The Documentary Film Group, better known as Doc Films, is a student-operated film society at the University of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is—according to a 2007 Chicago Tribune article—"the longest-running collegiate film society in the country" and may be the oldest film society of any kind in the United States.^[1][2] Formed in 1932 as a group of students who gathered to screen documentary films, it officially adopted the name International House Documentary Film Group in 1940. It has since expanded both the genres it screens and the activities it sponsors.

History[link]

Doc Films began in 1932 as the Documentary Film Group, as the students involved collected money to foot the bill for screening documentaries.^[3][4] In 1940, it officially became the International House Documentary Film Group",^[5] and by 1950, when an auditorium was in use for screening films, was already being hailed as "probably the oldest U.S. film society" by Film News.^[2]

Activities[link]

As the student organizers realized that they could not sustain the organization on documentaries alone, they expanded to incorporate fictional and experimental films. While the University's classes are in session, Doc Films hosts nightly screenings of films selected from one of these categories at Max Palevsky Cinema, located in Ida Noyes Hall. Doc's screening selection is eclectic. Each quarter of the academic year, students and members of the public propose series of ten films that are somehow related to each other (filmmaker, actor, language, genre, era, theme, etc.). The Programming Committee, which consists of any interested students or members of the public, then chooses among these proposals to schedule a different series for each weeknight (Sunday through Thursday). Recent films, normally delayed one quarter from their nationwide release date, are shown on weekends. Occasionally, Doc screens films which have not yet been released to the general public in the area, including The Rules of the Game and Brokeback Mountain.

Other events include showings of student films and conversations with faculty and professionals connected to the film industry. It has hosted a number of film directors, including Alfred Hitchcock, Woody Allen and John Ford.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Video profile from The University of Chicago
• Current calendar
• Database of Films shown 1936-2008

Look up doc or DOC in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

DOC, Doc or doc may refer to:

Media[link]

• Doc (TV series), a 2001-2004 PAX series
• Doc (1975 TV series), a 1975-1976 CBS sitcom
• "D.O.C." (Lost), a television episode
• Doc Films, a University of Chicago film society
• Doc (film), a 1971 Western film
• Documentary Organization of Canada, known as DOC, is a non-profit organization supporting documentary filmmakers in Canada

Computing[link]

• DOC (computing), a word processing file format, typically used by Microsoft Word.
• DiskOnChip, a type of flash memory device
• Dave's own version of Citadel, a bulletin board software variant

Food and wine appellations[link]

• Denominazione di origine controllata, an Italian level of classification
• Denominação de Origem Controlada, a Portuguese level of classification
• Denominación de Origen Calificada, a Spanish level of classification

People[link]

"Doc" is a common slang term for a physician; dentist; or, in the US Military, a Hospital Corpsman.

• Doc Blanchard (1924-2009), American football player and fighter pilot
• Doc Brown (rapper), British rapper and comedian
• Doc Hammer, American musician and writer of The Venture Bros
• Doc Holliday (1851-1887), American dentist, gunfighter, and gambler
• Doc Medich (b. 1948), American baseball player
• Doc Neeson (b. 1947), Irish-born Australian rock singer
• Doc Pomus (1925-1991), American blues singer and songwriter
• Doc Rivers (b. 1961), American basketball player and coach
• Doc Searls (b. 1947), journalist and author
• Doc Severinsen (b. 1927), American trumpeter and bandleader
• Doc Shaw (b. 1992), American actor, singer and rapper
• Doc Watson (b. 1923), American musician and songwriter
• A.A. Ames (1842-1911), American politician
• Mike Emrick (b. 1946), American hockey broadcaster
• Dwight Gooden (b. 1964), American baseball player
• Roy Halladay (b. 1977), American baseball player
• Harold L. Humes (1926-1992), American writer and activist
• Donald Minnegan (1902-2002), former coach and athletic director at Towson University
• Donncha O'Callaghan (b. 1979), Irish rugby union footballer
• Krzysztof Raczkowski (1970-2005), musician
• E. E. Smith (1890-1965), American science fiction writer
• The D.O.C., American rapper

Fictional characters[link]

• Doc (Buffyverse), a character in Buffy the Vampire Slayer
• Doc (Chrono Cross)
• Doc (G.I. Joe), two characters in the G.I. Joe universe
• Doc (cartoon character), an animated cat introduced by Walter Lantz Studios in 1959
• Doc Daneeka, a character in the novel Catch-22
• Doc Hudson, a character in the film Cars
• Doc Louis, a character in the video game series Punch-Out!!
• Doc Savage, a character in pulp fiction
• Emmett Brown, a scientist from Back to the Future
• Monte 'Doc' Parker, a character in the series Third Watch
• Doc, a character in the series Fraggle Rock
• Doc, a character in the series Red vs. Blue
• Doc, a character in the film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (generally considered to be the head dwarf, as he leads them from the diamond mine home and makes the decision to allow Snow White to become their resident housekeeper)
• Doc Saturday, a character in the series The Secret Saturdays
• Doc Boy, a character from the Garfield series

Medicine[link]

• DOC, an abbreviation for drug of choice in pharmacology
• DOC, an abbreviation for either of two different drugs:
  • 11-Deoxycorticosterone, a steroid hormone, or
  • 2,5-Dimethoxy-4-chloroamphetamine, a psychedelic amphetamine

Other uses[link]

• Dartmouth Outing Club
• Day-old cockerel, a term in falconry
• Department of Conservation (New Zealand)
• Department of Corrections (various)
• United States Department of Commerce
• Diesel Oxidation Catalyst, a diesel retrofit system for automobiles
• Dissolved organic carbon, a molecule classification
• Doc (mascot), the Towson University mascot
• Dominion of Canada
• Dóc, a village in Csongrád County, Hungary
• Dóc, the Hungarian name for Dolaţ village, Livezile Commune, Timiş County, Romania
• ISO 639-3 code for the North Dong language or dialect

See also[link]

• Dock (disambiguation)
• Documentation

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Oscar-nominated Joseph "Joe" Berlinger (born October 30, 1961) is an American documentary film-maker who, in collaboration with Bruce Sinofsky, has created such films as Paradise Lost about the West Memphis 3, Brother's Keeper, Some Kind of Monster, and Crude.

In collaboration with journalist Greg Milner, Berlinger has also written a book called Metallica: This Monster Lives, which is about his journey from making the poorly received Blair Witch 2 to creating Some Kind of Monster with Metallica, one of the world's most famous metal bands.

Berlinger has also worked on TV series such as Homicide: Life on the Street, D.C. and FanClub.

The first movie Berlinger directed, in 1992, was the documentary Brother's Keeper, which tells the story of Delbart Ward, an elderly man in Munnsville, New York, who was charged with second-degree murder following the death of his brother William. Chicago Tribune film critic Roger Ebert, in his review of the movie, called it "an extraordinary documentary about what happened next, as a town banded together to stop what folks saw as a miscarriage of justice."

He graduated from Colgate University in 1983.^[1] He lives with his wife and daughters in New York.

After spending $1.3 million dollars on legal fees over footage for his documentary "Crude," Berlinger expressed concerns about being able to make documentaries about legal cases in the future.^[2]

Paradise Lost[link]

Berlinger is best known for the breakthrough film series "Paradise Lost," which documents the murder trial and the subsequent legal battles of three teenagers wrongfully convicted of murder. The community of West Memphis, Arkansas believed that the three teenagers (known as the West Memphis Three) murdered three eight-year-old boys as part of a Satanic ritual, even though no physical evidence linked the three young men to the crime. The "Paradise Lost" film series documents the 17-year ordeal of these three young men from arrest to conviction to years of unsuccessful appeals and finally to a successful appeal.^[3]

The film series brought mainstream attention to the case, and many celebrities took up the cause of getting these young men out of prison and getting Damien Echols off of death row. The mainstream attention, brought on by the documentary series, allowed for a well-financed legal team to investigate every lead in the case. These subsequent investigations showed the incompetence of the West Memphis police, who had never dealt with this type of crime, and so the police let other suspects disappear from the community; for example, a man covered in blood used a restroom in a restaurant within walking distance of the murder scene shortly after the time of the murders.^[4] In addition to the failure to apprehend the suspect, the police lost the blood samples, even though this strange man left blood all over the bathroom. This mistake meant that the experts could never determine if this strange man was covered in the vicitims' blood.

Ultimately, the defense team hired DNA experts to test genetic material after fighting the prosecution for years to get access to it, and these tests again proved that no physical evidence linked the West Memphis Three to the murders; rather, a hair from one boy's stepfather was found tied into one of the shoelaces used to hogtied the victims.^[5]

See also[link]

Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky

List of Colgate University people

References[link]

External links[link]

• Discussion and Information Forum
• Joe Berlinger at the Internet Movie Database
• Chicago Tribune review of My Brother's Keeper

This biographical article related to cinema of the United States is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e