NYC Movie Guru – Review

This timely, honest and compelling documentary follows the experiences of First Lieutenant Michael T. Scotti in the U.S. Marines during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Michael took a home video camera and shot lots of footage throughout his deployment overseas from Kuwait...

The Film Chair – Review

Severe Clear (2009)–***1/2 Tomorrow may be your last chance to see Severe Clear in a theater when the film screens at LA’s Archlight Cinemas as part of IDA’s 13th Annual DocuWeeks showcase.  I’ve sat on the a DVD screener of the film for a couple weeks now, partly...

IFC.com – Review

By Matt Zoller Seitz on 07/30/2009 “I Am a Camera” could be an alternate title for Kristian Fraga’s “Severe Clear.” This documentary about one Marine’s experience in Iraq is opening for a one-week Oscar-qualifying run at New York’s IFC Center (it’s part of DocuWeeks...

Palm Beach Arts Paper – Review

by Hap Erstein Severe Clear (12 pm Sunday, Movies of Delray; 12 pm Monday, Lake Worth Playhouse): By now, there have been so many documentaries on the Iraq War, it seems difficult to approach the subject with a fresh cinematic perspective. But that is what director...

Spout – Review

Severe Clear is the Iraq documentary I’ve been awaiting conscientiously if not eagerly. There certainly hasn’t been a shortage of retrospective examinations from a position of authority – e.g. the macrocosmic No End In Sight and the microfocused Standard Operating...

indieWIRE – Review

by Eric Kohn Kristian Fraga’s “Severe Clear” breaks free of the “Iraq war movie” stigma by remaining essentially apolitical. The movie exclusively relies on cheap camcorder footage shot by U.S. soldier Mike Scotti during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, offering a...