On November 22, 2019, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, the acclaimed Tom Hanks-starring biopic about Fred “Mister” Rogers drops in theatres to warm all of our hearts. It comes just one year after Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, the acclaimed Fred “Mister” Rogers documentary that dropped in theatres the summer of 2018 to warm all of our hearts. Now I’m no grumpus. I want as much Fred “Mister” Rogers content as people are willing to give me. But it is curious that we’re getting a fictionalized version of the man so soon after such a culture-grabbing, supposedly definitive take on him. What can Marielle Heller’s drama show us about him that Morgan Neville’s documentary didn’t already?

This line of thought led me to a broader question. What form of film is more effective at exploring the ins and outs of a true subject: a documentary or a biopic? Are there certain parts of a subject’s psychological profile that are better suited to a fictionalized treatment? Are historical contexts better served for the journalistic approach of a doc? What can each form of film teach us about how we tell real-life stories? To tackle these questions, I decided to compare and contrast five real-life stories given both a documentary and biopic, and see which work is ultimately the most effective.

It’s time… for the Documentary vs. Biopic Battle Royale.

The Dog vs. Dog Day Afternoon

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Image via Cinedigm Entertainment Group

John Wojtowicz knew exactly who he was. And in The Dog, Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren’s co-directed documentary about him, we see Wojtowicz tell us exactly who he is in straight, blunt, often shocking detail. You likely know the main bullet points of his story — he robbed a New York City Bank to get enough money to pay for his gay lover’s sex change — from Sidney Lumet and Al Pacino’s masterpiece Dog Day Afternoon. But to hear Wojtowicz tell it himself, in an emotional tenor somewhere in between “an old buddy telling war stories” and “a monster about to rip your fucking head off,” makes for a captivating, complicated viewing experience. Wojtowicz will tell you straight up that he’s a “pervert,” a hedonistic man who marries multiple people of different gender and sexual orientations and refers to him all as his “wife”, just before telling you he’s a “Goldwater conservative” who was happy to go to war. He flips through wild, loaded statements with no regard for sensitivity. As a result, sometimes the raw power of what he’s saying gets inadvertently muted. It’s surprising to watch him be flippant about something raw the first few times — but then it just becomes “how he speaks.” Similarly, Berg and Keraudren’s lack of editorialization, a nice extension of their subject’s POV, causes some pacing issues in the last half, with moments flowing unnaturally into each other, and about six to ten different ending “buttons” in a row. Despite all this, I highly recommend The Dog. It’s utterly fascinating — and thanks to Berg and Keraudren’s thorough, ten-years-in-the-making approach, it turns not just into a rehash of one crime, but a treatise on New York, the burgeoning LGBTQ movement, mental health, sexual freedom, familial love, and the terrifying allure of fame.

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Image via Warner Bros.

It was interesting watching Dog Day Afternoon after The Dog, as so much of The Dog and Wojtowicz’s decisions are made in direct reaction to the cultural phenomenon of Dog Day Afternoon. Directed by film master Sidney Lumet and starring film master Al Pacino as the Wojtowicz avatar, the tense, real-time film narrows the broad scope of The Dog into the bank robbery and nothing more. At times, the film plays like a procedural thriller elevated by the mastery of craft of everyone involved (if you’re a David Fincher fan unfamiliar with this film, watch it posthaste). Pacino’s take on Wojtowicz (his character’s name is Sonny Wortzik; a brilliant first name choice, given that Sonny’s terrified, pleading eyes make him seem like a son in search of a father) is markedly different than the man I just got to know. Since Wojtowicz was given control of the narrative in The Dog, his brash confidence was placed front and center. Here, with a more objective camera from Lumet, we see Pacino often try and be confident, only to have his subconscious mannerisms betray him. Some moments did ring authentically Wojtowicz — the film takes care to mention Sonny’s status as a Vietnam vet and Goldwater conservative, and Sonny’s brief justification of his swearing (“I speak what I feel, you know?”) felt straight from Wojtowicz’s mouth. Whereas The Dog is explicitly interested in examining all of America, Dog Day Afternoon’s social temperature-taking occurs on the margins. When Sonny’s lover Leon (Chris Sarandon) arrives to speak on the phone with Sonny, he’s framed front and center — but behind him, out of focus, is a homophobic cop laughing. Ultimately, Lumet’s film shows what Wojtowicz himself was likely afraid to show. Lumet’s dedication to psychological and formal realism reveals a lot of truth that not even a documentary could muster.

Final Verdict: Dog Day Afternoon, for its masterful pacing, psychological objectivity, and rewatchability factor.

When We Were Kings vs. Ali

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Image via Gramercy Pictures

What do you first think of when you think of Muhammad Ali? There’s quite a lot to the man formerly known as Cassius Clay — his raw charisma, his loudly determinate activism, his mannerisms in the ring that can truly and accurately be described as floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee. All of this and more is on display in When We Were Kings, the Academy Award-winning documentary about Ali’s famed Rumble in the Jungle with then-heavyweight champion George Foreman. But when I think about Ali, I first think about the rope-a-dope. It’s a boxing tactic invented and perfected by the man, in which he lets his opponent land a bunch of early, minor hits and tire himself out. Then, Ali lands just a few blows and knocks the now-fatigued fighter to the ground. I find it fascinating — and I’ve never once seen it happen. When We Were Kings, directed and co-edited masterfully by Leon Gast, lets this moment happen in real time. And after a lean feature noted by its ruthless cutting of moments to the bone, watching Ali suddenly shift from defense to offense and knock down the heretofore unstoppable-seeming Foreman is astonishing. The rest of the movie astonishes, no doubt. But it’s all rendered in quick jabs, designed, perhaps, to tire the viewer out before its final blow. Gast is a master of the montage, blending images together with equal parts craft and casualness — at one point, he even merges two diegetic soundtracks together for maximum immersion/confusion. I found these moments to be incredibly effective — but when the film lands on more traditional talking heads (especially from the problematic, intellectual pontifications from Norman Mailer and George Plimpton), it does slow things down. Still, Nast yields oft-breathtaking results that even land hits on Ali himself. When Ali speaks of the joys of bringing black excellence like James Brown to Zaire in an attempt to remind African-Americans that being African is worth celebrating, it’s rightly captivating and inspiring. But when Gast reminds us, via his punchy editing, that this is all happening thanks to the funding of miserable dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, it forces the viewer to question the ethics of the whole affair — and even of watching the documentary itself.

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Image via Sony Pictures

In some ways, Michael Mann’s Ali, starring an Oscar-nominated Will Smith in the title role, plays like When We Were Kings stretched out into a moody, ambient-leaning slow motion. The opening 25ish minutes, in particular, borrow some of the wild usage of montage and music from the doc -- just with a lot less clarity, purpose, and immediate context. Mann stages a prolonged musical performance from Sam Cooke (David Elliott) and cuts between lots of disparate, in media res moments from Ali’s life. But if When We Were Kings cuts images to the bone, Ali cuts images and leaves a ton of meat, gristle, and fat -- and then refuses to tell you what kind of meat it is. Jamie Foxx’s entrance as cornerman Drew Bundini Brown is, in particular, nonsensical in its attempt to reach at high drama without any attempt at establishing a base reality. The word “reach” came to mind a lot while watching this film, especially in Smith’s performance. He is, no joke, one of my all-time favorite movie actors, and the idea of him teaming up with Mann to depict Ali (who publicly endorsed Smith) excited me to no end. But his take on the icon both reaches counterintuitively toward a sketch-like impression while also feeling strangely held back. Smith seems to be deciding to show no emotion in his face when playing Ali -- the moments of performance that do pop (like a lovely winter-set scene late in the picture) pop because Smith allows himself to actually emote and tap into what makes him naturally effective as a performer. And when Smith is forced abruptly into more traditionally written and staged “biopic scenes” (Ali and his dad fight! Ali says quotes we all know and love! Ali triumphs in the Rumble in the Jungle!), it feels less like a breath of fresh air and more like another bafflingly obtuse decision from Mr. Mann.

Final Verdict: When We Were Kings, handily, in the first round.

Man on Wire vs. The Walk

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Image via Magnolia Pictures

Man on Wire is electric. If you don’t consider yourself a fan of documentaries, this might be the one to make an exception for. Director James Marsh wisely structures and paces his film like a narrative heist picture, with an oft-intense score, interviews with “inside men,” and the meticulous description of a crackerjack plan. But the film certainly isn’t depicting your average heist of money or jewels, or any “object.” It depicts the heist of… air? Building ownership? Or is it actually an anti-heist? Not an attempt to take something, but an attempt to put a sense of love, romance, art, or whimsy into an otherwise neutral space? If I can’t exactly nail down Philippe Petit’s mission statement in erecting a wire across the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center and then walking across that wire, he certainly can. Marsh puts his subject at the center of the doc, and it yields delightful results. Petit is animated, intoxicating to listen to, and contagious in his enthusiasm. He discusses the most life-threatening, death-defying of stunts with ease and wonder. He’s a child in the best way, a person who thought of an inherently childlike idea and chose not to stifle his dreams with a dosage of “adult realities,” but to see it through no matter what. He even gets the notoriously gruff NYPD somewhat on his side — in some delightful archive footage, one cop delivers a press conference where he calls Petit a tightrope “dancer,” making sure to know that he’s not a “walker,” because what he’s doing is much more of a performance than just “walking.” You know what? If Petit can, for just one moment, turn the gruffest of gruff cops into an advocate for artistry and romanticism, than his wirewalk did its job and thensome.

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Image via Sony Pictures

The Walk is the Across the Universe version of Philippe Petit’s story. It’s a twee visual odyssey full of manufactured whimsy, overly romanticized pontificating on the importance of love and life, and a candy-coated view of what “France” is like. And… I think I lowkey loved it? I can’t lie to you -- many parts of this film are rough. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Petit with eerie blue eyes, a strange wig, and a truly bonkers take on a French accent that changes from scene-to-scene. He’s introduced speaking directly to camera from the Statue of Liberty, in a likely attempt to try and capture the raw appeal of the real Petit’s direct addresses in the documentary. But it is just a lot to take in at once, especially when coupled with Robert Zemeckis’ insistence on stuffing this staging -- and frankly, just about every sequence’s staging -- with show-offy, garish-on-purpose CGI. Zemeckis’ vision is “extra” throughout, with the elder statesmen of smart Hollywood spectacle (Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit) tapping into his unbridled inner child to try and find the sickly sweet core of Petit’s story. Ya want slick CGI-assisted one-take transitions? Ya want an Alan Silvestri score that slinks unsubtly with Cliff’s Notes versions of “jazz” and “France”? Ya want some of the most cartoonishly stupid cops ever committed to celluloid? You got it all and thensome. And yet, despite all of these objectively cringe-inducing contrivances -- or, in fact, because of them -- I grew to really enjoy the heck out of this picture. Was it Stockholm Syndrome? I’ll never be self-aware enough to know for sure. But the sheer glee of everyone involved -- and the straight-up fun of seeing the heist elements of the doc played out it full -- got me, goshdarnit. The film’s final moments alternate between visual splendor (that damn titular walk works, honey), quiet pathos (the last line and shot, especially), and out-and-out bonkers-ness (the damn bird is wild, honey). They’re an effective summary of the film’s charms and flaws, and make the case that the flaws are the charms.

Final Verdict: Man on Wire makes the walk much more handily, but I won’t stop thinking about The Walk’s oddness for some time.

Marwencol vs. Welcome to Marwen

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Image via The Cinema Guild

Marwencol is fascinating, heartbreaking, complicated, and beautiful. It made me cry at my desk! My coworkers were like, “Are you okay?” and I was like, “He’s just trying to deal with his feelings with dolls!” and they were like, “We don’t fully understand that thought out of context, but it’s good that you’re in touch with your feelings!” and I was like “Thank you!” Directed, edited, and produced by Jeff Malmberg, Marwencol tells the story of Mark Hogancamp, an alcoholic who was beat savagely outside of a bar when he drunkenly told his attackers he enjoyed cross-dressing. Hogancamp was in a coma for nine days as a result of the attack. When he awoke, he had barely any memories of his previous life. To cope with this horrifying trauma, he created a new world -- of dolls. Hogancamp repurposed Barbies, GI Joes, and other finds from his local hobby shop to create the town of Marwencol, a place home to symbols of Hogancamp himself, all of the important people in his life, and even his attackers. Hogancamp recontextualizes what he understands about his life (some of which is irrevocably changed or buried; he is no longer interested in alcohol after the attack) by staging these characters in World War II vignettes of military might, camaraderie, and good old-fashioned Nazi-killing. Or, at least, Hogancamp wants these vignettes to feel “good old-fashioned.” By turning his real-life attackers into cartoonish Nazis who are routinely decimated by the doll-Hogancamp and his allies, he is attempting to reclaim his identity, to literally conquer his trauma. But there’s so much buried inside of Hogancamp. It can’t be that simple. Sometimes it’s seen in brief bursts of bubbling anger by Malmberg’s stationary camera, sometimes it’s seen in Hogancamp’s Nazis torturing doll-Hogancamp in ways paralleling his real-life injuries. It’s tempting to read this documentary as a triumph of a man over his demons through art -- especially when we see his work featured in a swanky New York gallery -- but the truth is just so much more complicated. Hogancamp’s mission statement for his world is simple: “Everybody be friends with each other. Everybody got along. Nobody was against anybody else. Didn’t matter what clothing they wore.” While his art doesn’t make that statement 100% true for the world, or even his own world, it makes the case for the inspiring, present-tense, noble struggle of self-betterment in whatever way you need.

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Image via Universal Pictures

Welcome to Marwen is a freaking weird-ass movie. Not many people liked it upon its 2018 release — it has a scant 35% on Rotten Tomatoes and grossed a miserable $13 million worldwide off of a $39 million budget. But you know what? I’m happy to go to bat for this freaking weird-ass movie, this wildly idiosyncratic, tone-hopping, bonkers-CGI-assisted drama from Robert Zemeckis (was Zemeckis just binging documentaries lately?). I find the artistic decision to dive into the actual miniature world of Hogancamp’s creations to be inspired. Zemeckis’ take on Hogancamp (played by Steve Carrell, who’s not going for a direct impression but still finds notes not even seen in the doc) is that his reliance on fantasy is equal parts inspiring and inhibiting. As such, opening sequences in the world of Marwen (why lose the ‘col’? Who knows!) zip with crackling energy and fun, genre-skewing action and set pieces that remind you how good of a visual director Zemeckis is. But as the film goes on, these sequences become more and more menacing, filled with realities that Hogancamp just can’t get away from, and must reckon with. It’s an impressively unique rendering of a wholly unique journey. However — Zemeckis’ wild take on the material does yield some wonky, sometimes icky results. Zemeckis’ staging of Hogancamp’s attack — an out-and-out hate crime against a cross-dressing man — is loud and melodramatic, threatening to cross the line of tastefulness. In fact, much of the film’s real-world drama is “loud and melodramatic” when a gentler touch might yield better results, and pop more against the contrast of the fantasy world sequences (one sequence in a courtroom made me laugh out loud, and it was definitely not supposed to make me laugh out loud). Finally, while I understand that the film’s POV is subjective through Hogancamp’s eccentricities, some of the depiction of women is… not great! Which is interesting, because much of the hypersexualization and objectification (quite literally) of the women in Hogancamp’s story is also depicted in Marwencol, but didn’t bump me as being problematic. What was Zemeckis missing? What nuance about Hogancamp’s relationship with sex and sexuality did he accidentally smooth over?

Final Verdict: Marwencol is obviously superior -- but don’t count out Welcome to Marwen as an unorthodox dessert.

The Times of Harvey Milk vs. Milk

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Image via New Yorker Films

As a snapshot of LGBTQ history, an examination of systemic homophobia, a sobering reminder of how far we need to go, and an inspiring reminder of the powers of fighting hope, The Times of Harvey Milk is an essential watch. The content examined within needs to be disseminated and shared to everyone in America. It’s beyond important. Unfortunately, director Rob Epstein’s usage of form leaves a lot to be desired in modern eyes. It’s slowly-paced, gravely narrated by the legendary Harvey Fierstein, and relies a lot on the tired-and-true/Ken Burns formula of talking heads and panned in photos. In other words, it feels like an overly didactic, educational film. Its techniques work against the fiery charisma and active progressiveness of Harvey Milk, San Francisco’s first openly gay supervisor who was shot and killed by disgruntled supervisor Dan White. We get a lot of folks talking about the magnetism and unorthodox tactics of Milk, but it so often backslides into that classic storytelling maxim about telling not showing. When Epstein shifts primarily into a mode of archival footage about halfway through the film, its filmmaking quality ratchets up noticeably, matching its content with aplomb. And its content, I will reiterate, is absolutely necessary for everyone to experience -- we need this sobering reminder of violent homophobia, of social unrest, of the importance of representation, and of the need to keep fighting. But for too long, Epstein hampers his subject with an unnecessarily generic approach.

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Image via Focus Features

An Oscar-winner for its leading actor (Sean Penn) and screenwriter (Dustin Lance Black), Milk is, on paper, your average milquetoast prestige picture — a work Cleve Jones (Emile Hirsch) might call a “bourgeois affectation.” And yet, the film succeeds handsomely — thanks in part to director Gus Van Sant’s no-frills brand of formal integrity. While the color palate of the work is beautifully stylized, the rest of the film simply frames its actors in clean compositions and lets them act. It gives the work a sense of immediacy you’d find in a documentary while subtly promising the audience they’re in controlled, masterful hands. And Black’s work absolutely devastates with its casual authenticity. His screenplay, thankfully, allows Milk’s inherently tragic story to retain a sense of life, vitality, and humor. Its psychological focus is remarkably nuanced when it comes to Milk himself. While we often see him in an exterior, public role (like his beyond powerful campaign speeches or parade appearances), I found the quieter, more private moments where Milk forces a smile even with himself or closest friends to be the most revealing -- and the scene in which he finds the body of Jack Lira (Diego Luna) is utterly devastating. If I have one criticism of Black’s screenplay, it would be the too-neatness in its examinations of Dan White’s (Josh Brolin) murderous actions as being the result of his closeted gayness. White’s real-life actions were chaotic acts of terror, and I applaud Black’s decision to try and render a recognizable pattern out of chaos. But the “they’re gay themselves!” justification of homophobic behavior can feel overly reductive at best, and insensitively sympathy-inducing at worst.

Final Verdict: Milk, for its mastery of craft and ability to translate Milk’s humanity -- but the historical context afforded by the documentary cannot be ignored.