Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Annie Leibovitz - Life Through A Lens

Screens Thursday 16th October 2008, doors open 6pm at Wehl Street Theatre, Mount Gambier.

Barbara Leibovitz's star-studded documentary illuminates the personal and professional life of renowned photographer, Annie Leibovitz.
Tracing her career trajectory from Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and beyond, Life Through a Lens delves into the loss of her partner, Susan Sontag, the joys of parenting and her battle with drug addiction. But throughout it is Leibovitz's artistic practice that truly takes centre stage.

“An insightful look into how an artist ultimately confronts life and loss through a lens.”
Phil Gallo, Variety

"You don't have to sort of enhance reality. There is nothing stranger than truth."
Annie Leibovitz

“The most engaging aspects of this film are those that deliver the subject herself, holding forth at length about her life and work, which she does with affecting eloquence.”
Wall St Journal


She laughs off her over-the-top set-ups--like painting the Blues Brothers blue. But there's something else about her images that captures the imagination, and this gift was there back in her earliest photos, snapped when she was an army brat in the Philippines during the Vietnam War, through her hedonistic touring days with the Rolling Stones (of course followed by a stint in rehab) to her shots of today's political leaders. This is an open, thoughtful and frank documentary, and besides its revealing sketch of Leibovitz it also says something important about pop culture and the commercialisation of art. Especially as the photographer is now almost as famous as the people she photographs.

This stunning documentary features Mikhail Baryshnikov, Tina Brown, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Whoopi Goldberg, Mick Jagger, Bette Midler, Demi Moore, Yoko Ono, Keith Richards, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Patti Smith, Gloria Steinem, Jann Wenner and Anna Wintour.