Doc Watch: Old Ways

HOLBROOK/TWAIN: AN AMERICAN ODYSSEY (B) -  This is a surprisingly fond and tender tribute to the old-world traditions of the theater. Here we tag along with Hal Holbrook, who just turned 90, on a recent tour of his one-man show about Mark Twain that he's been performing for six decades.

Lusciously photographed in black-and-white by Scott Teems (who directed Holbrook in "That Evening Sun"), "Odyssey" celebrates both Holbrook and Twain as American treasures. Holbrook opens up quite a bit -- not surprising for an elderly actor -- about not only his craft but also his personal life. We get the requisite reckoning with his neglected children, plus particularly poignant recollections of his last wife, the actress Dixie Carter, the memory of whom makes Holbrook mist up as he can't help comparing their teamwork to that of Huck and Jim from Twain's landmark novel.

Teems dwells a bit too long in the second half on Holbrook's tales of his tours of the South during the civil rights era, but the extended segment is not without its payoff. Celebrities, including Annie Potts and a smug (what else?) Sean Penn don't add much to the proceedings. Teems is generous with excerpts from not only the recent stage performance but archived clips, including the 1967 Emmy-winning TV special.

What does stick are the intimate details of Holbrook's backstage life and the intricacies of the simple production, including interactions with his support crew. Holbrook is meticulous with his notes from each performance, stretching back decades, intent on not repeating his material in each town he visits.

But it's the images, lovingly captured that make this otherwise routine documentary a little special. You see an octogenarian put on his fat suit and Twain pants, as he soldiers along on his life's mission. There's an authenticity to it that seems to have gone out of style.

LITTLE WHITE LIE (C+) - Running about an hour, this biographical tale of a Jewish woman investigating her never-acknowledged black roots feels undercooked but almost right for a TV time slot. (It is airing and streaming on PBS.)

Lacey Schwartz had a middle-class Jewish upbringing, bat mitzvah and all, in Woodstock, N.Y., but it had long been obvious that she had a unique look that didn't match that of the rest of her family. Her dark complexion and kinky hair were officially attributed to an Italian grandfather. Families, of course, specialize in deflection and denial, and here the unspoken secret was that her mother's "friend," a black man who ran city recreation programs, was highly suspected of being Lacey's father.

Schwartz, directing herself (with help from James Adolphus), never brings full dimension to the story. It sits flat on the screen, and the "reveal" here is hardly a mystery. She doesn't extract deep emotion or observations from either of her parents or her biological father. She fails to connect fully with either her Jewish relatives or the newfound black ones, as if few of them wanted to be a part of this project.

"Little White Lie" lacks the heft and horror of more mature documentaries that rip bandages from gaping family wounds, such as "Capturing the Friedmans." Nor does it have the elegance of a drama like "Ida." It's a good story, but as a film it feels half-finished.