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Load of rubbish!!

An action-packed slog

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

This is another one of those documentaries that should that teach young filmmakers to leave themselves out of their own flicks. No matter how compelling the story, people don't appreciate hearing about how the writer/director himself is a great man simply for stumbling upon a story and having the ability ask questions. An example of my main problem with this film is the three minutes of the director getting stood up in Las Vegas. Three minutes later there's a lengthy montage of the subject telling us how great the director is--he feigns humility by pretending to protest her praise AND INCLUDES IT IN THE FILM!"Girl 27" is very much like "Cropsey," which should have been called "A Pair of Failures (Who, with Better Looks, Would have been Actors or, with More Investigative Skills, Detectives, but have Sadly Fallen into the Business of Boogieman Speculation Documentary) Running Around, Pushing Doorbells, Getting Jerked Around, and Ultimately Concluding Nothing." This is not to say that I expect anyone to actually SOLVE a mystery or tie up all of the facts with a nice little bow right before the credits hit, either. But I never throw on a documentary hoping to see the filmmakers throwing tantrums and getting upset when they hit a dead end. We're not all holding our breaths in anticipation of an interview that never happens, just because it's a monumental moment in the otherwise unremarkable life of a loser with a camera.This is one of those films where the director tries to associate themselves with a history that they had nothing to do with. After the trite Bible cliché to open the film (please folks, this overused even more than the opening line, "When I was a child, I used to dream that..."), the first voice we hear and the first interview we see is the director's. And he's making a case for the importance of HIS unearthing this story--even Greta Van Susteren hadn't heard of it! Jackie O. gave HIM a mandate! I found the director instantly off-putting, but because of the subject matter I continued watching like I did with "Intangible Asset No. 82." (Like "I.A. #82" this filmmaker goes to great lengths to tell you how little information exists on the topic before he proceeds to waste minute after minute of needless, self-inflating face-time.) This guy interviews people but inexplicably you hear him talking more than the interviewees. Directors should leave themselves out of their documentaries. I would say that the only exception should be when the filmmaker is an activist/advocate in the Michael Moore vein or when the draw of the filmmaker would increase awareness (as with "An Inconvenient Truth").Filmmakers: learn from "Brother's Keeper," "Romántico," "Man on Wire," "Marwencol," The Thin Blue Line," "Shotguns and Accordions," "Panama Deception," "You can't be Neutral," and other films that care more about the dignity and the humanity of the topic rather than with trying to entertain a mass Dateline-style audience.That this film is so formulaic isn't what's so egregious. I'm not rating this film based on the original music that could have been the soundtrack to 100 different mainstream documentaries over the last decade... [...It does seem that the higher-profile documentaries ("Freakonomics," "Client 9," "Food Inc.," "Casino Jack," "Plunder") don't teach you anything that you didn't already know if you cared at all about any of the topics. They're like the movie-form of a Wikipedia page. I don't really understand why people leave out facts and context that they try to squeeze onto DVD extras because the running time has been taken up with clips from Jimmy Stewart movies and montages conceived with classic rock song titles in mind. Films such as these seem to me more like a "Steal This Movie" or "Son of Sam" kind of biopic without professional actors. But by simply relating the story in "Girl 27" we are provided with more than we ever knew before, so a less-egoistic writer/director had the potential to make a very enlightening work.]...I also don't fault the writer/director for feeling a connection to the story that they are making--I WANT them to care intensely. But, filmmakers, if the subject matter is truly noteworthy and you are concerned about the running time of the film, I can't help but think that the cause you are fighting for (and the viewing audience) are better served by your not making a movie about you making a movie about some other person.

I have rather mixed feelings about this movie. It brings up an interesting, forgotten scandal, which I give it credit for. But I felt the movie was always straining a little too hard to be interesting, as though the filmmaker knew he really only had a 40-minute short but was determined to get a feature length film out of it.The movie is a mix of a documentary about the rape and a documentary about uncovering the rape, and I found that an interesting, fairly successful approach. The various film clips range from relevant to flippant. The filmmaker's worst instincts came out during the interviews with the victim. Tossing in film clips earlier made a certain amount of sense, but doing the same thing during her painful answers felt gimmicky and insensitive and just took away from the power of the scene. Sometimes you have to be willing to let a person or a situation speak for itself, but that doesn't happen in this movie.

This is in response to mravenwud's comment. You say that "girls are incredibly naive about men's sexuality" and that "they should not let themselves be left alone EVER in a place where there are men drinking". Why are you placing the blame for what happened to Patricia Douglas on her own shoulders? Are you saying that men are all naturally rapists, and that if women don't guard themselves carefully, they can expect to be violated? That does a disservice to both men and women, in my opinion.Attitudes like this are part of the reason why it is so heartbreakingly difficult, even today, for people who have been raped to come forward with their stories. Patricia Douglas didn't do anything wrong. She didn't "let herself" get raped-- she WAS raped.

GIRL 27 follows writer David Stenn in his search for vanished 1937 rape victim Patricia Douglas. To watch this elderly woman -- with fierce wit and total recall -- break seven decades of self- imposed silence and give the only on-camera interview of her life is just jaw-dropping. You won't forget her, even though MGM tried ruthlessly to make sure the world did. Also loved all the ultra-rare film clips (some unseen since the 1930s) and inclusion of other hushed-up MGM scandals. The depth of research is staggering here -- Stenn proves every point with eyewitness accounts or damning documentation. Not sure why another post claims Stenn hijacks the film, since he disappears once Patricia Douglas is found. (And give the guy a break, "Cool As Ice" was directed by David Kellogg and shot by Janusz Kaminski, so they've all done better since...) Don't miss this one. I'm still haunted by it.