Documentaries find home on cable; Four of five Oscar nominees have pay-channel roots

For all the media coverage of this year's Academy Awards, this will probably be the only story you read about documentaries. And that's a shame, because this happens to be the golden age of documentary films. There are more of them being made than ever, by some of the most creative directors in the history of the genre. And thanks to cable TV, you and I are able to watch more "docs" than ever. Some of the best are even nominated for Oscars. But most are not. Truth be told, the motion picture academy treats documentaries like a red-headed stepchild and has done so for years. The Oscars have snubbed some of the era's most innovative and important docmakers, including Michael Moore, Errol Morris and Judith Helfand. In 1995, Roger Ebert led an angry mob of reviewers demanding justice when "Hoop Dreams," a beautifully made account of two inner-city basketball prodigies, and arguably the most successful and acclaimed documentary ever, failed to earn an Oscar nomination. It was charged, but never proven, that the old-school types on the committee shut off the film after 10 minutes. After that fiasco, reforms were promised. And indeed, Ebert says, "The selection process at least seems improved." But he and other critics feel the committee's tastes remain stuck in the past. As proof, they point to "Fast, Cheap and Out of Control." This brilliantly idiosyncratic documentary was a critical and box office hit for Errol Morris in 1997 but wasn't even nominated for an Oscar. If there's one party that's thrilled by the academy's documentary tastes, it's HBO. This year, four of the five Oscar nominations went to docs produced for HBO and its sister channel, Cinemax. (Though they qualified as 2001 films, they won't air until later this year.) The two channels combined will air 120 hours of new documentary film this year, including HBO's popular "America Undercover" series (9 p.m. Sundays). Unlike HBO, Robert Redford's Sundance Channel doesn't produce documentary films. But it also has assumed a leadership role in promoting the genre. In a typical month it airs two dozen different nonfiction titles, including a classic every Monday night at 8, such as Barbara Kopple's "Harlan County U.S.A." (about Kentucky coal miners) and Frederick Wiseman's "The Store" (a day at Neiman Marcus). Earlier this year, Redford announced plans to launch an all-documentaries channel by 2003. Thanks largely to HBO and Sundance, "cable has evolved into the natural home of docs," Ebert says. That's great news for people who do much of their movie-watching on the small screen. About 85 percent of U.S. homes receive either cable or satellite TV, and one in three get HBO. Public television has also stepped up its support of documentary films in recent years. Best known for the decidedly middle-of-the-road fare of Ken Burns, public TV was home to the pathbreaking 1970s film "An American Family" and routinely airs the work of Frederick Wiseman, who is considered one of our greatest living filmmakers. The PBS series "American Experience" recently expanded its schedule and is starting to add documentaries by outsiders. One of the first to air will be "Daughter From Danang," winner of the top prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Risky business "Daughter From Danang" is a good example of what sets documentary films apart from run-of-the-mill TV "documentary" fare. It was risky to make because it did not follow a predictable storyline and did not tie up neatly at the end. Filmmakers Gail Dolgin and Vicente Franco heard about a young woman who was born in Vietnam but raised in Tennessee by an adoptive mother. The woman had recently contacted her birth mother and was planning a trip to Vietnam to see her. The woman agreed to let Dolgin and Franco accompany her. The filmmakers weren't sure what they would come back with; Dolgin imagined, at worst, they'd make a 20-minute short film. Mother and daughter had a tearful reunion, yet Franco said he "had this sixth sense" of strains resting just beneath the surface. As the week in Danang played out, those tensions began bubbling up - and then they erupted. The 20-minute short quickly mushroomed into a feature-length documentary with extraordinary emotional depth and power. "You dream of experiences like this," Dolgin said. "You go expecting one thing, but just like real life, you have to abandon your expectations." "Daughter From Danang" will air on PBS in early 2003. It also will be eligible for the Oscars next year, assuming PBS can break HBO's strangehold on the docs category. To reach Aaron Barnhart, phone (816) 234-4790 or visit the TV Barn Web site at www.tvbarn.com The Oscar nominees The nominees for Best Documentary Feature and their airdates: "Murder on a Sunday Morning": (see description in story). (HBO, March 31) "LaLee's Kin: The Legacy of Cotton": Susan Froemke and Deborah Dickson detail an impoverished family in the Mississippi Delta and how the legacy of slavery affects them. (HBO, May 12) "Children Underground": Filmmaker Edet Belzberg followed five of an estimated 20,000 abandoned Romanian children for more than a year as they tried to live in a subway. (Cinemax, July) "War Photographer": Swiss filmmaker Christian Frei spent two years following American photographer James Nachtwey. Nachtwey talks about the horrors he has seen as he captures more war images from the Middle East and Kosovo. (HBO/Cinemax, TBA) "Promises": The story of seven bright youngsters, four Israelis and three Palestinians. Filmmaker B.Z. Goldberg made it during relatively peaceful times between 1997 and 2000, but the children still talk poignantly about war, religion and how they view each other. (No airdate) @ART CAPTION:With hope and a piece of vinyl siding in hand, Judith Helfand visits vinyl makers in search for answers about polyvinyl chloride (PVC). @ART CREDIT:HBO @ART CAPTION:Mai Thi Kim and her daughter Heidi Bub meet at the airport in Danang. @ART CREDIT:GAIL DOLGIN @ART:Photos (2, color)