BIFF at Boulder Theater #2. Boulder, Colorado, 2014
If you get a chance, hoist your little fanny perpendicular and march yourself out the door to see this film. Or buy it through Amazon when it comes out. It is an extremely well-done documentary that is not just for photographers–so take your significant other along. I’d give it 4.9 shutter clicks out of five.
Who was Vivian Maier? That’s what the documentary asks and tries to discover. One possible answer: take a young woman with a possibly fake French accent and a Rolleiflex, then add one part Cartier-Bresson, one part Robert Frank, one part Diane Arbus, one part Mary Poppins, then throw in some dark seasoning a la Nurse Ratchet. She was a genius, a loner, and a mystery even to those who knew her (a list of folks which includes Phil Donahue).
What motivated her to accumulate tens of thousands of prints and negatives, along with a case full of undeveloped film rolls, without any apparent attempt to show them to anyone? Why did she hoard huge piles of newspapers (among many other trinkets)? Did she suffer some trauma or abuse when she was young? Did she eventually go a bit crazy in the end? Was she a good nanny? All of these questions are dealt with in the film, if not completely answered to your satisfaction.
Sadly, Vivian Maier died in obscurity in 2009 and it was her online obituary which eventually led John Maloof to find her. John had originally found her negatives two years earlier in an auction of unclaimed storage locker lots, but until the e-obit showed up, he had had no luck in solving the mystery.
To you Vivian, a belated congratulations and thank you for your wonderful work.
Postscript: As an hors d’oeuvre, here is a short (10-minute) YouTube video about Vivian taken from a 2010 episode of the Chicago Tonight Show:
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