USA,
2002, 90 min
Shown in 2003
CREDITS
- dir
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Anne Makepeace
- prod
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Anne Makepeace, Joanna Rudnick
- scr
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Anne Makepeace
- cam
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Nancy Schreiber
- editor
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Susan Fanshell
- mus
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Joel Goodman
- source
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American Masters/Thirteen/WNET, 450 W 33rd St., 6th Fl., New York, NY 10001. FAX: 212-560-2099. EMAIL: lacy@thirteen.org.
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COMMENTS
Anne Makepeace in person.
OTHER
Even as a child, Robert Capa was a gambler, a risk-taker. But at the age of 41, in Indochina, his luck ran out. Writer-director Anne Makepeace, with an eloquent script and masterful editing, blends Capa’s searing images with wide-ranging interviews, newsreel footage and photos of the handsome Capa himself, to show us how this man’s anti-fascist dedication and principled artistry are impossible to separate. Born André Friedmann in Budapest in 1913, Capa at 17 fled fascist Hungary for Berlin and then for Paris, where he “learned to eat... and to love.” There, at 22, he was reborn as American photographer Robert Capa, and his great love, Gerda Pohorylles, became Gerda Taro. Three years later, Capa was considered the world’s greatest war photographer—largely because he did not focus his keen eye for action on the brass and bigwigs. Instead, from the Spanish Civil War to D-Day and beyond, he shared the life of terrorized civilians and ordinary soldiers. And wherever he worked, for Life or for Magnum—the agency he founded with Chim, Henri Cartier-Bresson and George Roger—he captured people as they lived... and died. These days, it’s easy to understand how, through it all, the pacifist Capa felt that, “The war photographer’s most fervent wish is for unemployment.”
—Sid Hollister
FACTOID #1
The Festival has screened many debuts, both short- and feature-length, by some of cinema’s most influential artists including Juan Antonio Bardem, Jane Campion, Roman Polanski, Melvin Van Peebles and Lina Wertmüller.
