Three by Ross McElwee

ABOUT THE SERIES:

The American Cinematheque is honored to welcome luminary documentary filmmaker, Ross McElwee, for an in-person tribute featuring some of his greatest contributions to independent cinema, alongside the West Coast premiere of his newest project REMAKE. Among the exceptional cinéma vérité filmmakers, McElwee’s blend of larger historical or philosophical topics with interpersonal explorations has awed viewers for decades, offering a deeply personal lens in which universal experiences become intimately felt.

Opening a double feature is the restoration premiere of SHERMAN’S MARCH, McElwee’s profound vérité project that earned itself the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for its honest introspection and exploration about how personal and professional endeavors intertwine. On the second half of the bill, the personal essay PHOTOGRAPHIC MEMORY again turns the camera on the filmmaker, as he grapples with his son’s retreat into the online world and his venture to understand himself at his son’s age. The tribute will close with McElwee’s most recent work, REMAKE, an intimate and anguished retrospection on the filmmaker’s life that directly confronts the unimaginable trauma of a father losing his son.

Join us as we celebrate filmmaker Ross McElwee and his remarkable contribution to documentary cinema.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKER: 

Ross McElwee is an American documentary filmmaker whose work blends autobiography, cultural observation and humor. His breakthrough film SHERMAN’S MARCH won the Sundance Grand Jury Prize.  In that film, he learned to embrace the joy that sometimes occurs while working in his modified approach to cinéma verité, an approach which could yield moments of life effortlessly, and frequently humorously, unfolding before the camera.

McElwee has made ten feature-length documentaries, which have premiered at such festivals as Sundance, Berlin, Cannes, and Venice three times.  He has received numerous career honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Pennebaker Award. In 2005, MoMA presented a full retrospective of his work, later shown in Paris, Seoul, Quito, Madrid, Portugal and Moscow.   In 2024, The French Ministry of Culture awarded McElwee the rank of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres for his filmmaking.

McElwee taught courses in documentary filmmaking in Harvard’s Department of Art, Film, and Visual Studies for over twenty years.  He retired in 2024 and is now Professor Emeritus based at Harvard, where he continues to work on his films.