Annie Leibovitz – Life through a Lens
I missed it when it was at cph:dox last year but the Swedish broadcaster SVT2 had it on its excellent strand KSpecial programme last night. And I was glad to see it. Not so much because of the film itself – which is one of those “look at this genius” programmes, where a lot of the celebrities, she had photographed was interviewed to tell us how brilliant she is. From Mick Jagger to Hillary Clinton – but because the film showed the development of a classic documentary photographer who started as an observer, who was inspired by Robert Frank and Cartier-Bresson, to end up as a set-up portrait photographer of celebrities.
Her sister made the film, that is most interesting when it describes the observational period at the cult magazine Rolling Stones where she made exceptionally good photos based on her close relationship with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, and with the members of the Rolling Stones. But not only that, also a wide range of social issues was covered by Leibovitz, a daring character, as one says about her, a person who says that “mobility is my God – as long as I´m travelling I´m happy”, a person who was able to make herself unnoticed because she as a true documentarian stayed with her characters for a long time so they forgot she was there.
The film can be bought through Amazon.
More about the film: http://www.cphdox.dk/d1/ft.lasso?s=2007106&ser=512&e=1
USA, 2006, 83 mins.
