How True/False Film Fest 2024 dazzled and uplifted with movies, music and more
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A person might cut any number of paths through a given year's True/False Film Fest.
In impromptu street-corner meetings and deliberations over coffee, friends praise or puzzle over a handful of titles that escaped your schedule. It's impossible to see everything.
But whatever moviegoers took in at this year's fest, which wrapped Sunday night, they encountered stories that will stick to their souls. Whether you too spent the weekend in darkened theaters or simply are curious about what True/False entails, here's the path I took through Columbia's homegrown, internationally-acclaimed nonfiction film festival.
"This is Going to Be Big" offered an uplifting start to my in-person fest. Director Thomas Charles Hyland comes alongside neurodivergent Australian teens preparing a school musical about one of their country's pop-music legends. The film avoids stereotypes and pitfalls, casting these characters in three dimensions and celebrating their innate and evolving strengths.
"Daughters" continued in a moving direction; the film forms both a deeply intimate portrait of prisoners and their families and quietly damns details of the for-profit prison system that increase the distance between these loved ones.
Several stories at this year's True/False unfold over the course of a decade or more. "Yintah" is among them, chronicling the sustained inner fire of indigenous leaders who, for the sake of their beloved home, meet Big Gas and Oil and the Canadian government head-on. The film owns a rightful fury and righteous soul.
More than anything, I crave True/False films which rearrange my expectations, leaving me more unsure of my convictions. "Look Into My Eyes" fits that bill, as director Lana Wilson patiently sits alongside New York City psychics and their clients, weighing every spirit in the room to gauge what's truly happening — and if the truth even matters — while observing the healing so often passed between two sensitive, seeking souls.
This year's True Life Fund film, "Three Promises," takes an important approach to archival filmmaking as Yousef Srouji gathers footage his mother took in early 2000s Palestine. The film proves timely and, unfortunately, quite timeless as it tries to make sense of how families cope when their home movies become war movies.
"Gwetto," from True Vision award winner Michaël Andrianaly, is both a vibrant hangout documentary and meditation on displacement. Spending waking and near-sleeping moments with young immigrant men working at a car wash, his film addresses questions it never plans to answer, interrogating whether they are the right questions at all.
Often, True/False offers viewers an on-the-ground, embedded look at a generational story. "Union," from veteran True/False directors Stephen Maing and Brett Story, beats in time with Chris Smalls and the Amazon Labor Union as they take the fight to a global giant.
Set in Missouri, "Girls State" forms an entertaining, occasionally maddening, and ultimately hopeful look at our future. The high-school students who gather for this civic program know themselves, their world and the particular frustration of being treated as something less than a boy. Their collective motion inspires.
More: Missouri students lead 'Girls State' into True/False. Our Q-and-A with the directors
"A Photographic Memory" plays like a quintessential True/False film. Director Rachel Elizabeth Seed handles light and shadow, sifts past and present, and considers the spiritual properties of art itself, as she builds a memory of her late mother — a brilliant photographer and journalist — from the work she left behind.
More: This filmmaker's mother died when she was an infant. True/False film explores mom's life
Now, a few True/False superlatives to award.
Favorite music moments at this year's True/False
Several fest films contained powerful musical moments. Chief among them: when Eugene, a wounded psychic, turns in a beautiful rendition of Billy Joel's "And So It Goes" in the coda of "Look Into My Eyes."
The audience is rewarded when Halle finally gets her "You're the Voice" spotlight moment in "This is Going to Be Big." And the "Daughters" scene set to "Sea of Love" underlines stark differences between incarcerated men and their little girls — and shows what binds them together.
True/False annually creates a dynamic rotation of bands and buskers, and it was a delight to hear Daniel Villarreal unite the music of Central America and middle America live, in person; to catch Columbians like Ruth Acuff and Rae Fitzgerald, the latter rightly introduced as a "local legend"; and catch up again with returning Austin rockers Good Looks.
Great moments in True/False Q&As
True/False filmmaker Q&A sessions can add context and color to the movies, depending on the quality of the questions asked. Two moments from this year's class of post-screening chats stood out: when Lana Wilson read a poem by Palestinian-American poet Naomi Shihab Nye, a St. Louis native; and Rachel Elizabeth Seed discussing why therapy was a necessary line item in her production's budget.
Large-as-life True/False characters
True/False diehards know these films yield real and compelling characters, people as large as life. A few favorites stood out this year.
The kids are alright: The teens in both "This is Going to Be Big" and "Girls State" left me brimming with hope for what's ahead.
A Chad and a great dad: Chad, the fatherhood coach in "Daughters," laced the film with wisdom. I would follow that man anywhere.
A mother of invention: Sheila Turner-Seed, the late mother and artist at the center of "A Photographic Memory," looms as large — and as lovely and tender — as any True/False character I can recall.
This year's top five True/False films
Again, your path and list might diverge. But here are my five favorites from True/False 2024:
1. (tie) "Look Into My Eyes" and "A Photographic Memory": Both films instantly felt worthy of the all-time True/False canon. Don't make me choose between them. I won't do it.
3. "Yintah": The amount of soul and power on screen were staggering. The film's directors captured the tedium of the fight against environmental degradation, but it's important for viewers to embraced that needed, resilient tedium going forward.
4. "This is Going to Be Big": Crowd-pleasing without once pandering, and a deeply personal work of art.
5. "Girls State": Sometimes the homer pick is the right pick. Directors Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine exhibit such a deep affection for their subjects, foregrounding their whipsmart personalities.
Aarik Danielsen is the features and culture editor for the Tribune. Contact him at adanielsen@columbiatribune.com or by calling 573-815-1731. He's on Twitter/X @aarikdanielsen.
This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: True/False Film Fest 2024 delivered entertainment, enlightenment
