Pihla Pekkarinen reviews Taylor Swift’s new documentary.

Miss Americana is undoubtedly one of the most high-profile films arriving at Sundance this year. Taylor Swift first dropped the news of a Netflix documentary in a social media post publicly accusing Scooter Braun and Scott Borchetta of attempting to prevent the film from being released due to their ownership of her original master recordings. Fans and fellow artists flocked to her defense and, three months later, her documentary premiered at Sundance Film Festival. Directed by Lana Wilson, the film spans several years of Swift’s life, and includes intimate interviews, recordings of studio sessions, and a few f-bombs which provoked audible gasps from the audience. According to an interview with Swift, Miss Americana looks at the “flipside of being America’s sweetheart,” exposing some of the challenges Swift faces as she embarks on the process of writing her latest album, Lover.

The film zeroes in on a few pivotal moments of the singer’s life, orienting itself around themes of change and growth. One of these moments is her public feud with Kanye West, which ended with #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty trending worldwide on Twitter and Swift disappearing from the public eye for a year to lick her wounds. To the film’s merit, there is no attempt to defend Swift or explain her actions. Instead, it simply states the facts of the feud, and focuses on the aftermath, including Swift’s reaction to going from publicly adored to generally reviled overnight. The film is (obviously) sympathetic towards Swift, but not as overtly as one might expect. 

Another pivotal moment the film details is Swift’s sexual assault trial and her subsequent foray into politics after years of public neutrality. Though  depicted to be an earth-shattering shift for Swift, she remains surprisingly apolitical throughout. Her discussion of the trial feels like the only moment in the film where she acknowledges her position of privilege, or the existence of an unequal society. Swift describes the ordeal as humiliating and degrading, “and this was with seven witnesses and a photograph. What happens when you were raped, and it’s your word against his?” Otherwise, the singer’s politics, which the film suggests are “radical,” seem limited to “women and gay people should have rights,” and this discrepancy proves grating.

Your enjoyment of this documentary depends entirely on whether or not you buy into Taylor Swift’s victim narrative. Miss Americana acknowledges this frequent criticism of her, but does nothing to subvert it. Swift is portrayed as a victim of the media, of the public, of her stardom – the odds are stacked against her, and she manages to rise above. The film doesn’t deliver on its promise to show the flipside of being America’s sweetheart; it’s simply another angle, still from the front, maybe with less shadows. The film was not during the worst year of her life; it was made afterwards, in retrospect, to ensure her performance remains slick and smooth. The vulnerability I was hoping for? The film fails to get there.

If there is one thing Miss Americana does right, it lies in capturing Swift’s spirit. The film is not aimed at finding new audiences: Swift doesn’t need to do that, and it’s doubtful she will gain any new fans from this documentary. But for pre-existing fans, it is a beautiful 90-minute concentrated dose of Taylor; kittens, clumsiness, faux-vulnerability, and all. If that’s your thing (like it is mine), it’s perfect. If it’s not, maybe give this one a pass. Miss Americana has little artistic merit beyond its subject matter, and if you aren’t a Taylor fan, this film probably isn’t for you. 

5/10

Miss Americana will be released worldwide on Netflix and in select theatres on 31 January 2020. Check out the trailer below: 

Manisha Thind reviews Sinéad O’Shea’s first feature documentary on a troubled Northern Ireland community.

Bleak, grounded and revealing, Sinéad O’Shea’s first feature documentary ‘A Mother Brings her Son to be Shot’ comprehensively voices the story of the O’Donnell family. Living in a housing estate in Free Derry, Northern Ireland, paramilitary groups patrol the streets gathering intelligence and acting as the pseudo-police securing the community. “You are not entering free Derry,” a mural says. The peace process that vowed to deliver opportunities for the young generation and to stop the violence has not produced the fruits it promised. The promise is shattered within the first moments of the film with the sight of an armoured police patrol car passing; a sight more akin to the streets of Palestine than the United Kingdom. Drug abuse plagues the community. Suicide rates have doubled since the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. The young wish for ‘The Troubles’ back out of sheer boredom. Revolutionary sentiments rumble, police-dissident corruption seethes, and above it all violence dominates. The director herself proclaims this documentary as “complicated… grey [and] both funny and dark.”

In short the story stems from one event: the mother, Majella, takes her teenage son, Phillip “Philly” O’Donnell, to a “shooting appointment”. Why? To be kneecapped by Republican dissidents, “The Ra”, for distributing drugs amongst other forms of alleged antisocial behaviour. This was the lesser of two evils; the other option was to be shot in the front garden and be put into a wheelchair. “Death to dealers”, the graffiti proclaims, and that is exactly what Philly dreads to the point of insanity.

The documentary opens with one of Majella’s sons wielding carefree a crowbar, a hatchet, a saw and finally a “torture weapon” – a bolt cutter. Eleven years old, this son, Kevin Barry, is the youngest member of the O’Donnell family. Whilst light-hearted, as a result of the shockingly amusing comments that Kevin makes accompanying his showcase, this scene alludes to the pervasive and cyclical nature of violence in this particular section of the community. Later the camera pans out to reveal Kevin bestowing his expertise on colt M19s and bullets to his mother; again the audience laughs in bewilderment. Comedy, in this documentary, is born out of shock-horror.

The despondency, fear and desolation in Majella’s eyes are representative of the O’Donnell’s situation, the disposition of their community and that of the overall documentary. Through her eyes we can gauge the most honest portrait. Taking diazepam, swallowing bags of powder followed by shots of Sambuca, going six days without sleep, hallucinating, having nightmares about masked men are all things attributed to Philly. He is paranoid, suicidal and psychologically traumatised. And his mother is aware of this. A deep regret clouds Majella – her decision to take her son to be shot. She lives with the knowledge that others call her a bad mother. She knows Philly’s life is still in danger. Yet he returns home in the morning, intoxicated, the shake of his hands immediately recognisable to his mother. Majella is powerless.

This documentary isn’t a political survey of the situation in Derry in the aftermath of ‘The Troubles’ and it doesn’t concern itself with wider political questions. O’Shea herself is delicate in her handling of the political aspect of this documentary being particularly pre-cautious in the use of terminology. Nevertheless, O’Shea subtly yet strikingly alludes to the political alignments of Ireland’s republicans, with Palestine for example, in murals across the region.

During a five-year period of filming, O’Shea has hour-long conversations with the Hugh Brady. This “realist [and] fatalist” was once part of The IRA, then was jailed for sixteen years and now acts as a mediator between The Ra and those in Philly’s predicament. Despite scraping at truths, stating that expelling armed Republicans is still viewed as “informing”, he is a deceitful character to some extent. Ultimately he was expelled from a movement he was committed to after being caught with cannabis and as a result was tied to a lamppost and “painted”. Montages of footage of Brady’s IRA past stress the magnitude of his loyalties and the bias that bleeds into his dialogue. Here it is important to congratulate O’Shea and her team in the thoughtful use of archived footage throughout the documentary.

It was the question and answer session with O’Shea that shed more light on the complexities. O’Shea herself proclaims that it was impossible to determine the truths from the lies during filming. Moreover elements are left out, such as two other siblings in the O’Donnell family; they did not want to appear on camera. This leads to a deficiency in the documentary – the audience doesn’t understand the extent of organised crime in the community. Kevin Barry discloses The Ra are actually taxing the drug trade. Whilst completely plausible it cannot be confirmed; in fact Kevin Barry emerges to be a reflection of his irrational older brother. Why is it plausible? The eldest of the O’Donnell brothers, who is omitted from the documentary, was a bigger drug dealer than Philly yet wasn’t shot. Was he taxed and allowed to carry on with trading in drugs? We don’t know. This dimension alludes to a more cautious O’Shea.

Conceivably the failings of the documentary were to a greater extent a symptom of factors out of O’Shea’s control. The ending is forced to some extent due to the lack of further contact with the O’Donnells. Still, the documentary manages to end on a cyclical note – the father Philip Senior is shot in both knees after being released seven years into a thirteen-year jail-sentence. Again the audience is left wondering as to why. It is only in the plenary session with O’Shea that answers emerge. Hugh, O’Shea tells us, argued that the aforementioned early release was due to Senior passing out information about the cause to the police and then the depositions being released. Senior on the other hand maintains it was due to a brawl or accident. O’Shea then reveals Senior was scarred on his thigh and not on his knees. It is infuriating that conclusions aren’t definitively reached in this documentary and a lack of a robust, objective, outside voice adds to the irritation. Truth is lost somewhere in the estates of Creggan. O’Shea’s narrative is limited and heavily constrained; an interview with a scholar of a related field could’ve added a much needed dimension of clarity.

Although O’Shea can be praised for her patience and dedication spent on the project, this documentary would have benefited with an additional year or more of filming (if funds allowed it of course). Kevin Barry is a refreshing subject in the documentary, and perhaps its true star. As stated previously he provides much comedic relief throughout; he is astonishingly intelligent as well as witty. At fourteen he begins taking drugs outside of cannabis and exhibits anger issues, especially in school, however he is able to channel the rage and aggression into boxing. Towards the end he is shown to be an exact physical copy of Philly implying to some extent a pessimistic future for him. Possibly the greatest tragedy to befall Creggan lies in the loss of Kevin Barry’s potential. The missed focal point in the documentary is the failure of Northern Ireland’s youth to find opportunity; maybe it’s because it is too common a tragedy to register. The documentary itself ends on a doubtful note for the future of the O’Donnells. Upon the film’s release, however, Kevin Barry proceeds to become a building apprentice. If filming had continued longer the documentary could’ve ended on a more positive note – arguably more in line with to actual trajectory of the O’Donnells’ futures.

O’Shea achieves an insight into a small faction of a community still troubled by ‘The Troubles’ themselves. Original in its primary subject matter, it accomplishes by bringing attention to a significant issue within the UK which news outlets don’t pay attention to. Once an invisible community and the people in it disposable, O’Shea manages to expose their realities to some extent. Solidarity against the authority and anarchy stage themselves in the final scene of a bonfire. The peace process hasn’t solved ‘The Troubles’, the war is still not over and a community of people in “Free” Derry continue to live in a post-war prison of violence. The Union Jack burns.

A Mother Brings Her Son To Be Shot was screened at UCL on October 18th. Check out the trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Milo Garner reviews Peter Jackson’s technically and visually experimental WW1 documentary. 

Among the unruly film conservationist community – an elusive and underloved subsection of society at the best of times – there is much discontent afoot. Peter Jackson’s latest project, a commission from the Imperial War Museum to mark the centenary of the First World War’s conclusion, has been considered by some to be an act of barbarity, an unjustifiable marring of historical record for the sake of empty titillation. This project, entitled They Shall Not Grow Old, is understandably controversial: Jackson has taken archive footage from the Western Front and not only colourized it, but dubbed it with sound and rendered it in 3D. That’s not even to mention blowing up 4:3 to 16:9, often considered a sin in its own right.

The arguments against this kind of treatment are plentiful and not without merit, especially the suggestion that in making these images more ‘realistic’, one forgets that they do not necessarily represent reality at all. Not only is much of the footage used staged or in some way manipulated – what is off-frame is often more indicative than what is on – but also an artefact of how these historical people viewed their own present. To ‘enhance’ these images with tools of modernity might, in an extreme example, not be so dissimilar to colouring in cave drawings in order to make the horses more lifelike. While yes, that much would be achieved, it would also be a total distortion of the way in which early man perceived and recorded horses – it may seem more real to us, but not in any helpful way.

This angle, while entirely valid, misses the aims of Jackson in creating this film. He is not attempting to make better the images of his forefathers, but rather to use the data contained within those images so as to construct a fantasy that might, itself, communicate an idea of the First World War. Little of what Jackson presents can be considered ‘real’ – the colours are imagined, the sounds invented, the voices guessed at – but just like any costume drama set in the Great War, that does not stop these from being authentic. By adapting the indexical record of the First World War, which even if staged or manipulated is still constructed with genuine soldiers in genuine locations, Jackson can then inject this impression of the past with his own expressive interpretation. This is not an improvement of old footage so much as an attempt to use this footage in an essentially fictional recreation of the First World War. He wishes to recreate it according to the aesthetic of direct human senses – we see in colour, we hear synchronised sound, we perceive depth. So too did the soldiers Jackson wishes to depict, and through their eyes he attempts to see. This is, of course, impossible – therein lies the art of cinema.

But does it work? In large part, I think it does. Jackson opens the film with framed and untouched (besides the unobtrusive addition of mild 3D effects) footage depicting recruitment and preparation early in the war. As this leads into the fighting – he structures the film in a simplistic, linear fashion – the various effects sweep over the screen. The impact is at first startling; the distortion inherent in the footage met with image smoothing techniques, and occasionally garish colours, initially suggests the tone of 80s video footage, almost as though we are viewing some kind of re-enactment. But as the film continues the imagery becomes more consistent, and at once more intimate. This is not to say that black-and-white footage is inherently alienating; rather that to see these young faces laughing or speaking, smiling in impossible close-ups, is to imbue them with something lost in the limitations of silent documentary of the 1910s. It feels almost wrong – especially as a student of history – to suggest such a superficial (and fictitious) adaptation of old images can change their effect in any meaningful way. Then again it is that replication of the human sensory condition, and application of modern aesthetic sensibilities, that in Jackson’s own words ‘reach[es] through the fog of time and pull[s] these men into the modern world’.

Unfortunately this fascinating gambit lies in contrast to the worn-over and school-friendly structure the rest of the film rests in (albeit understandably, given a copy will be sent to every school in the UK). Every theme is covered individually, each given a few minutes, the course of the war covered in as wide and generic a sense as possible. While the interviews that underscore the entire film are of course specific, they are rent from their direct context so as to allow them the bizarre position of ‘general anecdote’. The wheres and the whens are forgone for the general atmosphere of war. This is justifiable, but feels rote, and paradoxically impersonal. Jackson will often cut to close-ups of soldiers faces to directly humanize them, and yet these soldiers will remain anonymous, matched to voices that are not their own, intercut with battles in which they did not fight. As associative montage this might be effective, but it does seem a little at odds with Jackson’s initial purpose. This also leads to Jackson’s trouble when representing scenes of battle in a larger sense, as the exact kind of grittiness he would like to impart was never captured (or archived) on film, other than the grisly leftovers. As such he must fall back on printed images of battle, with a ballistic soundscape of artillery fire and the occasional bagpipe standing in for visual effect. A conspicuously absent feature given its core importance to understanding the experience of war, even if the descriptions on the soundtrack serve as adequate substance in lieu.

They Shall Not Grow Old is, as such, a strange contradiction of sorts. As a documentary, it is entirely uninspiring in form, and other than its brief treatment of the post-war experience it offers little novel in terms of structure. But the direct experience of witnessing these soldiers resurrected by digital technologies rebukes any loss in confidence instantly. To see these men looking so immediately real (the footage not only colourized, but stabilized, and smoothed) is startling. While the black-and-white footage untreated could hardly be described as inhuman, it has previously served as a unique sort of cage for the men of the early 20^th century. Where wars of deeper history lack such filmic record – and so are simply imagined in colour, inspired by clearly contrived elements of visual art (paintings etc.) – the nature of film is such that these monochrome images become a sort of phantom memory for those recalling these battles beyond their years. It is in much the same manner that young children often wonder if the past was in black-and-white entirely. And it is for these children especially that the film has been constructed; it aims to break this silver cage, and create a new, vivid, memory of the past. In this it undoubtedly succeeds.

7/10

They Shall Not Grow Old is currently showing at the Imperial War Museum. Check out its trailer below:

It’s festival season! The FilmSoc blog is covering the 62nd BFI London Film Festival (10th – 21st October), diving into the myriad of films and events on offer to deliver reviews.

Lydia De Matos reviews Michael Moore’s outrage-filled documentary targeting the current political climate in the United States.

Michael Moore’s newest documentary may market itself as a fully loaded gun aimed at none other than the 45th President of the United States, but the reality is somewhat different. Fahrenheit 11/9 (the title a reference to Moore’s 2004 feature concerning the war on terror, Fahrenheit 9/11) is rather a full-scale exposé on the downfall and ultimate failure of American democracy in the 21st century.

For the film’s first 20 or so minutes, however, you’d be forgiven for not realising this. Moore sets his audience up with a fairly straightforward rehash of the later stages of the 2016 US election (emphasis on the word “fairly,” as, let’s face it, this is Michael Moore we’re talking about). It’s from here that we’re spun in a completely different direction, as a perhaps slightly tenuous, but overall necessary, link is made back to the director’s hometown of Flint, Michigan.

Throughout his filmography, Moore has rarely failed to return home. Whether he’s focusing on a Flint-based story such as in his 1989 debut Roger and Me, or covering more widespread issues such as gun control in 2002’s Bowling for Columbine, Flint is always featured prominently. But never has this homecoming felt more crucial. For the past four years the town has been experiencing a water crisis which has essentially poisoned the entire population, a situation which became widely mediatised earlier this year, and I’d been wondering for a while when Moore would announce that he’d be covering the subject. Watching the first segment on Flint, I thought this was it, that Moore had simply used the inherent bait that is Donald Trump to shed more light on an issue which still threatens his hometown. But you’ll soon realise that this, too, isn’t quite the case; instead, it’s merely a part of the overarching argument.

Moore takes us through a series of segments which tackle some of the most important, and decidedly controversial, subjects surrounding the USA over the last few years. From the Parkland shooting, to teachers’ strikes, to the allegations of rape and sexual assault levied against a number of men prominent in the news media (and interestingly, as the film notes, many of whom were critical of Hillary Clinton during her campaign): Moore spares nothing and no one, even criticising the actions of former President Barack Obama.

In spite of this, the director seems to have somewhat restrained his usual style. His interviews are less guiding, with fewer witticisms; in fact, Moore spends most of the film behind the camera, rather than in front of it. No need to worry for Moore fans, though – his style hasn’t disappeared altogether. Acts of stunt journalism, such as attempting a citizen’s arrest on Michigan Governor Rick Snyder before soaking his front garden in water from Flint, serve as proof that Moore is undoubtedly still a performer. If anything, he seems to have finally found a perfect tonal balance, with enough dark comedy to create excitement, interest, and controversy, but not so much that it cheapens the gravity of the subject matter.

At the beginning of this documentary, the audience, faced with footage of the night of the 2016 election, is asked a question: “How the fuck did this happen?” We assume it references Trump, and in a way it does, albeit indirectly. This film, with a scattershot approach seemingly focused on every heartbreaking American crisis of the past few years, begins to make sense of how democracy failed the United States’ public so badly. Trump, in all his toxic glory, is simply the symbol of that failure. Flint, and Parkland, and everything else, represent the other side – the side of those who have been disenfranchised by the current system. Poisoned, unprotected, shot at, and killed, they have given up faith in their system – and who can blame them? Want to know why Michael Moore is angry again? That’s why.

Fahrenheit 11/9, convoluted though its argument is, makes the reason for Moore’s anger clear. It even offers a solution, and a simple one, too: to act, to vote, to get up and do something. It may feel like a slightly naïve message, but as this documentary indicates, there isn’t really a better option.

8/10

Fahrenheit 11/9 is currently released in UK. Check out the trailer below:

Nick Mastrini reviews the documentary revealing the fascinating career of Kubrick’s right-hand-man.

Tony Zierra’s Filmworker is a documentary that celebrates the hidden craftspeople of filmmaking by exhibiting the career of Leon Vitali, the actor-turned-right-hand-man for Stanley Kubrick, who relinquished a burgeoning career in front of the camera to work behind it.

A filmmaker as creatively independent as Stanley Kubrick can’t be defined by a genre, movement or single film. For Kubrick, the opposite is true: his work came to define the second half of the 20th century. As if by cosmic coincidence, the director’s career fits exactly into those five decades; Kubrick produced his first film, a boxing documentary short titled Day of the Fight, in 1950, and screened the final cut of Eyes Wide Shut six days before his death in 1999.

Vitali enters this timeline exactly halfway through, playing Lord Bullingdon in Barry Lyndon in 1975. It becomes clear Kubrick wanted his actors to live as their characters, to learn every piece of dialogue by heart. While this caused issues for some cast members, Vitali prospered, and connected with Kubrick as a collaborator. Vitali coins the film’s title as a catch-all term to describe the breadth of tasks he would complete in service of Kubrick. What the documentary reveals is that – by sheer dedication to a laborious career – he ultimately became an understated cinematic polymath.

Filmworker does well to exhibit the two sides of the Kubrick-dedication coin. One voice notes that ‘he always had the energy for other people,’ confirming Vitali’s sincerity and selflessness. The late R. Lee Ermey (whose defining role in Full Metal Jacket was developed with Vitali’s support) and Matthew Modine highlight that they, or anyone else, would be “too selfish” to take on the role the filmworker did. And through a number of intimate interviews Zierra reveals the toll this took on the man who “became the arms and legs” of an iconic director.

From acting through editing and printing to casting and foley design, Filmworker takes us on a journey through cinematic departments and showcases Vitali’s expertise in each one. As this path unfolds, the weight of Kubrick’s career takes its toll. “Stanley kind of ate you up,” remarks one voice, and eventually, it is the global span of the director’s appeal that forces Vitali to live and breathe not a single role but a number of films. Every print inspected, every frame and every trailer, every marketing move and shopfront window concerns him. Filmmaking is a business above all, which makes Vitali stand out even more. He recalls asking “Stanley… do I look corporate?”

Filmworker is a great watch for the cinephile, especially one more interested in the human impact of filmmaking as a lifestyle than intense analysis of the films themselves, as in the Kubrick doc Room 237. Conspiracy theories and subliminal messages aren’t to be found here. Instead, this is the remarkable story of a craftsman whose curiosity led to mastery, and whose legacy deserves to be printed on film.

Filmworker was released May 18 and is now showing in UK cinemas. Trailer:

Emma Davis considers Molly Dineen’s documentary about the Brixton neighbourhood icon ahead of its premiere on BBC2 tonight.

In Molly Dineen’s latest documentary Being Blacker, Brixton is the undercurrent to the life and philosophy of Blacker Dread. There is plenty inspiration to take from London’s people, places and its spirit. Even UCL’s own student productions of Brick Lane in Flux and Heimweh tackled the social consequences of Britain’s cultural and economic behemoth. It was easy to assume that this would be about Brixton’s changing identity – gentrification is a hot topic to discuss. But when Dineen focuses on Blacker, some more universal themes such as love, family, death, and masculinity come to light.

So, who is Blacker Dread? Most people in the audience at the March 5th BFI screening would know the answer to this, many being from Brixton. From his records shopfront, he would invite the community in any reason. People have fond memories of searching for their favourite reggae record, watching (and celebrating) Usain Bolt’s Olympic achievements, or accepting his offer to keep an eye on the youth when they encountered police. He is a cultural and social figurehead for the London district, with achievements in the reggae industry, and even met Nelson Mandela on his 1996 visit to Britain. Being Blacker, however, approaches our mythical hero by humanising him. 

We meet Blacker’s oldest friend, Napthali, and his family, who are all affected by the loss of their matriarch in Blacker’s mother. However, as the events unfold, the intimacy and bond between individuals is unforgettable. The documentary has a home-movie feel. That is how the film began in its practical origins – Blacker had asked for a recording of his mother’s funeral from Dineen, a home-video that establishes the film’s core themes and catalyses the narrative course. After that, Dineen follows Blacker around his home and his shop, but she falls into the background easily, allowing the audience to get absorbed into the stakes of Blacker and those around him. At times, it is a little difficult to piece together the particular chronological point in film’s linear structure. Even so, Dineen’s flow is still smooth. 

Unlike my own expectations, politics was not the forefront. When an audience member in the Q&A session asked if Blacker would pursue politics, he replied by indicating that he is more interested in mentoring and cultivating talent. Love is key to understanding Blacker – not only does it come from his belief in Rastafari, but how also in how he treats others. He is certain about who he cares for and it’s shown what he does for them. Blacker sacrifices for his own, and they do so in return. He is quite a character, but he has quite the heart as well.

And most bluntly, there is a challenge to the idea of happy immigration. His family attest to how he has a stronger affinity with Jamaica. From his own experience to his youngest son, life in Britain is not an opportunity, but a hindrance. The focus on Blacker and his son, and then some moments with Napthali, bring issues of masculinity to light. His son lives in Jamaica, thriving socially and academically, unlike in the UK where he was deemed a disruption. Napthali struggles to find employment with his criminal record and reflects on providing for his family. Blacker talks of ‘failure’ when people fall into crime: with family, with the state, or somewhere else. He denounces education as pillar for success (traditionally, what immigrants would rely on for social mobility) or political correctness to help form identity, but doesn’t refuse these for others. This intersection, between masculine success and Britain’s post-colonial legacy, is powerful.

Dineen’s last films were ten years ago, and her return to filmmaking is coupled with a return to her student film days when she made her first film about Blacker and his involvement with the reggae sound system culture of the 1980s. When an audience member called for a filmmaker like Dineen to make more films about underrepresented social topics, her response cites her responsibility as a parent. While the BFI so keenly promoted the support and purchasing of the work by female filmmakers before the screening started, there is still progress for female-made films to have a chance. There are obstacles in these films being made, not just for their distribution and consumption.  

But certainly, the honest and intimate filmmaking of Being Blacker shines many truths. There are uncomfortable moments. The start is an actual funeral, and the privilege of Dineen attending the family affair is extended to the audience. Blacker and Naphtali experience their own difficulties in the years after, trying to make the best despite a society and its institutions stacked against them. There is some whiplash when confronted with current British youth. After being lulled in the experience and wisdom of older people like Blacker, Napthali and his family; there is a reminder of the institutional and physical violence against young Black British men now.

Whether or not you are an ethnic minority in the UK, it is quite easy to see that there are parts of Britain missing from mainstream exposure. Dineen revealed that it was difficult to release the documentary, as an executive said portraying Black British people as being involved with crime and violence was generalisation. This is hypocritical. If there were more content out there, there would be more instances for audience to reduce for their generalisations. As such, it is important to watch this observation of British life. Keep in mind, that it is a single British life — the experience of a singular Jamaican British man, very localised to the Brixton context. Such specificity doesn’t demean its importance, but rather elevates it, and there is still something universal to be found. 

Being Blacker airs on BBC2 on March 12th at 9pm.

The latest edition of Central DOCS Club, in association with UCL Film Society, featured a screening of Walk With Me, a glimpse into the monastic life led and taught by Thích Nhất Hạnh, followed by an engaging audience discussion.

A superbly shot and edited observational documentary, Walk With Me reveals the daily activities of visitors and residents in Plum Village, a rural monastery in France, as they follow the guidance of Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. Their journey towards zen is presented in an appropriately peaceful, yet thoroughly engaging, film, directed by Max Pugh and Marc James Francis.

Box office draw is supported by the sonorous tones of Benedict Cumberbatch reading Nhất Hạnh’s journal entries, appearing every so often as if to reflect the Buddhist practice of pausing upon the sound of a bell and experiencing the present moment.

What the film does wonderfully is emerge from Plum Village to show the relationship between the monastic individuals and the world many of them left behind. Some return to relatives who, despite the more conventional lives they have led, show the empathy and tolerance which their sons and daughters have devoted their lives to.

The group walks through New York’s streets calmly, as if in slow motion, a stark contrast to the modern racecourse around them. The camera does not judge, and the individuals do not speak to the filmmakers; instead, as the travelling monks sit in a city square, the observational mode captures a vociferous Christian preacher denouncing their beliefs. A member of the public confronts the preacher, before hugging a nearby stranger. Smiles and silence surpass the intolerance.

Keep an eye out for Central DOCS Club’s next screenings — stay up to date with Film Society’s Facebook page and Picturehouse Docs.

The latest screening at Central DOCS Club – where newly-released documentaries are shown at Picturehouse Central in association with FilmSoc – featured Mountain followed by a discussion.

Alexandra-Loredana Petrache reviews Jennifer Peedom’s symphonic doc.

A gorgeous piece of cinematography. An ode to the mountains. 

Beautiful imagery and score

Soothingly narrated by Willem Dafoe and bringing in the Australian Chamber Orchestra to perform pieces from the likes of Vivaldi, Mountain presents stunning, breath-taking imagery of people who aim for more: who test themselves, defy the norm and go in search of aventure. It also shows the modern reality of such sports, and of the people who try them in pursuit of not only the climb itself, but social media’s fame and adulation. The documentary scratches the surface of a whole universe of sports and sport-lovers, of madness and sanity, of will and strength, and shows the audience the thrills and perils that come with such ventures, without going too far into characterising the activities or associated risks. This is not meant to be an in-depth documentary about climbers, mountain-bikers or base-jumpers, but a serene piece of cinematography accompanied by good music. It will occasionally make you reach the edge of your seat but mostly it will induce a sense of wonder and worship towards the mountains. The music complements the footage perfectly – the beginning of the film comes into focus as a violin is being tuned. The sound weaves the metaphor of dizzying heights: we see climbers ascend over the crescendo of a violin, as a piano is subtly playing in the background, finishing off the metaphor of serene peace that accompanies the sport.

What Mountain succeeds at is showing both the exhilarating and the brutal: people smiling upon reaching their destination on the mountain, and euphoric spirits and cheers, but also bloody fingers, faces bitten by frost, tents filled with snow so cold it feels like a blade cutting the flesh down to the bone. Broken legs, twisted ankles, deep scratches, concussions, vertigo, pain, death. The price to pay for fleeting moments of sweet ecstasy.

Climbing a mountain: reward or plunder?

We keep talking of conquest when we speak of mountains and I’m not sure whether this comes from a sense of reward after the daunting experience that climbing can be or if it is sheer arrogance – do we really think we can outwit timeless (yet perpetually changing) rock giants? Is reaching a peak plunder or reward? Should we not talk of conquering ourselves, perhaps? Are mountains not just enablers for us to test our mental and physical strength?

The mountains can be a refuge for an ordinary living, an infusion of life, of raw, naked reality. It is a two-sided story: one of humility and one of hubris. On one side, we are glancing upon our condition and are reminded we are insignificant in this vast world. On the other, this sheer feeling of inferiority pushes us to overcome it, reach for the gods and prove that we are nothing less. And the fall will be all the more bittersweet knowing that, for a split moment, we were their equals and shared their world.

It is interesting how the film-makers decided to give the audience only a taste of the charm and seduction the mountains possess, instead of going for something with more substance and tackling concrete ideas about the sports presented or the more commercial aspect that now accompanies some of the sports presented. They focused on romanticising the antithesis between man and mountain, between ephemeral and long-lived.

Join us at the next Central DOCS Club screening on 8th January: see and discuss Walk With Me, a rare insight into the world of mindfulness and the Zen Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh, narrated by Benedict Cumberbatch! Check out the Facebook event HERE.

Mountain premiered at London Film Festival on October 9th. Watch the trailer below.

Our second co-hosted Central DOCS Club event at Picturehouse Central featured a screening of Jane Goodall doc Jane followed by a discussion. Get involved in the next DOC Club screenings with Mountain on Dec 18th and Walk With Me on Jan 8th.

Editor Chloe Woods continues the discussion with her review of the film.

Apparently I can’t assume everybody knows who Jane Goodall is. Born in 1934, the world’s most famous and most-revered expert on chimpanzees first set foot in Africa in her early twenties, and in 1960 established the (ongoing) field study of chimps in Gombe, Tanzania. Not long afterwards she shook both the scientific community and the wider world with her groundbreaking observations into chimpanzee behaviour – particularly the revelation that they used and made tools – and since the mid-1980s she has travelled the world to campaign for conservation and environmental responsibility. That’s Jane Goodall¹.

Brett Morgen’s documentary, Jane, expands on the bare bones of this biography via recent interviews with Goodall, narration from her 2001 autobiography and – most astonishingly – footage from the National Geographic archives, shot in the 1960s by Hugo van Lawick, and believed lost until 2014. Van Lawick, as the documentary notes, is considered one of the world’s greatest nature filmmakers, and it shows. He was also for a while Jane Goodall’s husband: that shows, too, despite the constraints of the assignment brief (Goodall was not, for example, best pleased to be informed the National Geographic wanted footage of her washing her hair when there were chimps to look at) and the objectivity a wildlife photographer must attempt to maintain between subject and camera. But in the early years at Gombe, where the largely untrained Goodall was free to work as she best pleased and did so according to her own values rather than the established ones of the scientific community – then rather colder and more dismissive towards viewing animals as individuals with personalities rather than automatic cogs in the grind-wheel of natural selection – Gombe was not a place of enforced objectivity, and likely better for it.

But it takes a while for Jane to get to that, and it has no inclination to hurry through its story. There are many shots, particularly in the opening minutes, of Goodall by herself in the African forest; then Goodall, and later others, interacting with the chimpanzees to whom she gave names. We learn a little about her childhood, about the part of her life spent (still with van Lawick) on the Serengeti, and about her subsequent campaigning work, and much of this is accompanied by Goodall’s own thoughts on the matter. She is hardly unaware of the startling position she occupied as a young woman doing work in Africa by herself, first feared-for and required to take her mother along as chaperone, then dismissed by her looks and her age when her research challenged prior belief. She muses also on the dangers of chimpanzees, not then known, but growing apparent through the years of research; the dangers to chimpanzees by close human contact, both accidentally and as deliberate harm; and, perhaps most intimately, on how she came by her own character and the single-minded confidence that would lead a person to watch the chimps for months upon end while making no apparent progress. She makes no apologies for having no interest in marriage until she met someone who shared her passion and, when it came to a choice between husband and that passion, no apologies for putting the passion and her ambition first. For though we learn about Jane’s relationships with her first husband², her son and her parents, it’s clear the defining relationship of her life has been that with chimpanzees, both in aggregate and singularly.

So, from the caterpillar crawling on the branch to the infant chimp playing on the tent, Goodall’s calm, classic English accent leads the viewer through the grainy images; and though relatively few of the clips might correlate to the moments referenced, since chimps will rarely perform for camera and the most important events can hardly be predicted – that’s of no consequence. If we don’t see it as it happened first we are, after all, used to the illusions of cinema, and being in the right place and the right time – Africa, the young Jane Goodall with her hair back in the loose ponytail she still wears today – they are truer than many, weaving a tale it is difficult not to be drawn into. (Though it does get a little didactic towards the end, which is no crime in itself but clumsily shoehorned here.)

The strange thing about this is it almost disguises the fact that Brett Morgen, as a filmmaker, has not done anything outstanding. The critical world has been full of praise for this documentary – well, yes. Van Lawick’s footage is universally gorgeous and Goodall’s strength of character and intelligence shine through: beyond this, the construction of the documentary is on the unoriginal side. It’s very much as if Morgen, handed these impressive starting blocks from which to construct the documentary, fitted them together competently enough (and I’ll admit, combing through the archive footage must have been a hell of a job), then floundered when asked to impress upon it his own interpretation. The points of focus feel as though they’ve been riffed from Goodall’s autobiography and, if so, she must take credit for the narrative structure of Jane, which races through emotional milestones without lingering long enough to let their impact sink in, repeats itself to the point of patronisation, and uses trite, overblown musical prompts to spell out the moment’s mood. And as a result it is merely very good when, given the materials and subject matter at hand, it could well have been brilliant.

Goodall is very media-savvy and this film as much as anything will show her as she wants the world to see, but you can be both astute and genuine. There can be little doubt her love of chimps, and of the natural world more broadly, has driven her for fifty years; little doubt too, though it receives passing mention in this up-close-and-personal work, of the impact she’s had upon both the scientific and environmentalist communities. Jane treats us to details in the life of a remarkable woman from a perspective once thought lost forever. Even if Morgen might have been less condescending in his musical motifs, it’s well worth the watch. Because that’s Jane Goodall – the first and grandest of the Trimates³, and perhaps the most important primatologist in history.

¹Some details which didn’t make it make it into the film but which this writer considers interesting: in 1962, after first developing her own ideas on chimp behaviour and marking herself out as an independent thinker, Goodall became a student of Newnham College, Cambridge as one of the few people to study for a PhD without first receiving a bachelor’s degree; she is vegetarian; and in 1987 or so Gary Larson referenced her in a comic which the staff at the Jane Goodall Institute described as an “atrocity” but Goodall herself was apparently quite entertained by.

²You wouldn’t know it from Jane, but Goodall has been married twice. Her second husband, Derek Bryceson, died of cancer in 1980 after about five years of marriage.

³There were three women who set out, via the encouragement of palaeoanthropologist Louis Leakey, to study then-unknown great ape species in the 1960s and ‘70s. The second, the bombastic Dian Fossey, was immortalised in the 1988 Gorillas in the Mist three years following her murder at still-unconfirmed hands; the third, Birute Galdikas, is less well-known but like Goodall campaigns for environmental conservation and primate protection, in addition to continuing her research on orangutans in Indonesia. The unfortunate alternative name for the group is “Leakey’s Angels”. So now you know.

The first of our co-hosted Central DOCS Club screenings with Picturehouse Central saw ’78/52′, the story of Hitchcock’s famous shower scene, screened and followed by a discussion.

Katie Jackson continues the discussion with her review of the documentary.

The most famous scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho’ (1960) is undoubtedly that shower scene: Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) enters the bathroom never to leave it again, only a third of a way through the film. The scene has transcended generations, with children growing up knowing it as a symbol of horror, even if they don’t know where it’s from. It has been re-done and reimagined time and time again in horror movies and spoofs alike.

It is this legacy that has led a trail of fanatics in its wake, re-watching this film over and over again. Alexandre O. Philippe’s ‘78/52’ is a tribute to all of those people, as well as Alfred Hitchcock and the team who created Psycho. It is a brilliant documentary, shot in black and white as a homage to the original film, which delves deep into the many layers of that scene.

It features detailed insights and fun anecdotes from a range of different people, including editors, horror directors, film historians and Marli Renfro, who played Janet Leigh’s body double. Hitchcock himself also makes a few appearances through old archive footage.

78/52 is a 90-minute-long documentary about a one-minute scene, which does at times feel like it’s being drawn out for the sake of it. However, it does meticulously unravel the many technical and contextual components that led up to and surround this scene, all given by a group of knowledgable people who clearly feel inspired by this movie moment, making it all the more compelling.

It is an almost undisputed fact in the world of cinema that Hitchcock was a (slightly crazy) filmmaking genius, who revolutionised cinema at the time. 78/52 perfectly demonstrates why this is true from every conceivable aspect, while putting its main focus on one of the most famous film scenes of all time, ending with an in-depth play-by-play.

One theme touched upon in the documentary is how voyeurism plays a central role throughout Psycho. Even this theme is brought into 78/52 itself as we sit and watch the likes of Eli Roth and Richard Stanley, enraptured by that iconic scene on the TV screens in front of them. It is small touches like these that make this a more sophisticated documentary than most.

Although 78/52 can seem a little pretentious and slow at times, and is another film in a long line of documentaries and movies about Psycho, it is definitely worth a watch for anyone interested in filmmaking or for those who love the genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Both Psycho fanatics and one-time watchers will definitely learn something from watching this film, leaving you with an undeniable urge to hold a Hitchcock movie marathon.

Editor-In-Chief Sofia Kourous Vazquez runs through a few films from the docs-focused London festival, which ran from the 5th to the 10th of September.

WINNERS

Grand Jury Award: ‘Purge This Land’ (Lee Anne Schmitt)

This is a documentary that shies away from people and focuses instead on spaces. How can historical locations and spaces convey their story when paired with spoken word and sound? Schmitt tells the story of John Brown, a radical white abolitionist who came to believe violent armed conflict was the only way to achieve liberation for the oppressed peoples of the United States; indeed, the film’s title is taken from a Brown quote, in which he states ‘the crimes of this guilty land can never be purged away but with blood’. As the film travels across the US, tracing Brown’s activities and visiting scenes of other events significant to American slavery, segregation, and racial relations history, the director reflects on more recent events and her personal life — Schmitt’s partner is a black man, and her child is mixed race. The film skillfully conveys the emotional through objective facts. Its glances back at the violence, prejudice, and discrimination that occurred less than a century ago are reminders of the complex and problematic heritage of a nation, and honours the importance of remembrance and ongoing critical examination.

Emerging International Filmmaker Award: ‘Taste of Cement’ (Ziad Kalthoum)

Kalthoum bathes a construction site in Beirut in beautiful golden light as he silently documents the monotonous lives of the Syrian labourers who work here. The men have a 7pm curfew, after which they descend for rest through a hole into the gloomy foundation of the building. The primary footage of slow, repetitive, mechanical labour — the stacking of bricks, the drilling of holes, the steady ascension of the site lift that takes the workers up every morning and down at night — is interspersed with clips from Syria, for as these men lift buildings out of the ground in their host country, their towns back home are being demolished by bombs.

This is a quiet film, ruled by stillness and rhythm, but sink too deeply into viewing comfort and you’ll be jolted back to reality. Despite its beautiful images, ‘Taste of Cement’ won’t let you forget the sad irony of its subjects’ situation. It’s observational, but rather muted. You might long for more but maybe that’s the point. For these Syrian men, the past is being erased; their futures perhaps as well. The present is their only reality, and this is where the film makes its nest.

OTHER HIGHLIGHTS

‘Photon’ (Norman Leto)

‘Photon’ is Leto’s second full-length feature and he isn’t planning on quitting anytime soon, but honestly he could. He has every right to be that proud of himself. This film is the product of hard work and vision. It is designed. In it, a pleasant, authoritative, and slightly humorous narrator traces the history of the universe. We start at the Big Bang and end, well, in the future, with predictions (or warnings?!) of what’s to come. Voice aside, what establishes the film as something unique are the visuals, including fascinating and often beautiful computer animations of particles, organisms, embryonic development. You can’t tear your eyes away, and you don’t want to. Sometimes what you see is shocking. Towards the end, what you hear definitely is. You will question the meaning of your life and the course of humanity in this impressive example of avant-garde documentary. Seek out where this is showing, sit back, and let it happen.

‘Atelier de Conversation’ (Bernhard Braunstein)

A charming little package of warm and high-quality documentary film-making. Multiple times a week, a free French conversation workshop convenes at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. All sorts of characters, all of them foreigners, come along with the desire to improve their skills. Their interactions and communication, guided by an instructor, are sometimes humorous, sometimes heated, sometimes touching, and always colourful. Even when differences arise, the participants are united by the willing vulnerability that accompanies learning a new language. This is what Braunstein captures so compassionately. ‘Atelier’ is a lovely patchwork quilt of humanity to cosy yourself up with. It’s simple, and it works.

Open City Documentary Film Festival was founded in 2011 by the UCL-based film school of the same name. The 2016 edition was hosted at the university. This year, the festival was based in the Southbank Bargehouse Oxo building and ran screenings at venues across London including the ICA, Picturehouse Central, Genesis Cinema, and Regent Street Cinema.

Editor-In-Chief Sofia Kourous Vazquez reviews Avi Mograbi’s latest documentary feature.

Natural light softly fills a plain, spacious room. Chalk writings and drawings decorate the back walls. In front of these, a group of men playfully act out the rise and fall of democracy and dictatorships in their home countries. This sounds difficult. It’s not. These men prove that all you need to tell their stories are a few wooden stools to stand on and a healthy dose of humour.

The men on-screen are refugees, many from Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Sudan. They eat and sleep at the HOLOT detention centre, where they wait for months, and often years, for news on their refugee status — a legal protection Israel rarely grants — and their futures. Voluntarily participating in weekly drama workshops organised by filmmaker Avi Mograbi and theatre director Chen Alon, they engage with each other and their difficult situations through exercises and improvisation. Their performance space? An abandoned military hangar near the facility. Proximity is key because, though they are permitted to leave HOLOT, roll call is taken three times a day, greatly restricting their freedom.

In Between Fences (Bein gderot), Israeli filmmaker Avi Mograbi spotlights the faces of immigration detention in his country. Though maintaining the unconventional approach and activist spirit of his past works, his latest film expands, with warm aesthetic sense, beyond politics and into the essence of humanity. Mograbi steps back from his usual quasi-protagonism, and instead hands the story, and power, over to the subjects.

It might initially sound dull to learn about the struggles of escaping persecution, crossing borders, and navigating immigration bureaucracy through basic re-enactment by non-actors, but the delicate nature of the migration and asylum-seeking process are difficult to document without creating some ethical dilemmas. Through ‘Theatre of the Oppressed’ technique, elaborated by Brazilian stage director Augusto Boal in the 1970s, the refugee subjects in Between Fences are empowered. The approach puts the performers, called spect-actors, in control of the dramatisation, which becomes fluid and meaningful through their different added inputs and interference. The result is extremely moving.

One scene the men act out is an incident at a playground in Tel Aviv where Israeli parents passive-aggressively instruct their children to avoid their black playmates and, in the ensuing confrontation, call for the “infiltrators” to get out of their neighbourhood. Another depicts an asylum-seeker being bribed and blackmailed by Israeli immigration officers to return to his country of origin, or else face arbitrary imprisonment. In many of the skits, the detainees are joined by white, Israeli participants intrigued by the workshops.

Crying out into an imagined desert, a huddle of people reach the fence on the border between Egypt and Israel. They cover themselves with thin, invisible blankets and gather together for warmth. “Please! We are asylum-seekers! Please help us!” On the other side of the barrier, guards angrily urge them to turn back. “Please! We are cold and hungry!” The guards shake the non-existent fence and, through mime, threateningly point their weapons. Like many of the scenes in Between Fences, only the fuzz of a mic or boom pole dipping into frame serve to alert us that what we are watching is not actually happening. The harsh desert wind feels real; at just the right moment, the pane-less windows of the hangar lets in a breeze that ruffles the actors’ clothes and flutters the hair of the young Israeli woman also playing the part of a refugee.

The fourth wall does not exist in the Theatre of the Oppressed, and Mograbi does away with it in his documentary as well. We often see the director involving himself in the workshops, wearing his headphones and sound recording equipment as he does, and the cameras are also often keen to join in. The result is unorthodox but comforting. In a Q&A following a screening of Between Fences at the ICA, Mograbi revealed he could not include the most touching moment of the shoot, which involved one of the Eritrean migrants sharing his need to risk returning home to be united with his newly orphaned son, because the footage was ruined by the director’s crying and resulting shaky camera work. “I’m sorry I could not be more professional, but…” He gives a sheepish smile and shrugs. Personally, I am glad professionalism is sometimes tossed aside; it is good to know there is empathy behind the camera.

Empathy is indeed the film’s greatest achievement. The footage from the workshops is interspersed with clips of informal interviews of HOLOT’s detainees and documentation of the centre’s exterior, enriching the material with deeper insights into the state of limbo the men are trapped in. Between Fences is a process. Comfort increases as it progresses, and the documentary practice becomes more authentic when it confronts and questions itself in the various small turning points.

This film surprised me. Not only interesting in subject matter and innovative in format — to be expected from Mograbi — it is beautifully presented as well. Fluid camerawork imbues the film with a quiet vibrancy to match the spirits of its endearing subjects. Subtle sound design effectively uses silence to create space for emotion and communication. At other times, the natural audio is overlaid with singing, adding a poignant touch to the communal moments. Between Fences does not ask questions, and it certainly does not provide answers. It listens, suspending itself ambiguously between hope and hopelessness.

Between Fences was released in January 2017. It was screened in August in cinemas across the UK as part of ‘Crossings: Stories of Migration’, an ICA-led film and events programme supported by the BFI. Watch a clip from the film below.

Our Documentary Producer Nick Mastrini reviews Kirsten Johnson’s documentary – “a stunning exploration of personal experiences, piecing together a global adventure to contemplate the nature of memory and perspective.”

The beauty of documentary filmmaking comes through its serendipity — the moments when, by virtue of a filmmaker simply being present in a certain situation, the completely unexpected and inexplicable happens. The film Derrida, with cinematography by Kirsten Johnson, begins with the French philosopher Jacques Derrida outlining his views regarding the present and the future. He sees two types of future: that which can be anticipated and ‘will be’, and that which is impossible to anticipate.

Of the latter, he says: ‘For me, that is the real future. Derrida sees the present as the anticipation of the near future alongside the ‘retention’ of the recent past, continually unfolding relative to this balance between expectation and memory. Perhaps, having shadowed Derrida for weeks, tracking his errant thoughts, Johnson’s sense of time, so beautifully represented by Cameraperson, was spurred by the philosopher’s musings.

Cameraperson ebbs from nation to nation, experience to experience, all from the perspective of Johnson. The idea of retention is crucial to understanding the impact of every image; Johnson is in dialogue with her past self, returning to the instances of serendipity that stayed with her over the last 25 years. Every emotive moment accumulates into a narrative of a lifetime, using the benefit of hindsight to note the significance of individual experiences within the bigger picture of a career. In Johnson’s case, a career of using the camera allows for these experiences to be rewoven into an autobiographical narrative that recalls what was seen at first sight.

Meanwhile, the retrospection is also an exploration of the morality of documentary filmmaking, of the presence of the camera in a real situation. A stunning scene sees a boxer lose a tight decision at the Brooklyn Center. Johnson’s camera tilts from the jumbotron’s screen to the reality of the ring below, before the disgruntled fighter storms out of the ropes, past Johnson and into the changing rooms. Johnson follows, unafraid of the boxer’s aggression and unpredictability. Indeed, it is this unpredictability that Johnson desires to capture, even when risk is involved. The scene concludes with the young man finding solace in his mother’s arms, a stark counterpoint to his frenzy.

Johnson finds the themes at the core of each scene and connects memory to memory without any commentary aside from the impact of editing, allowing the audience to infer what it all meant to the cinematographer. The theme of familial love, particularly mothers, abounds, and the reason why becomes clearer as the film unfolds. Johnson intersperses footage of her mother as she copes with Alzheimer’s, causing viewers to interpret the images of motherly love with added significance. An incredible scene sees a midwife revive a newly-born child with limited oxygen in Nigeria. The camera lingers, depicting the quiet assurance of the nurse and the nervous utterances of the Johnson behind the camera, highlighting the tension between her role as a cameraperson and as a human being.

This tension finds an almost comic presence in a scene in Bosnia, as a young child plays with an axe with startling recklessness. This is part of another consistent thread that depicts Johnson’s experiences in post-war Bosnia. There, her relationship with a rural family proves the power of documentary film in capturing the impact of history on humble individuals and communities. Towards the film’s conclusion, she returns to the family to the family to show them footage of their younger selves, and its purpose in the documentary she helped to create. In response to this time capsule, the family’s gratitude is clear. It is gratitude for a career that has captured the inexhaustible variety of life, and Cameraperson captures one life with equal elegance.

4/4

Cameraperson is screening in select UK cinemas and is available now on Digital HD – for more info head to Dogwoof.com/Cameraperson. See the trailer below:

Check out more of Nick’s reviews on Within and Without.