media were (and often remain) unwilling to cop to their biases. Sharpton has spent a lifetime calling the storytellers out for their slant — and schooling us to do the same. As straightforward as it appears, “Loudmouth” also invites an engaged but necessarily judicious scrutiny.LoudmouthNot rated. Running time: 2 hours 3 minutes. In theaters. More