The Autobiographical Documentary in America

262 Pages·2002·1.279 MB·English

by  Jim Lane

The Autobiographical
Documentary in America
Wisconsin Studies in Autobiography
William L. Andrews
General Editor
The Autobiographical
Documentary
in America
Jim Lane
The University of Wisconsin Press
The University of Wisconsin Press
Monroe Street
Madison, Wisconsin 
www.wisc.edu/wisconsinpress/
Henrietta Street
London WCE LU, England
Copyright © 
The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
All rights reserved
    
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lane, Jim, –
The autobiographical documentary in America / Jim Lane.
262 pp. cm. — (Wisconsin studies in autobiography)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN ---(cloth: alk. paper)
ISBN ---(paper: alk. paper)
. Autobiography. . Documentary films—United States.
I. Title. II. Series.
CT.L 
.—dc 
For Kate, Emma, and my friend Jaromil

Contents
Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 
 The Convergence of Autobiography and Documentary:
Historical Connections 
 David Holzman’s Diary:An Unlikely Beginning 
 The Journal Entry Approach: Narrative, Chronology, and
Autobiographical Claims 
 Autobiographical Portraiture: Family and Self 
 Women and the Autobiographical Documentary: Historical
Intervention, Writing, Alterity, and the Dialogic Engagement 
Afterword 
Notes 
Filmography 
Works Cited 
Index 
vii

Illustrations
L.M. Kit Carson as the confrontational David Holzman,
ca.  
Ed and Jane Pincus (Diaries [–]) 
Mark Rance’s mother and uncle Howard searching for her
father’s grave (Death and the Singing Telegram[]) 
Ross McElwee with a member of a southern survivalist group
that he encountered while filming Sherman’s March() 
Mark Massi and Tom Joslin (Silverlake Life: The View from
Here[]) 
Filmmaker Alfred Guzzetti’s grandfather, Beniamino
Giovanni Verlengia; grandmother, Pauline Verlengia;
and mother, Susan, as a baby (Family Portrait Sittings) 
Chaim Ravett as a boy, ca. , in a Polish school photograph
(Everything’s for You) 
Robb Moss in a publicity shot for The Tourist() 
Tony Buba with the depressed Braddock, Pennsylvania, in the
background (Lightning over Braddock []) 
The eponymous Joe and Maxi, ca.  
A young Christa, ca. , around the time of her adoption 
Mindy Faber constructs a life puppet (Delirium[]) 
ix