Hotshot

I'm a 4th generation logger from Oregon, our whole family has been around wildfires for a long time. Many of us have worked on them.

When loggers are asked to work on fires it's usually bad.. It's also a part of life out here in the big timber.

Yes i call some Hotshot firefighters good friends and have profound respect for what they do at work. You will see why.

I never expected a movie to be as good as this one. Hotshot is hard hitting and shows some uncomfortable things but is worth every second.

I can only compare the quality of this project to that of the late Japanese filmaker Akira Kurosawa in that it takes the viewer on an epic journey in a brilliantly filmed but dangerous landscape that these men and women work in.

The brief news stories of wildland fire are never even close showing what is really happening out there.. It's hard work that can get one injured or killed fast.

Hotshot (2023) illustrates the part the news media can't.

Buckle up, drink some water and keep your eyes open.

It's one hell of a ride.

I am a avid documentary watcher and love the art of filmmaking. I have no training or excellence in the field other than my own thoughts and novice reads. This doc is one of the best that I have ever seen! As a former wartime Marine, I love to see docs in the realm of events that I have participated in and been through and this is right up there with WAR. I gripped a towel the entire time I watched because I am so high strung and was loving every minute of what I was watching. The educational value and what could be learned by watching this film is worthy of a rent/buy. I'm not sure what the correct words are for it, but the 'scenery' and 'fill' scenes are unbelievable to see and make you appreciate this world we live in. I think this doc is right up there with the likes of 'Free Solo' and other Academy award winners...it definitely has my vote. ***I purchased this doc strictly off the trailer and my love for Hotshots, Firefighters, etc.

"Behind the scenes" is an understatement. You'll see the good, the bad, the ugly, and more truth bombs are dropped than you'll be able to process. Unlike most documentaries, this film doesn't need to make anyone look good, the content itself is so powerful the major points to the story are apparent for all to see.

Yes, you'll get a glimpse the film's character's personal lives, but you'll also get a mid level view, then a bird's eye view of the fire problem sweeping across the western U. S. More than any of that, you'll see some of the best video of fire behavior anywhere. The footage is not like other video you've seen, it was only captured because the film's creator spent years imbedded with the crew to see the fire world through their eyes.

It's hard to say what Mr Mann intended here, which makes this all the more impressive. Not that I was confused or distracted. Quite the contrary. More to it, I was consumed, as if by fire. And maybe that's it. Maybe he was looking to create an immersive experience. If so, fire, or his seat at the fire is a breathtaking beautiful experience. The poetry and nuance of this production is pure music. And, as fits, for a documentary, a substantial education on nature's most powerful equalizer. We are reminded that as a planet, a people we were born of fire. You will see a 1,000 things you have never seen before, and though, the subject is God cursed fire, it is strangely gorgeous.

Hotshot (2023) is a film is absolutely rife with some of the most incredible footage of California wildfires, quite possibly ever taken. But it's not simply enough for a film to have distinctly stunning visuals. Hotshot opts to be a uniquely informative film that covers a lot of significant issues in the exploitation of committed and determined Hotshop crews (or as the FED calls them:"forestry technicians") who put their lives at risk weeks at a time to combat some of the most devastating wildfires in modern California history.

As someone who grew up under the smoke filled shadow of and studied California wildfires myself, I find this film quite honestly to be one of maybe only two genuinely authentic deep dive documentaries into California wildfires in a way that documentary should but rarely do. (Fun sidebar-- even without the filmmakers explicit acknowledgement of which fires he'd film for certain shots, I was often able to tell which fires he'd filmed simply based on the landscapes and fire behavior he'd film. Most of these fires were filmed in the devistating 2019-2020 fire season. Mad props for showing up to the Apple Fire in Banning back in August 2020, Gabriel Kirkpatrick Mann.)

There is however one aspect of the film i don't fully agree with and that is sort of the climate change denial that is occasionally sprinkled into the film. But I can't deny that while I may not agree with some of the climate aspects that this film occasionally presents, Hotshop very much makes up for that with countless far more informative hot takes on both the exploitation of hotshot crews by the US government, the reckless burn banning policies that has lead much of California to being in a decades-long burn-debt, and even exploitative nature of the media who rapaciously captures footage of wildfires for headlines regularly.

It's a film that operates much unlike the standard documentary formula. There are no interviews with any set of individuals andno redundant graphics or statistics. There are simply an insightful and emotional monologues by the films creator, Gabriel Kirkpatrick Mann, throughout as they personally shoot incredible footage of countless wildfires and the equally incredible men and women who push their bodies and souls to the limit to fight the beast hand to hand. These monologues are often introspective as much as they are a critique on the wildland fighting world and lend itself to this film having a spark of soul much like wildfires themselves. Definitely worth the watch and definitely worth seeing again.