Criterion Review #2 (nostalgia)

(nostalgia) (1971)

Hollis Frampton is a name that is new to me.  He was an avant-garde artist working in the 70s and 80s until his death in 1984 at the age of 48.

(nostalgia) is a film that is part of a larger collection called Hapax Legomena.  It is 36 minutes long, and depicts a series of 12 photographs, slowly burning on a stove-top as Frampton's voice-over tells us the origins and back-stories of each.

There is, however, one twist: over each photograph, Frampton tells us the story of the next photograph, which we haven't seen yet.  Therefore, with each new photograph, we have to choose: do we listen to the story of the next photograph, so that we can recognize his descriptions when it comes along?  Or do we watch the current photograph slowly burn away into ash?  (nostalgia) seems to comment on our memories and our attempts to preserve the past: what is a photograph but a preservation of a moment?  Is it a futile attempt or a valiant one?  Should we instead focus on the present?  As we watch each photograph burn, we realize the moment in the past has been replaced with the Now.  Time moves along, and moments fade away like fire into ash...