Documentary Film: "Our Time" – A Review
Wednesday, June 24th, 2009Last weekend was the Fourth Annual Solstice Film Festival in Minneapolis,MN. According to the organizers, “The Solstice Organization, over the past 4 years, has solidified itself as one of the premiere newcomers in the film industry. Solstice Film Festival, has garnered a reputation of being one the best film festivals in the mid-west. The 2009 Solstice Film Festival once again boasts an award-winning program featuring exclusive premieres, top-notch short galleries and thought provoking documentaries.”
Quite frankly, I was a bit disappointed. While the overall quality was generally good, with over 800 submissions, I expected more.
There were, however, a couple of blog-worthy entries: “Bicycle Dreams” which I will discuss on Working With Others; and “Our Time” which I’ll address here.
Directed by Matt Heineman and Matt Wiggins, Our Time originally premiered as The Young Americans Project. Here is the official synopsis:
What’s up with kids these days? After graduating from college, four friends load up an RV and embark on a journey across America to find out what their generation is really about. The group travels to all 48 continental states asking their peers the same questions they had been asking themselves. They explore issues such as race, the Internet, political awareness, the environment and pop culture. Along the road the foursome meets a cross section of American society, ranging from a farmer in Kansas to a drug dealer in New Mexico, from a cancer researcher in Boston to the founder of Facebook in Silicon Valley. ‘The Young Americans Project’ is a passionate portrayal of a generation, a meditation on coming of age in 21st Century America, and a rallying cry against apathy.
I’ve had some first hand experience with documentary films and film makers. What you learn very early on is that you may start out wanting to make a film about “A” and you end up with something about “B”. And the best documentary films have a “cinema verite” quality about them where the film makers let the story come to them as it unfolds rather than trying to influence or shape it in a certain way. Eudora Welty’s approach of “listening for a story” works well here.
In the narration at the beginning of the film, you hear these words:
“Much of what is said about Generation Y comes from people who are not part of it… This generation is too big and too diverse to fit under one label”.
What strikes me about this documentary is that Heineman and Wiggins stuck to the premise that this generation is “too big and diverse” and they let the film show that. However, when I watched this film – and I hope everyone who has the opportunity will also see it – I found myself asking at least two questions. First, what do each of the people featured really have in common with one another? For example, what does Facebook founder Mark Zuckerman have in common with Xavier Jirron from New Mexico? And second, what are the similarities and differences between the coming of age of my Boomer Generation and that of Gen Y?
In considering the first question, what jumps out at me is the entrepreneurial aspect of the members of this generation. In just about each of the examples you have people engaging life the best that they know how, meeting it on its own terms, and trying to make a difference by not plugging into a big corporation but by creating opportunity by seeing a need and addressing it. What you also see is a generation that is essentially asking the same existential questions about what is next – some more deeply than others.
In some ways answering the second question is actually easier. When I was in college, my parents’ generation had about as many complimentary things to say about us as the older generations did about Gen Y in this film. As we paraded around in our blue work shirts and red arm bands (OK-I was one of those people!) we were as much a puzzlement as the twenty-somethings are with their flip-flops, tattoos and cell-phones. And we both had an undercurrent of discontent about the establishment. Ours was about the Vietnam War and the military industrial complex. I see Gen Y as having more of a steady push for change or at least questioning just about every institution. And I think that examination is not only a good thing, it is a necessary thing.
What I really appreciated about Our Time was that it was a film about Gen Y by Gen Y. As someone who primary focus is helping members of each generation work and play well together, I am constantly in learning mode. It was just nice to have a data point about the Millennials that was not another survey or book. Hearing the voices of this generation has, if nothing else, increased my interest in not only wanting to understand them, but also wanting them to succeed.
If others have seen Our Time I’d love to hear your comments. Its next screening is during the ACEFEST on July 11, 2009 at 4:30PM at the Tribeca Cinemas, 54 Varick Street, NY, NY.
