Doc Watch: R.I.P., Nicky Winton

NICKY'S FAMILY (C-minus) -- In memory of Nicholas Winton, who died this week at 106, we finally got around to streaming the documentary celebrating his efforts in 1939 of shepherding more than 600 Jewish Czech children to safety, rescuing them from almost certain death after Hitler's invasion in a series of train journeys.

Unfortunately, this documentary -- if you can call it that, laden as it is with endless re-enactments -- is a mess. At more than 100 minutes, it is about twice as long as it needs to be. It starts with a 15-minute primer on the origins of World War II, which plays like it was written for schoolchildren. With this all you need is "Hitler, Jews -- Go." The final 15 minutes is also redundant, as we're shown example after example of the current generation paying the good deeds forward.

But it's the re-enactments that sink this as they dominate the middle hour of the film. They are clunky and corny, clashing with the archival footage as the filmmakers aim to portray Winton as the ultimate selfless saint. It's telling that a clip from a 1988 British TV show -- in which Winton's secret was revealed and he was reunited with many of the rescued kids now grown to middle age -- evokes the movie's only real emotional reaction. The documentary's gimmicks, by contrast, distract from the historical significance of Winton's heroic actions.

This is a noble effort -- it is hosted by one of the Prague survivors -- but it plays like cheesy TV trash.

INDUSTRIAL SOUNDTRACK FOR THE URBAN DECAY (C-minus) - This rather odd documentary about the roots of industrial music emanating from England in the late 1970s and early '80s barely scratches the surface of the subject matter.

It's only 52 minutes long and -- nearly fatally -- it features no live music on the soundtrack. It consists almost entirely of studio recordings -- in the background of talking head interviews and playing over crude footage of live performances.

We check in with the middle-age versions of the blokes and ladies behind such bands as Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, NON, SPK and Re/Search, including Genesis P. Orridge, Boyd Rice, Stephen Mallinder and Graeme Revell (now renowned for scoring films). They tell wonderful stories of growing up dirt poor in industrial towns like Sheffield and absorbing the sounds from factories and other clanking venues, incorporating it into their post-punk sound. One interviewee describes his tools of the trade as the debris of society.

It's a shame that the filmmakers (newcomers Travis Collins and Amelie Ravalec) neuter the music by compartmentalizing it into random ambient sounds. They also are hindered by serious audio dropouts in some of their interviews, which makes those working-class accents difficult to make out from under the muffled drone of their songs.

This is a basic primer on the fascinating subterranean industrial scene, which awaits a fuller, more polished documentary.