A marathon of human resilience, A Lion in the House clocks in at just under four hours in duration. As usual, there’s always some fool who makes a mountain of a molehill over this (moaning was overheard during the festival), and to complain about its length is to trivialize the plight of its subjects. Embracing five cancer-stricken children and their families over six grueling years, this is as affecting as documentary filmmaking gets, and is bound to break your heart. It is also an intimate drama of ebb and flow; of medical setback and breakthrough as gripping as The Death of Mr Lazarescu. Both films share downward spiraling turns and moments of resignation, but the doctors and nurses documented for real couldn’t be any further from the Romanian circus act of Cristi Puiu’s film. Filmmakers Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert invest heavily here, and they capture everything: Tim’s disdain for Republicans; a bedridden Justin being treated to a Playboy; utter bravery in the face of spinal taps and tube insertions; a poignant convergence as two families momentarily cross paths. Through the constant relapses, excruciating treatments, and fleeting windows of light, some die, and some live on. But the young keep fighting.

Same can’t be said for OilCrash, a film loaded to the brim with defeatist talking heads who could learn a thing or two about fighting spirit. In their assessment of the oil crisis, they do not exude confidence: the days of the Beverly Hillbillies are history; Texas and the like are now graveyards for black gold; populations may have to be downsized; untamable economic growth means it's all downhill from here. Does it matter that I choose not to drive? Probably not: oil remains non-renewable, supply will never catch up to demand, even rocketing barrel prices aren’t yet a deterrent, so we’re still all screwed. There are no immediate solutions here – even hybrids and biofuels are more or less dismissed – just big fat bullet points reiterating that 1) it will run out, 2) we’re going to fight over what’s left, and 3) it’s the root of all wars. This didactic hiding on the excess and self-destructiveness of the human race is on top of all that global warming shit. This is not an optimistic documentary at any point; more of a kick in the guts, a desperate plea to anyone watching with half a brain to come up with some alternative, some means of substituting one dwindling form of energy for another. They say human ingenuity will apparently get us through this mess, but after watching OilCrash, even Werner Herzog’s interplanetary fantasy seems more plausible.—Tim Wong