A Photographic Memory (2024) True/False Film Festival

Photographer Rachel Elizabeth Seed never knew her mother, other than as an idea. Seed‘s mother passed away when she was only 18 months old. She knew her mom was a photographer  but she really didn’t know what that meant until she became one herself.  Deciding to try and find out who who her mom really was she started to dig into to her mother’s archives as well as reaching out to her friends, many of whom were some of the great photographers of the 20th century.

This wonderful portrait of a young woman and her mother is going to really hit home for most people. The quest to find out about a love one after they are gone is something many people have done and seeing someone go through the process and find wonderful gems is a real treat.   We should all be so lucky as to find out all these cool things.

One of the joys for me was getting to hear from the various photographers that Seed knew and interviewed. Having a brother who worked as photographer for years it was wonderful to get to put voices and faces together with names I’ve been  hearing for decades.

The bigger joy of the film, the real point of the film,  is seeing Seed connect with her mom.  This is a journey too many people never get to take. Watching Seed get to know her mom made me smile.

Recommended.

Wrestling with There Was, There Was Not (2024) True/False Film Fest

I have spent the better part of the last week trying to find words to discuss THERE WAS,THERE WAS NOT.  The film is a portrait of a once upon a time country called Atsakh that lay between Armenia and Azerbaijan that was wanted by both countries. They went to war  to gain the disputed land and wiped Atsakh off the map, not that anyone but the citizens, cared.

The film is a portrait of five women in Atsakh whose lives are changed. a politician, an Olympic-hopeful athlete, a domestic violence activist, a painter and a woman who disarms land mines for a living. Over the course of the film we watch as the women discuss their lives and watch as their country goes from existing to not

There is so much here that needs to be unpacked and discussed. This is a film that has so many levels operating at the same time that it's hard to know where to begin. Certainly the fact that film doesn't fully hit you until it's done and you are thinking about it after the end credits roll. I know that the film seems like it's just the story of the women, but then things change and as the conflict comes it changes, and then you get to the end and it's changed again as we learn Ataskh has ceased to exist. This is a present day version of what happened in and around the Second World War.

There is an enormity of emotion and a hurricane of thoughts that I am having trouble expressing. 

The problem with writing on the film has been that each time attack the piece I have found that I went too much on one subject and left something out.  I would restart  and then go off in another direction, only to find the need to start over and do it again.

I thought that what I simply needed to do was rewatch the film... but that sent me going off in other directions.

I can not imagine what would have happened if I saw this at a festival and had to move on to something right after this.

If you haven't noticed, I have a high opinion of the film. It has kicked me to the curb six ways to Sunday, forcing me to think about a lot of things that don't have easy answers.  Because I am still wrestling with the film I am going to suggest that you buy a ticket and take a ride. Just know that the film is considerably more than the simple log line they are using.

And do me a favor, after you see the film please come back and tell me what you think, both of the film and the larger issues it is raising.