The foremost thing that can let a documentary work out as a good and interesting one is its subject. And let me just say, I could barely finish watching this documentary! There were several issues I was having with this documentary. The first is the most obvious one, that this documentary is focusing on four unrelated persons and completely different subjects. You could say that they are all connected through their passion for their work but there are millions of people out there with a passion for something. I mean, what makes these guys so special and worthy of featuring them in a documentary? And that brings me to the other problem of that the documentary just doesn't ever manage to get deep or involving with anything. The way it's set up, is that it just lets its subjects talk about their work but it doesn't tell you anything about the person itself, or what drives and motivates him. You were supposed to take all of this out of the way they were talking about their work I suppose but it just didn't worked out too well for me.It might had worked out for me if the different subjects were being a bit more interesting ones. But one involves a gardener, the other a robotics designer and the other a guy who is fascinated by mole rats. The one interesting subject involves a lion tamer but because every different subjects take up about as much screen time as the other, the documentary just doesn't ever find the time or space to let any of them work out as something good and interesting enough. It was really lacking some depth, which was due to the combination of its concepts and the approach to all of it. It actually became a very repetitive documentary after a while, since nothing in it ever felt as if it was progressing and going anywhere interesting or surprising. The style also became repetitive and predictable after a short while. The style actually seemed to be the foremost thing that was supposed to keep this documentary together and provide it with pace and visual splendor (with the help of acclaimed cinematographer Robert Richardson) as well but it really started to work against the documentary after a while. It actually helped to prevent this documentary from ever becoming a well enough focused one.I'm not exaggerating when I'm saying that, about half way through the documentary, I already got fed up with it and lost all interest. I really had a hard time finish watching it and when it finally did, I was glad it was all over with. It's not like I hated watching it but it just was a documentary I got absolutely nothing out of!5/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

so altogether i found this documentary to be strange and really pointless. i know it got awards and things, but i personally did not enjoy it too much. there was no humor or drama in it to keep you interested, just a bunch of wierdos and their jobs. some of the people in are rather different which isn't a bad thing, it just didn't leave a good impression on me. i was thoroughly bored by this movie, no offense to my creative writing teacher. the circus theme throughout the whole movie was kinda cool but i didn't get it, and robotics and lion taming is definitely not my thing. the green animals thing was neat, i really liked the garden lots of colorful flowers, but how did these four jobs connect? it just didn't make much sense to me why someone would make a movie about that. But if you are into stuff like this you might enjoy it. who am i to stand in your way. I am just forewarning you about possible suffering.

This makes the third Errol Morris movie I've seen, and I'm increasingly not liking his style. He seems to find very interesting and varied characters, great personalities to create documentaries for, and then with tongue-in-cheek editing make fun of everything they are about. It's never really a direct caricaturation of them and Morris seems most of the time to be saying, "But no, no, these people are really fascinating, really!", but there's always these subtle little canted angles and not-so-subtle editing techniques that show that Morris seems to be mocking them behind their back.This movie tracks four people who break the traditional boundaries of organic separation... a man who studies African hairless molerats to find that they are amazingly ant-like, a lion tamer, a man who keeps a garden full of animal-shaped shrubbery, and a robot designer. The general theme of the film seems to revolve around the question of what designates animal, human, and life features? So the title of Fast, Cheap, & Out of Control doesn't really seem to mean anything in terms of the movie... right? Except of course Morris seems just a little disturbed by these individuals' passions (he might call them "obsessions") making synthetic designs on life. I share not that fear and honestly don't appreciate some of the connections Morris makes in the film.But I stress his subtlety. With no voice-over narration and leaving the words entirely to the interviewees, it's not as if Morris ever pounds that anxiety onto the spectators' collective head. Instead he mixes circus footage and ant footage together often at times when they're taken out of the context of the circus and the ants, showing a sort of collective absurdity behind what all of these people are talking about. I don't find them absurd, I find them all very neat and interesting individuals.Unless, of course, he didn't intend such juxtapositions, which means he's just a bad craftsman instead of a silent subverter. Considering none of this films I've seen so far have particularly impressed me, I don't really care to find out what he's trying to do.--PolarisDiB

In science, there is a property of any complex system, that more complexity and subtlety will result with each added component. This, in my opinion, was the subject of "Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control." The parallels drawn between AI, societal mammals, commonality of life (the lion tamer) and art (topiary gardener) flesh out a world where the idea of "God" can well be reduced to a simple inherent property of existence. Mole rat societies are not so far from human societies; humans are not so different from animals; robots are not so different from animals; and each individual represents a unique degree of specialization that proves important to the greater society it exists in. I found this work elegant, subtle, and even-handed, not to mention completely unique in its structure and faith in the audience to decipher an individual meaning from the context provided. Each person interviewed is wholly engrossed in their craft, something for which no other human can be substituted, and that exuberance shines in their eyes. It's a strange ride that inspires wonder in trusting viewers, exactly the way that the experts' wonder has motivated their realization as truly unique humans.