DIG
unrated , 115 mins .

The “Hoop Dreams” of indie rock, “Dig!” follows two bands on the flip side of success over seven years. In this highly in-depth and successful film, opening this week at the Sunshine, Ondi Timoner has comprehensively chronicled the friendship and eventual adversity between the rock groups the Dandy Warhols, led by Courtney Taylor (who narrates the film), and their lesser known (though better loved) counterpart the Brian Jonestown Massacre.

While the two bands frequently performed together, the Dandy’s eventually took off and were signed by Capitol Records. The less predictable, more maniacal BJM were left in the dust of their own self-sabotage. Once, when a studio executive had come to scout them, front man Anton Newcombe got into a fist fight with his fellow band mates on stage.

Ms. Timoner has clearly chosen sides by having Mr. Taylor narrate the film, and while his voiceover brings an undeniable intimacy, a neutral voice probably would have been more professional. Still, “Dig” is funny, alarming, and easily one of the best movies about music I’ve seen in a long time. Rock on.

– Eddie Goldberger

DEADLINE
unrated , 90 mins.

In 2003, then-Governor George Ryan took the nation by surprise by granting blanket clemency to the 170 Illinois inmates on death row, commuting all their sentences to life. Chronicling this event, and trying to build on it, directors Katy Chevigny and Kirsten Johnson have crafted a compelling and respectable, though at times misguided, documentary in “Deadline.”

An astounding number of people – 13 – on Illinois’s death row were found to be innocent of their crimes, thanks to an investigation made by a class of undergraduate students at Northwestern University and a separate investigation by the Chicago Tribune. Mr. Ryan immediately set up clemency hearings for each death row prisoner, to decide whether or not to abolish the state’s capital punishment.

Using interviews with exonerated prisoners, as well as those whose convictions have stood, the filmmakers argue that the death penalty needs to be abolished in this country. Their documentary is thoughtful and effective, but they go a bit wrong in portraying Mr. Ryan as some sort of saint. Mr. Ryan was involved in a bribery scandal at the time, and while that is no reason to believe his motives were not genuine, it is something the viewer might like to know. There is a line between propaganda and a point of view, and here they tread dangerously close.

– Eddie Goldberger

TYING THE KNOT
unrated , 87 mins .

Whatever your views on gay marriage, you have to feel for documentary filmmaker Jim de Seve, whose “Tying the Knot” seeks to rouse indignation in favor of homosexual nuptials. Mr. de Seve faces an uphill battle: Those sympathetic to his cause are unlikely to encounter new arguments or images here; those opposed will probably never see this movie.

Both will find Mr. de Seve’s picture frustrating. He is an unsteady narrator, sabotaging his film’s momentum by breaking up tales of gay love with tangentially related news reports. He is trying to link the personal with the political, the local with the national and even international. But the effect is jarring and counterproductive – he interrupts moving stories just as they become involving.

The heart of the film concerns two couples – Mickie and Lois, female police officers in Tampa, Fla., and Sam and Earl, male ranchers in Oklahoma. In each case, one partner dies without properly providing for the other. Lois was killed in the line of duty, but Tampa’s police pension fund didn’t recognize unmarried couples, and Earl’s improperly filed will left Sam with nothing.

Had these couples been allowed to marry, Lois and Earl’s estates would have been disbursed as the deceased intended. Yet it’s just as true that Lois and Earl could have responded to society’s shortcomings by making better plans.

Mickie and Sam feel that society regards gays as second-class citizens. So do a lot of other people, and Mr. de Seve’s film echoes these sentiments. But at its best, this documentary celebrates the heartfelt desire of most people – gay or straight – to unite completely with another human being.

– David Mermelstein

WOMAN THOU ART LOOSED
unrated , 94 mins.

A huge auditorium overflows with a gospel revival gathering. The preacher, Bishop T.D. Jakes (a multimillionaire evangelist who plays himself), is strutting back and forth on the stage, resplendent in a fine suit and shiny pate, working up a sweat as he coaxes a flock of hundreds into an orgy of spiritual ecstasy. In walks an attractive woman with fancy hair and wild eyes (Kimberly Elise), who ends up brandishing a handgun and pulling the trigger just as the pastor is reaching some kind of crescendo. We see her next on death row, hardened and sulky, visited by Bishop Jakes.

With often confusing chronology, “Woman, Though Art Loosed” is the story of this woman, Michelle, and her struggle to overcome the hard luck of her life. It is based on a religious self-help novel of the same title, which Bishop Jakes wrote in order to empower women, particularly those who have been abused. In this adaptation, a wide-eyed, hopeful girl is sexually abused by her mother’s boyfriend (Clifton Powell), then left to fend for herself. Tossed from home by her remote, disbelieving mother (Loretta Devine), Michelle enters a cycle of drug addiction that brings her nasty men and nastier jobs. When she emerges from jail the first time, she finds herself listening to Bishop Jakes, and not entirely impervious to his message.

Indeed, Mr. Jakes’s message of redemption is the point of the film. And though his deep, velvety voice sounds compassionate in prison-cell conversations and compelling in his syncopated preaching, people don’t go to the movies to be redeemed. Obvious writing, spotty acting, and awkward direction give this film the pedantry of a church sermon. Bishop Jakes may preside over an evangelical media empire, but this film will only appeal to the converted.

– Emily Bobrow