Free Film Screening: Capturing the Friedmans (Andrew Jarecki 2002)

Birkbeck Film Season: Department of Psychosocial Studies and Gender Studies and Raphael Samuel History Centre
Home Movies: Surveillance and the Family
From the Oresteia to The Godfather, the family has been a primary unit of drama and the site of tragedy. In Hollywood the family remains the preferred site of redemption as well as the ideal object to threaten with malevolent external forces. The family, it seems, must be protected at all costs but it is also persecuted by the relentless gaze and eaves-dropping of documentaries and reality TV. The extent and intensity of representations and observations of the family in contemporary visual culture testify to the psychic and social anxiety it evokes.
The main form of surveillance in the family has been the self-surveillance of the home movie and it is via this internal, reflexive gaze that we will be looking at the family in this series. In particular we will be examining the relationships between the vicissitudes of family life, audio-visual technologies, documentary and fantasy.
Screenings and Panel Discussions
Capturing the Friedmans (Andrew Jarecki 2002) Wednesday June 13th 6pm-9pm, Panel: Professor Mandy Merck (Royal Holloway, University of London), Dr Alisa Lebow (Brunel University) Chair: Dr Amber Jacobs (Birkbeck)
see also: Tarnation (Jonathan Caouette 2003) Wednesday 20th June 6-9pm, Panel: Dr Catherine Grant (Sussex University), Dr Michael Lawrence (Sussex University) Chair: Gordon Hon (Winchester School of Art)
Please note the screenings are free and open to the public but the audience is asked to remain for the discussion