''News from Home'' is a 1977

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

directed by

Chantal Akerman Chantal Anne Akerman (; 6 June 19505 October 2015) was a Belgian film director, screenwriter, artist, and Film studies, film professor at the City College of New York. She is best known for films such as ''Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 108 ...

. The film consists of long takes of locations in New York City set to Akerman's

voice-over Voice-over (also known as off-camera or off-stage commentary) is a production technique where a voice—that is not part of the narrative (non-Diegetic#Film sound and music, diegetic)—is used in a radio, television production, filmmaking, th ...

as she reads letters that her mother sent her between 1971 and 1973 when Akerman lived in the city.

Production

In November 1971, at the age of 21, Belgian film director Chantal Akerman moved to New York City. There she took petty jobs, made films and befriended filmmakers such as

Jonas Mekas Jonas Mekas (; December 24, 1922 – January 23, 2019) was a Lithuanian-American filmmaker, poet, and artist who has been called "the godfather of American avant-garde cinema". Mekas' work has been exhibited in museums and at festivals worldwi ...

and the cinematographer

Babette Mangolte Babette Mangolte is a French cinematographer, film director, and photographer who has lived and worked in the United States since 1970. Life and career Mangolte was born and raised in France and moved to New York City in 1970. She attended L'Eco ...

, who became one of her recurring collaborators. According to Akerman, she spent the period living "like a vagabond." Principal photography for ''News from Home'' took place in the summer of 1976, three years after Akerman had returned to Belgium and after she had achieved critical success with the 1975 film ''

Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles ''Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles'' (, "Jeanne Dielman, 23 Commerce Quay, 1080 Brussels") is a 1975 drama film written and directed by Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman. It was filmed over five weeks on location in Brussels, ...

''. Locations chosen for ''News from Home'' correspond to the areas where Akerman used to take walks, which include the Times Square subway station and a long shot driving up Tenth Avenue from 30th to 49th Streets in

Hell's Kitchen Hell's Kitchen, also known as Clinton, is a neighborhood on the West Side of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is considered to be bordered by 34th Street (or 41st Street) to the south, 59th Street to the north, Eighth Avenue to the eas ...

. Other scenes were filmed in

Tribeca Tribeca (), originally written as TriBeCa, is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. Its name is a syllabic abbreviation of "Triangle Below Canal Street". The "triangle" (more accurately a quadrilateral) is bounded by Canal Stre ...

and on the

Staten Island Ferry The Staten Island Ferry is a passenger ferry route operated by the New York City Department of Transportation. The ferry's single route runs through New York Harbor between the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and Staten Island, with ferry ...

. The sound was not recorded along with the images, but was added later.

Release

The film was released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

in France through Carlotta Films on 18 April 2007.

The Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films." Criterion serves film and media scholars, cinep ...

released it through its Eclipse series in 2010 as part of a set called ''Chantal Akerman in the Seventies''. The set includes four feature films that Akerman directed in the 1970s as well as a number of short films. ''News from Home'' is included on the first disc of the set, called ''The New York Films''.

References

External links

* * * 1977 films Belgian documentary films Documentary films about women Films directed by Chantal Akerman Documentary films about New York City French documentary films 1970s French-language films 1970s avant-garde and experimental films Women in New York City French-language Belgian films 1970s French films {{bio-documentary-film-stub

Production

Release

See also

References

External links