Cameraperson

Film, not film, whatever it is, Cameraperson plays like a study not only of cinema itself, but a warm, welcome reminder that there is (ideally) an intelligence, and maybe even a bit of grace, behind the moving images that wedge themselves in our memory; that they are the handiwork of a living, thinking, feeling, sneezing human being, someone who is both camera and person.

In ways both subtle and overt, the movie continually draws our attention to the human consciousness guiding every shot, the hand that is gently yet unmistakably manipulating the image.

Cameraperson is about process and aesthetics, images and rules but it is also about empathy and ethical dilemmas.

Cameraperson’ is a thoughtful examination of the role of the documentary-maker, showing us how it feels to be that person behind the camera.

Without narration or a conventional storyline, it’s a uniquely insightful memoir-cum-critical-treatise.

As an autobiography told in pictures rather than words (including occasional glimpses of Johnson’s parents and her children), Cameraperson makes a strong case for the merits of the observational life. As a bonus, it also demonstrates what it looks like when the person who’s holding the camera sneezes.

The film shifts back and forth in time. It works like memory that way, but the memories are Johnson’s, not the viewer’s, which makes the absence of some discernible organizing principle a real drawback.

This montage of B-roll flirts with self-indulgence while simultaneously saying less about the person behind the camera than the project surely intended.