5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival
1. After seeing American Animals, I want to read Mr. Pink The Inside Story of the Transylvania Book Heist by Chas Allen
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The film: American Animals
About the film:
In 2004, an unlikely band of college students attempted an outrageous heist of rare books (including original copies of Audubon's "Birds of America") from a university library. Inspired by the larcenies they'd witnessed on screen, they planned for months. What happened — and, arguably, didn’t happen — is the focus of this white-knuckle fictional caper film, directed with colorful verve by Bart Layton (The Imposter, T/F 2012). The acting is impeccable, but what truly sets the movie apart is that we also meet the actual young men (now older, of course) and hear the story through their not-always-reliable recollections — a strategy that only amplifies the tension. In what's sure to be one of the most talked-about movies of the year, Layton manages both a satisfying narrative conclusion and insights into the true gulf between the movies and real life.
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The Book: Mr. Pink The Inside Story of the Transylvania Book Heist
About the book:
In this amazing true story, four college students of privilege and promise become unlikely criminals. Told from first hand experience, the story follows the author, Chas Allen, as he and a mismatch of friends revel in an outward appearance of parties and excess on a university campus. But behind the facade of keggers and class, the students venture off the beaten path to find themselves playing a dangerous high-stakes game with an underground casino, dealing with European black market buyers, and living a real-life version of the movies they had always admired. As the risks increase so too does their desperation to turn to crime.
2. After seeing Love Means Zero, I want to read Open: An Autobiography by Andre Agassi
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The film: Love Means Zero
About the film:
In this provocative confrontation with one of the most famous names in tennis, director Jason Kohn (Manda Bala, T/F 2007) grapples with the legacy of Nick Bollettieri — a fantastically successful self-promoter, a driven and abusive coach and the architect behind the careers of many tennis greats. Over a series of extended interviews, Kohn does battle with Bollettieri, pushing the aging coach to a level of introspection and reflection that's clearly uncomfortable — and maybe impossible. But throughout the verbal sparring, the stories keep coming — tales of hustle and grit and the destructive legacy of winning at all costs.
About the book:
From Andre Agassi, one of the most beloved athletes in history and one of the most gifted men ever to step onto a tennis court, a beautiful, haunting autobiography.
Agassi’s incredibly rigorous training begins when he is just a child. By the age of thirteen, he is banished to a Florida tennis camp that feels like a prison camp. Lonely, scared, a ninth-grade dropout, he rebels in ways that will soon make him a 1980s icon. He dyes his hair, pierces his ears, dresses like a punk rocker. By the time he turns pro at sixteen, his new look promises to change tennis forever, as does his lightning-fast return.
3. After seeing Won't You be My Neighbor, I want to read The World According to Mister Rogers: Important Things to Remember by Fred Rogers
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The Film: Won't You be My Neighbor
About the film:
A true master of synthesizing pop culture into great filmmaking, Oscar-winning director Morgan Neville (20 Feet from Stardom, T/F 2013) reframes that most beloved (and much parodied) cultural institution: Mister Rogers. But fear not — instead of sinister revelations, this artfully crafted portrait offers hard-won uplift. From Fred Rogers' beginnings as a pastor who saw television as his pulpit to his rise to fame as an outspoken defender of public television to his visionary insights into child development, formed during the best-seen-not-heard era, this public history will feel deeply personal to many viewers. Though "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" may feel like an American relic, Neville asks us to consider what of value we have lost since the more open-hearted days Rogers' show represents — and wonders how we can find it again.
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The Book: The World According to Mister Rogers
About the book:
There are few personalities who evoke such universal feelings of warmth as Fred Rogers. An enduring presence in American homes for over 30 years, his plainspoken wisdom continues to guide and comfort many. The World According to Mister Rogers distills the legacy and singular worldview of this beloved American figure. An inspiring collection of stories, anecdotes, and insights--with sections devoted to love, friendship, respect, individuality, and honesty, The World According to Mister Rogers reminds us that there is much more in life that unites us than divides us.
4. After seeing The Price of Everything, I want to read The $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art by Don Thompson
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The Film: The Price of Everything
About the film:
Art and commerce alternately collide and cozy up in the latest from Nathaniel Kahn (My Architect), which examines the enigmatic mechanics of an art market where the swirling vagaries of popularity elude nonprofessionals. We meet Stefan Edlis, a highly quotable, Vienna-born art collector and Holocaust survivor; the rising superstar, Nigerian-American artist Njideka Akunyili Crosby; and whip-smart art maven Amy Cappellazzo, whom we see prepping a major collection for auction. The absurdly successful Jeff Koons employs a buzzing factory of assistants who convert his notions into art products, while op art pioneer Larry Poons tasted the other side of the boom, falling out of favor when, after astronomical success in the early '70s, he pursued less commercial directions. The whole thing crackles with kinetic energy, and Kahn perfectly balances his characters, leaving the audience hungry for the next bon mot and thrilled to be allowed behind the curtain of this rarified marketplace.
About the book:
Why would a smart New York investment banker pay $12 million for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock’s drip painting No. 5, 1948 sell for $140 million?
Intriguing and entertaining, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark is a Freakonomics approach to the economics and psychology of the contemporary art world. Why were record prices achieved at auction for works by 131 contemporary artists in 2006 alone, with astonishing new heights reached in 2007? Don Thompson explores the money, lust, and self-aggrandizement of the art world in an attempt to determine what makes a particular work valuable while others are ignored.
5. After seeing Three Identical Strangers, I want to read Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited by Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein
5 Books I Want to Read After Attending the True/False Film Festival | The Film: Three Identical Strangers
About the film:
The first 30 minutes of this stranger-than-fiction tale deliver a jaw-dropping, feel-good human-interest story that managed to go viral, even in the pre-internet era. Oblivious of each other's existence, three young men — Robert Shafran, Edward Galland, and David Kellman — grew up in three very different conditions. An uncanny coincidence helped reunite these three identical triplets, separated at birth. Soon, the trio are media stars and we embark upon a romp-filled tour of the early 1980s (Studio 54, Phil Donahue, Kim Wilde etc.). But the story switches gears, revealing darker themes and insidious forces. Robert, Edward, and David, always captivating on screen, become the center of a knotty conspiracy, one that will ramp up our ongoing debate about nature versus nurture, along with questions of scientific ethics. It's a disquieting look at how hidden forces can shape our lives.
About the book:
Elyse Schein had always known she was adopted, but it wasn’t until her mid-thirties while living in Paris that she searched for her biological mother. What she found instead was shocking: She had an identical twin sister. What’s more, after being separated as infants, she and her sister had been, for a time, part of a secret study on separated twins.
