synopsis

Subway is a subterranean passage that lies somewhere between fiction and diary, with literal and psychological overtones from the late ’60s. Framed within a ride on the Harvard/Ashmont Subway Line at rush hour–as the train fills and then empties, moving further from downtown Boston while I direct my 7-year-old nephew, Ben, to stand and look around, sit, get off, watch himself depart, get back on, and walk away–intercut with various scenes from my on-going (Bolex) film diary; seagulls circling, anti-war street demonstration past Playboy Club in downtown Boston, large dogs leaping into saltwater, crowd on escalator, Ben’s image in surveillance camera, twilight through half-built, backlit Coop City under construction…

The impulse for multiple layering, juxtaposition and other interplay of disparate imagery seemed to come naturally, even after having spent some years co-making documentary films. At the same time this film comes closer to a narrative structure than anything I’ve made before or since, with the exception of PSSSHT!

notes

My 1st solo film is a subterranean fusion of fiction and diary, with literal and psychological overtones from the late ’60s. Framed within a ride on the Boston subway at rush hour, the train fills and empties as I direct my nephew Ben in simple moves – intercut with disparate images my on-going film diary. Multiple layering, juxtaposition and other interplay of imagery seemed my second nature, and so the end of my attempt to direct, and the start of a life-long search for a film language of my own making.

screenings

Group show, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA (1972)