Cameraperson
It seems fitting that, to close out the year I finally watched Koyaanisqatsi, I also got to watch Cameraperson — which is in many ways, and none of them dismissive or demeaning to either film, a funhouse mirror of its antecedent.
Koyaanisqatsi is a film that's very interested in collage and rapidity, and at times felt like a sensory HIIT where you feel the push and the rest and the push and the rest, and the cavalcade of stock washes over you.
Cameraperson is an antithesis — is collage, yes, assembled from around a dozen or so vignettes, all of them quiet, both literally and figuratively, but meticulously placed so that you, the viewer, are given the space and time to form the connections yourself.
The dialogue in this film is spartan; the visuals are arresting and deliberate. Nothing feels wasteful.
Kristen Johnson is very interested in relationships between storytelling and memory and between identity and witness. She is interested in the vastness and fragility of human existence. She does not have many answers; she wants you to help her find them.
The best movies take you places: sometimes that is into someone's head, sometimes that is into a Nigerian NICU.
She takes you there quietly, never flinching, never letting go of your hand. I don't know what else to say. I think it's somewhat disingenuous to call it an entertaining movie, but it's certainly an enchanting one, and I am different and better for having watched it.