BEAUTIFUL DREAMER: BRIAN WILSON AND THE STORY OF SMILE
No cert, 110 mins
BEACH Boys fans will relish 30 extra minutes of footage not seen when this was shown in BBC1's Imagine slot. It's a great story - Brian Wilson's amazing comeback from mental collapse to finish the project that sent him ga-ga in the first place, the most famous unfinished record of all time.
Pity about the lack of objectivity. Not a soul to say, for example, that sublime though it is in parts, Smile has got "factory made" stamped all over it. File under "hagiography".
LOS ANGELES PLAYS ITSELF
No cert, 169 mins + 20 min interval
"IF we can appreciate documentaries for their dramatic qualities, perhaps we can appreciate fiction films for their documentary revelations," intones Thom Andersen at the beginning of his exhaustive and exhausting survey of "the most photographed city in the world".
Andersen uses scenes from films shot in, around and about Los Angeles - Blade Runner, Chinatown, Sunset Boulevard and countless others - to document how LA is portrayed. Very media studies-friendly.
MONDOVINO
Cert PG, 186 mins
AN ambitious documentary investigating globalisation and the wine business. "Le vin est mort," says one old grower. He's complaining about the Californian-based Mondavi company and US wine critic Robert Parker, whose combined influence is squeezing out idiosyncrasy and producing the vinicultural equivalent of Le Big Mac. In France, it's clearly the Resistance v the Collaborators all over again.
Jonathan Nossiter wrote, shot, directed, produced, edited. Well done Jonathan, but next time get a proper editor in - this wanders all over the shop and is 30 minutes too long.
