Written by Bamboo
Shot in the Dark is a very well done documentary by Adrian Grenier (before he starred on HBO’s Entourage) about what it means to be a father. The film starts as a series of interviews with random people in New York, as well as Adrian’s friends and family members. Adrian has not seen his father in over eighteen years. He feels as though he doesn’t know what it means to have a father or how he should feel about not having a father around while he was growing up. Adrian hopes to gain some insight through this documentary.
It’s fascinating to see how Adrian’s perspective seems to change throughout the documentary as he conducts interviews with people and family. There is one scene that appears to be an accidental phone call to his father that I really liked. When finally seeing and interacting with his father face to face after nearly two decades, Adrian seems much more accepting of the concept of being a family and having a father.
Video
Aspect ratio is full frame. The documentary is shot with a single video camera as a series of interviews. Quality isn’t very good at times, somewhat shaky camera work, but overall you see what you need to.
Audio
Audio is English 2.0 or Spanish 2.0. It’s easy to hear most of the way through the interviews; however, there are a few phone conversations that are difficult to hear and some parts have background noise. Overall, for what it is, the audio is okay.
Special Features
Audio Commentary: Make sure to watch this after seeing the movie; some parts are given away as you listen to the commentary. It is worth watching, very interesting to hear how they found some of the people they interviewed.
Behind the scenes of the “You Drive Me Crazy” music video: Three minutes long, shows Adrian behind the scenes in a music video (a part he got while making his documentary).
Are you my Daddy?: Four minutes long. Adrian goes to see his friend John, who was with him while making the documentary. This takes place ten years later, and John is now a dad.
10 years later: Updates via Skype: It was omitted in the documentary that Adrian’s father had adopted two daughters; in this extra you get to see him with them. Updates, filmed during winter 2011, where you see Adrian on Skype talking with his now much older sisters and father, runs about three minutes. There is a second section here where you see video chat with Bob and his mother Karesse, also lasting about 3 minutes. They talk about being married. Shot with an iphone 4.
Final Thoughts
I found this documentary very interesting. The project was conducted very well, the interviews are great, and it made me think about my experiences with my father growing up. I think it’s worth a watch.
