People Near Here

Directed by Ron Finne

"Do something for the camera!" In the late twenties, 16mm home movie cameras became available and the well-off used them through the 1930s. Then the 8mm camera increased participation in the very events it recorded, drawing out the facts of who we are or play at being. In this film, Americans – across stages of life, across decades, in backyards, at a graduation picnic, on a beach and in other ordinary places – reveal silly, happy, intense and sad things about themselves, mostly with exuberance and dignity. The film is arranged without internal editing of the found sequences.