Aired on PBS's American Masters series, this biographical portrait of 20th-century photographer Dorothea Lange was directed by an insider, filmmaker Dyanna Taylor—Lange's own granddaughter. Taylor also taps into precious archival material shot by Phil Greene in the early 1960s, interviewing the aged Lange not long before her death from esophageal cancer, as the artist gathered her negatives and prints for a career-retrospective exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art. The documentary looks at Lange's early life among the Bohemian crowds of New York and San Francisco, and her first marriage to a California painter, who had no objection to his new wife opening her own photo studio/salon. The relationship ended (more or less amicably) when Lange met Paul Schuster Taylor, an economist assigned to cover the displaced farmers and struggling migrant workers of the Great Depression. Lange's developing social conscience and established skills at composition resulted in powerful and classic images, most notably "Migrant Mother." Later, Lange took pictures of the internment camps used to imprison Japanese-Americans during WWII (the U.S. military hired her but then suppressed the work) and, despite chronic health problems, created photo montages of the changing California landscape (making her somewhat of a pioneering environmentalist). Authors interviewed here include Richard Steven Street, Jan Goggans, Anne Whiston Spirn, and Lange biographer Elizabeth Partridge. A fine biography of a famed shutterbug, this is highly recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (C. Cassady)
Dorothea Lange: Grab a Hunk of Lightning
(2014) 108 min. DVD: $24.99 ($54.99 w/PPR). PBS Video. SDH captioned. ISBN: 978-1-62789-078-6. Volume 30, Issue 2
Dorothea Lange: Grab a Hunk of Lightning
Star Ratings
As of March 2022, Video Librarian has changed from a four-star rating system to a five-star one. This change allows our reviewers to have a wider range of critical viewpoints, as well as to synchronize with Google’s rating structure. This change affects all reviews from March 2022 onwards. All reviews from before this period will still retain their original rating. Future film submissions will be considered our new 1-5 star criteria.
Order From Your Favorite Distributor Today: