Characters on the Couch
Film & Television Blog
by Dr. Sandra Cohen
LADY BIRD
Mothers & Daughters
How History Plays Its Part
In Problems Loving and Letting Go
and Lady Bird begins with a Joan Didion quote splashed across the screen: “Anyone who talks about California hedonism has never spent Christmas in Sacramento.” Christmas is mostly for children or, at least, the child part of us. And, few come through childhood unscathed. Greta Gerwig’s charming, brilliantly written, funny, and psychologically real film has…
LEO HURWITZ
DIALOGUE WITH A WOMAN DEPARTED 1972-1980
A Poem Of Love To A Wife
Who Lived In Protest Against Hate
Shoot Film, Not People: this is the poster filmmaker Peggy Lawson, Leo Hurwitz’s wife, carried during a march against the Vietnam War. As we watch Dialogue With A Woman Departed, (Watch Film) Leo’s 4-hour love poem to Peggy, we come back to this sign again and again. Again and again, we come back to Peggy:…
LEO HURWITZ
THOUGHTS ON THE MAKING OF
DISCOVERY IN A PAINTING
A film by Leo Hurwitz &Manfred Kirchheimer
This Piece Is Written By Manfred Kirchheimer Featured in Photo Below Manfred Kirchheimer’s thoughts on the Making of Discovery in a Painting with Leo Hurwitz: In 1968 Leo Hurwitz and Manfred Kirchheimer filmed an early version of Cezanne’s Still Life with Apples, to be called Journey into a Painting at the Museum of Modern Art…
LEO HURWITZ
DISCOVERY IN A PAINTING 1969
Seeing & Imagining
Leo Hurwitz’s 29-minute film, Discovery in a Painting (Watch Film), is a beautiful sampling of his personal passion for seeing. Filmed at MoMA in New York City, this film is one of the various ways Leo explores the importance of seeing with open eyes. For Leo, seeing doesn’t just involve seeing what is there. More…
LEO HURWITZ
THE ART OF SEEING 1968-1970
THIS ISLAND
Seeing With Our Hearts
This Island, a Leo Hurwitz film (Watch Film)- directed and edited by Leo with co-editor Peggy Lawson and cameraman Manfred Kirchheimer – is a film about a museum: The Detroit Institute of Art. But, This Island isn’t just about a museum. It’s about discovering the meaning in art. And, that requires looking deeply and openly…
LEO HURWITZ
THE ART OF SEEING 1968 – 1970
DISCOVERY IN A LANDSCAPE
“I Will Look With Your Eyes
You Will See With Mine”
Seeing isn’t a simple thing. It often takes another person’s eyes to help us understand something in a new way. This is how Leo Hurwitz uses his eyes and camera in his The Art of Seeing series with its three films, Light And The City, Discovery In A Landscape, and This Island. In these films,…
LEO HURWITZ
THE ART OF SEEING 1968 – 1970
LIGHT AND THE CITY
If We Look – What Will We See Next?
Seeing is art for Leo Hurwitz. He sees what others refuse to see. What we see in Light and the City is a piece of this art. And, Leo never turns away from truths that need to reach the light of day. In The Art Of Seeing Series, we are once again privy to the…
LEO HURWITZ
IN SEARCH OF HART CRANE 1966
Reflections On His Suicide
& His Childhood
Leo Hurwitz’s penetrating and poetic script and his camera (with the assistance of fellow cameraman Manfred Kirchheimer) (Watch Film), follow John Unterecker, Hart Crane’s biographer (the 800-page “Voyager: A Life Of Hart Crane”), through Unterecker’s researches into Hart Crane’s life. In Search of Hart Crane is composed primarily of fascinating interviews with friends of Hart…
THE SHAPE OF WATER
Seemingly Magic Cures
Cruelty and misunderstanding can make you a monster or a mute. Guillermo del Toro’s compelling allegorical fable, The Shape of Water, shows us that quite well. We can say all the obvious things about this multi-layered film set in its backdrop of the Cold War and a high-security government laboratory in 1962 Baltimore. There’s loneliness…