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THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, JULY 22, 2016 N C7 Film in Review proudly shows the camera what he The Seventh Fire calls his “criminal organization” chest Not rated tattoo, and the diluted dope he cooks Running time: 1 hour 18 minutes up. Mr. Brown cuts the hair of his The only genuine moments of peace quasi-protégé Kevin, a teenager con- in the searing documentary “The tent to do small-time drug dealing Seventh Fire” come at the very begin- until he can graduate to something ning: lyrical shots of headlights mov- bigger — Kevin has a “Scarface” post- ing forward on a long stretch of road at er hanging in his house. He’s a little daybreak. After that, the director, Jack unsure just how much he wants a Pettibone Riccobono, practically grabs criminal life, though, and he’s es- viewers by the backs of their necks tranged from his father, a recovering and shows them the bleak lives of two alcoholic who catches leeches to sell residents of Pine Point, an Ojibwe for bait. village in northern Minnesota on the When Mr. Brown learns he has to White Earth Indian Reservation. return to prison, he organizes a Rob Brown, a onetime gang leader, farewell blowout. In one scene, Kevin is shown dealing, and using, with white teenagers from a neighboring town. The movie provides startling, detailed looks at the wrecks drug addicts become. Mr. Brown’s binge during the party begins with wide- eyed excitement, but sputters to a close when he’s a heavy-lidded, barely coherent mess. In the end, he has no clue how to clean up his psychic and physical wreckage. The betrayal of Native Americans THE FILM COLLABORATIVE FILM MOVEMENT by larger forces looms over this pow- Hooligan Sparrow Ye Haiyan, with a protest sign related to the sexual abuse of girls, in this documentary opening on Friday. Rob Brown, left, and his quasi- erful movie without ever being explic- protégé, Kevin, in the documentary itly discussed. “The Seventh Fire.” GLENN KENNY Risking All to Stand Up to the State In 2014, for a show of his work at the generated global headlines in 2010 unease and suggestive violence, does- Fight Valley Brooklyn Museum, the Chinese artist when, in agitating for the rights of n’t draw you in; it yanks you, a canny and refusenik Ai Weiwei created an female prostitutes, she offered to turn strategy that instantly puts the viewer Not rated installation called “Ye Haiyan’s Be- tricks without charge. on Ms. Wang’s side and turns the Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes longings.” It looked simple enough, You can learn more about Ms. Ye’s presumably (or at least relatively) Take that, Ronda Rousey. The for- starting with the four past from a Google search than you disinterested audience into a kind of mer mixed martial arts champion — MANOHLA walls, which had been can from “Hooligan Sparrow,” which collaborator. now a budding movie star with turns DARGIS covered with rows of focuses on a short period in her life. “Hooligan Sparrow,” which Ms. in “Entourage,” “The Expendables 3” photographs depicting That isn’t actually a criticism, though Wang also shot and skillfully edited, and “Furious 7” — is challenged by her quotidian objects like it does suggest some of this movie’s has the pulse of a mainstream thriller BREAKING GLASS PICTURES FILM former Ultimate Fighting Champi- REVIEW socks, undies, a bicycle limitations. Documentaries that com- but without the pacifying polish and onship peers in Rob Hawk’s “Fight Miesha Tate portrays the owner of a and appliances. The or- press vast swaths of history into a few tidiness. (One of its executive Valley.” Don’t get me wrong; she’s not gym in this Rob Hawk action film. derliness of the wall display was in hours can be frustratingly shallow, of producers, Alison Klayman, directed in the movie. But a few of her erstwhile stark contrast with the artful jumble course, and also say less than those “Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry.”) It drops rivals take a swing at the big screen scattered on the floor, which included that bore into one subject, place or into Ms. Ye’s life in 2013, around the (and Ms. Rousey’s Hollywood status) ground ring the Yards, she dies, and a few suitcases, various taped card- moment in time. “Hooligan Sparrow” time she and a small group of other, in this punch-drunk action drama, her distant, delicate sister, Windsor board boxes and assorted other for- largely dispenses with the socio-his- mostly female activists were pro- starring Miesha Tate (the former (Susie Celek), investigates. Windsor lorn items — a table fan, a pillow, a torical picture. Instead it employs the testing the light sentence given to U.F.C. women’s bantamweight cham- joins the Knock-Around Girls, who fridge, a motorbike. familiar storytelling strategy of the some convicted male sex offenders for pion); the featherweight Cris Cyborg include Jamie (a mischievous Cabrina The admirably gutsy documentary charismatic personality whose strug- (Cristiane Venancio, but here billed Collesides) and Yanni (Kari J. Kra- “Hooligan Sparrow” tells the story of gles are meant to be representative of abusing six schoolgirls. It’s a right- under her nom de octagon); and Holly mer), and learns the “No. 1 rule of the Ye Haiyan, the Chinese woman who the greater political stakes. eous, dangerous protest that becomes Holm, who bested Ms. Rousey in a Knock-Around Girls: Make sure the owned that pillow. Born in 1975, at the One of the strengths of “Hooligan an emblem of conscience. In time, it championship bout in 2015. other one is safe.” tail end of the Cultural Revolution, Ms. Sparrow” is that it makes those stakes also leads to unanswered questions There are non-U.F.C. actresses, too, Cue the inevitable training mon- Ye became an activist after working in real, visceral and urgent, partly by and some startling, hair-raising mo- including Chelsea Durkalec and Erin tages, as Windsor acquires callused a karaoke bar and a massage parlor. laying bare just how difficult it can be ments, as well as the indelible sight of O’Brien, playing Tory and Duke, lovers knuckles under the tutelage of Jabs By 2001 she was writing about her to make a documentary like this. It’s Ms. Ye on a dusty road with her who are part of a Camden, N.J., street- (Ms. Tate, the picture’s true star), the experiences in a blog, using the han- the debut feature of Nanfu Wang, who daughter, her passion and the belong- fighting crew, the Knock-Around Girls. owner of a gym. Disappointing plot dle Hooligan Sparrow. According to a inserts herself into the fray early in a ings that Ai Weiwei made famous. Among their tormentors is a female twists ensue in a climactic brawl paper by an academic named Jona- short, tense scene in which — while gang led by the intimidating, um, Ms. starved for snappier choreography and than Benney and published in The facing the camera alone in a room — “Hooligan Sparrow” is not rated. It Cyborg. When Tory, striving to raise editing. Ms. Tate, who has a sequel International Journal of China Studies, she nervously explains that the police is in English and Mandarin, with Eng- money to leave Camden, accepts a brewing, is clearly the winner. Ms. Ye said she “encountered femi- are about to question her about her lish subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 23 challenge at the notorious under- ANDY WEBSTER nism” for the first time in 2005. She recent activities. The scene, with its minutes. 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