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 Genre:
Documentary Starring:
Albert Bitterling, Roscoe
Collins, George Harris, Joe Payne
Description: Early Errol Morris documentary
intersplices random chatter he captured on film of the genuinely
eccentric residents of Vernon, Florida. A few examples? The
preacher giving a sermon on the definition of the word
"Therefore," and the obsessive turkey hunter who speaks
reverentially of the "gobblers" he likes to track down and kill.
How To Order:
Buy It Now new and used from Amazon.com. |
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Review
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The ordinary denizens of a small
Southern town become natural
subjects for filmmaker Errol
Morris in Vernon, Florida,
a hypnotically bizarre character
study. Based on the evidence of
the film, this small humid town
in the panhandle is home to a
disproportionately high
percentage of oddballs. (On the
other hand, Morris's other work
suggests that poking a camera
anywhere uncovers a common vein
of weirdness.) Some of the
material comes across as
sideways homespun wisdom: when a
man gazes across a swamp and
marvels at how much water is out
there, he adds, "And that's just
the top of it." Hard to argue
with that. Then there's the jar
of sand the contents of which,
its owners swear, has been
growing in volume over the
years. And a hunter's
descriptions of the
near-orgasmic highs and lows of
turkey hunting is a monologue
that would have impressed
Faulkner or Thomas Wolfe. It has
always been an open question
whether Morris's blank-eyed
camera is encouraging the viewer
to laugh at his subjects or
simply presenting the world as
it is. You'll laugh, and more
likely be astonished.
--Robert Horton
Courtesy Amazon.com |
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