CAPTURING JARECKI: This evening I had the chance to attend a Q&A with Andrew Jarecki, director of the fine documentary "Capturing the Friedmans." The film, for those of you unfamiliar with it, concerns the tribulations of a family in Great Neck, Long Island after the father and one of the sons were accused of multiple counts of child molestation in the late '80s. The film is full of twists, including that the family had shot dozens of hours of home-video footage of their arguments, that one of the sons now works as one of New York's most popular birthday-party circus clowns, and that while the father was undoubtedly a pedophile, he and his son may very well have been innocent of the charges against them.
Jarecki who also, oddly enough, founded Moviefone, was an engaging and charming speaker, who showed clips from the DVD's voluminous bonus disc and later answered questions about the fascinating case. Jarecki was clear that he did not make the film as an advocacy piece, putting him directly at odds with the crusading and self-indulgent documentarian duo of Nick Broomfield and Michael Moore. He name-checked "Fog of War" director Errol Morris as his leading influence, and the two ironically are against each other in this year's Best Documentary Oscar category.