INTERVIEW: New doc puts Robert Frank in frame
Photo: Robert Frank and June Leaf are the subjects of Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank. Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment / Provided by Film Forum press site with permission.
Robert Frank’s 1950s publication The Americans was a watershed moment for the photography world. His depictions of a lost, struggling and hurting America captured audiences, instigated debates and made a name of the Beat Generation artist.
Frank, now in his 90s, continues to create work, and on occasion he allows an outsider to come in and understand the process of photography and his views on coming to the United States from Switzerland as an immigrant, living and working in New York City, and deciding to move to Mabou, a small fishing village in Nova Scotia.
If any of this sounds familiar it might be because Frank was the subject of a much-heralded documentary a few years ago called Don’t Blink — Robert Frank. However, the source material — the life and times of a documenter of social life — is too rich a subject for only one exposé.
Enter director Gerald Fox, who finished his portrait of Frank, Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank, 15 years ago, but it had never made it to movie theaters in the United States. Now audiences at New York City’s Film Forum have a chance to see this highly intimate and thoughtful documentary.
“When Robert Frank was doing a show at the Tate in Britain, he gave me permission to come and make a film,” Fox said in a recent phone interview. “I was amazed he was going to do that because people said he never does it, but he said to me, ‘You can come over.'”
Over the course of the filming, Fox tried to have Frank open up about his relationships, his fatherhood, his work and his memories. The director largely succeeds with opening up the artist, even though at times the photographer seems somewhat reserved and distant.
“I tried to draw him out about his life and take him on a journey back through his life, but also engage with him about his work,” Fox said. “I think what he didn’t want to do is do the interviews in a very formal sort of way. He wanted to be out and about.”
In the 85-minute feature, Frank is seen walking around the beaches of Coney Island, New York, trying to find places he photographed decades earlier. He walks the streets of New York City and rides the buses. The conversations are varied and deep, from the tragedies involving his two children, his relationship with June Leaf and his thoughts on the changing landscape that is downtown Manhattan.
“I wasn’t a crazed fan like some people are about his work,” Fox admitted. “I liked him. I thought The Americans was amazing. Some of the films I thought were interesting. He was an amazing photographer, but I don’t think I was somebody who was completely mesmerized by the work. I probably didn’t even know it as well as other people, which maybe is part of why he wanted somebody who is not totally obsessed with his work. I think I admired his work, but I wasn’t completely somebody who was going to do what June Leaf was complaining about, these people who worship him.”
When he was following Frank, Fox didn’t want hagiography. He also knew that Frank understood the cinematic process; after all, the photographer directed a legendary Rolling Stones documentary and also worked with Jack Kerouac on cinematic projects.
“I think always when you make a film, you need to admire the subject and grow to admire the subject because you’ve got to stay with it for a long time in order to make the film and to be passionate enough to look into his whole life and career,” Fox said. “But at the same time you need a little bit of distance, otherwise it becomes sort of hagiography. Even though I didn’t want to put other critics into the film because it was such a lovely story that he was telling … at the same time I hope there’s a sense that the audience can make up their own mind about what they think about the photographs.”
Frank didn’t have any final say over Leaving Home, Coming Home, so Fox felt free to take the film in any direction he wanted. However, Frank’s photographs and films populate the work, which left some hurdles for distribution.
Here’s how the story goes, according to press notes: Fox made the film following a commission by the South Bank Show, a leading arts documentary series, and the doc was intended to accompany a retrospective of Frank’s work at the Tate Modern in London. That version, running approximately 60 minutes, played with the exhibition and was broadcast on ITV. It went on to win prestigious awards, including the Grierson Best Arts Documentary.
International distribution was not secured because Frank owns the copyright over his images and films, and the photographer wasn’t sure the open conversations about his life should be shared with all. Many years later, Fox gathered the courage to reintroduce himself to Frank at his downtown studio, and the photographer allowed Leaving Home, Coming Home to play in cinemas.
In some ways, the circuitous journey of the documentary mimics the distribution for Frank’s own Rolling Stones documentary, C***sucker Blues. Fox said that legendary film can only be presented three times per year and with Frank in person at the screenings, which means it is virtually never shown.
The release of this artistic portrait must be extremely satisfying for Fox. Audiences are finally seeing his work and experiencing Frank’s work anew.
“In a sense, you’re looking back at a man’s life over a long period, and I don’t think it matters whether it was made now,” the director said. “In fact, I don’t think if I told a lot of people that it was made now, apart from the look of New York and the adverts, the story of him would be the same really, so I think it speaks to audiences now. And I hope it will speak to them in many years to come. He had ideas about being a photographer, but also about life and also how you deal with these tragedies and the change in his life from New York to living in seclusion up there in Mabou. I feel very strongly it’s great that it’s finally being seen by audiences in America because it’s a very American story I think.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank is now playing New York City’s Film Forum. Click here for more information and tickets.
