Directed by: Heidi Ewing, Alex Gibney, Seth Gordon, Rachel Grady, Eugene Jarecki, and Morgan Spurloc
MPAA rated PG-13 for elements of violence, sexuality/nudity, drugs, and brief strong language
Genre: Documentary
Review by Alyn Darnay
Back in 2005, University of Chicago economist Steven Levitt and New York Times journalist Stephen J. Dubner teamed-up to write a book called Freakonomics. They covered a wide-range of topics in an attempt to demonstrate that statistics and figures can be used to allow us to look sideways at things previously accepted as fact. The book became wildly popular and by 2009 there were over 4 million copies in circulation worldwide. If you’ve read the book you know its perspective on our world is as entertaining as it is educational and enlightening; so is this documentary.
Although a lot of the film’s content does come directly from the book, the way in which the filmmakers choose to visually interpret the material makes the concepts in the book appear even more compelling and more fascinating, while the interviews and perspectives presented become more believable because they are, well…real.
Divided into 4 segments and held together by explanations from the book’s authors, the film clicks along at a nice pace moving from one story to another. Just as the book did, Freakonomics again attempts to investigate human behavior from a different perspective; how a person’s first name can dictate success in life, how the thought-to-be sacred world of Japanese sumo wrestling can contain corruption and still be respected, how an extraordinary drop in the crime rate during the 1990s can be explained in human terms, and how cash incentives can be used to motivate underachieving students in a Chicago public school. All fascinating stuff and all compellingly presented.
As you watch the film unfold, presented through the diverse styles of these six directors, you’re constantly entertained and amused, and always involved in the concepts and action. But then again, you wouldn’t expect less from this dream team of highly acclaimed documentarians.
I don’t generally rush out to see documentaries, but liked this one a lot. It held my attention from start to finish and left me wanting more. You’ll find Freakonomics highly entertaining and in the same sideways manner it projects its topics.
Rating: 4 Stars (out of 5)
Guest Writer Alyn Darnay is an accomplished director, actor and script writer.