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Day 13 @ MSPIFF 2015: 'I Touched All Your Stuff' Reviewed

When press notes compare a documentary to Errol Morris, what does that typically tell you as a viewer? Does it suggest that you're going to see a film that digs like a termite at its subject? Does it suggest to you a seamless blend of interview footage and dramatic recreation? Does it promise oddball topics presented via relatively straightforward reportage? (Or does it say to you the PR team doesn't trust anyone to know Morris from Michael Moore, Frederick Wiseman, Alex Gibney, Les Blank, Laura Poitras, Jenni Olson, Werner Herzog, Morgan Spurlock, or Kirby Dick?)

As it turns out, the new documentary I Touched All Your Stuff does have overtones of Morris, specifically his recent documentary Tabloid, a knowingly salacious examination of the strange case of Joyce McKinney. Like McKinney, Christopher Kirk is a slippery subject. While incarcerated in South America, he tells directors Maíra Bühler and Matias Mariana about how he ended up embroiled in a long-distance love affair.

Why's he in prison? Why did he trust "V"? What's this all leading up to? Like with Tabloid, the ride seems a little bit more interesting than the actual subject matter and outcome. In the Morris film, one almost sensed him making a point that anything can be made prurient via the tricks of the medium. Bühler and Mariana, on the other hand, seem more focused on stressing the boundaries of fact and fiction, and the narratives we construct for our own purposes. (Shades of Sarah Polley's Stories We Tell, actually.)

Still, you've got to admire how much material they mine from very limited resources. And, like him or not, Kirk makes for a very compelling interview subject. I just wouldn't trust him with a nickel, is all.

I Touched All Your Stuff is playing at 9:40 p.m.

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Results
(credit: Magnolia Pictures)

More Highlights For Wednesday, April 21

The Cut (Fatih Akin, Germany) Director Fatih Akin's Head-On and The Edge of Heaven were both comparative hits in America, so far as international cinema tends to do here, so the third installment of the ersatz trilogy ought to be a no-brainer for many fest-goers. (6:30 p.m.)

Results (Andrew Bujalski, USA) Confession: I never much cared for the cinema of Andrew Bujalski (i.e. the man who will go to the grave trying to shake the word "mumblecore" from his shoulders) until Computer Chess. Following that blazingly original comedy, I'm first in line to see what he's doing next. (7:15 p.m.)

A Hard Day (Kim Seong-hun, South Korea) All reviews suggest this darkly comedic South Korean thriller is a cult classic just waiting to happen. Hong Sang-soo alum Lee Sun-kyun stars as a homicide detective who endures a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. (10 p.m.)

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For the festival schedule, and a complete listing of all the movies being shown, click here. Ticket information is available here.

Throughout the entirety of the 2015 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival, WCCO.com will be spotlighting one notable movie each day, along with other notable screenings. To see WCCO.com's complete coverage on the MSPIFF, click here.

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