I tend to oversubscribe to film festival and screening e-updates but was glad to see that the eighth year of the SF Documentary Festival is underway; it’s SFIndie’s crown event during a busy (and publicized) year of programming. Before the Roxie-based fest closes next Thursday I’m hoping to see the Bay Area Shorts and “The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virgina”–my mom’s family hails from WV, but even if they didn’t, who could resist with a description like this?
Bringing the WTF to this year’s DocFest is the truly awesome White family, the infamous Appalachian clan known for misdeeds as impressive as their family tree: shoot-outs, robberies, gas-huffing, drug dealing, pill popping, murders. They’ve got their pride, the Whites; Jesco’s a tap-dancing star, and do we detect a note of self-satisfaction in their own notoriety? Because it’s hard to believe they forgot the cameras were rolling when they got out the drugs for grandma’s birthday party. If you’re born a White, you’ve got a decision: either live the lifestyle or try to live it down. But, as they put it, ‘At least people know who the [&%$!] we are.’