Really two documentaries in one, though they're inextricably linked not simply because of the person at the center but because of Nan Goldin's life, how open she made herself (through visual distortions but sometimes just with the total, brutal truth in photography) and how dedicated she was and is, as the person to be a major driving force in the fight against the Sackler's, in particular with their All the Money in the World style stamp on museums and places. But above all, it's a great film (documentary or otherwise) about community - the ones that Goldin was in as a young artist, as an art organizer in 1989 with the AUDS exhibit, and then in the past several years against the Sacklers.
This is a film that would have been on its own a terrific story of this group staging these protests (taking as direct influence the Act Up protests of the height of the AIDS crisis); what takes it into feeling so important and unique is how Poitras weaves Goldin's recent times, and how harrowing and terrifying it becomes for people in the group (spoiler, the Sackler's were spying on Goldin and others), with her story as told through the thousands of photographs she took over the years. Just the use of the sound of that slide projector with those clanks immerses you into her memories and the rich, daring, wonderful and sometimes very tragic tales she had of those she knew (not least of which John Waters collaborator Cookie Mueller).
It's an equally inspiring and devastating portrait of a life - among other lives - where there was almost no other way to go except to create and find a voice through artistic expression. It doesn't take long for one to be taken with her storytelling, not just her story, and because Poitras is careful with using music and needle drops, like they are there but used to emphasize a particular time or place like "Sunday Morning" over footage of Provincetown in the 70s, you have an intimacy, like you are with her in the room seeing these slides and seeing an entire world that is now more celebrated of course (what Hipster or borderline Hipster hasn't said "damn I wish I could've lived in New York in the 70s and early 80s), but then it was such that, as Goldin says, they were seen as the outsiders, but they saw the Normies of the world as those outside of their world.
What's also so great is how the storyline of the Sackler/Opioid protests and that entire campaign - which turned out to be a mixed success, sadly Purdue and the Sacklers got a way with a lot and it's frustrating to see that (it doesn't make the film frustrating, it actually is good that nothing is sugar-coated and, ultimately, the outcome of the names being taken off like the Met and the Louvre is as good as they might very have expected - does dovetail into how Goldin found her voice as an activist, past just with her artistic/erotic photography, into that exhibition that caused a mountain of controversy. You almost may take for granted how skillfully and seamlessly Poitras brings the strands of history and governmental and business-related chicanery, and despite the several important supporting characters, like the journalist and the one woman who are central to the Sackler case, Goldin never gets lost as the subject.
This is sensational documentary filmmaking because of how it draws us in thematically, politically, and personally and emotionally. This is a story of a hero who wasn't in her early years always but bared witness always. And I'm sure Goldin would bristle at anyone calling her that, but she went through a lot of pain and struggle (and addiction and isolation), and it cant help but feel *monumental as a saga of what is possible in America (against what many in the Powers that Be would want to see or know in art, culture or from victims of addiction). I knew very little about her going in and I suspect many will become absorbed as I was; moreover, you may find yourself affected by the heart-break that these families shown on camera confronting the Sacklers. Or, if not that, the catharsis that Goldin comes to regarding her sister and her parents.
This is a film that would have been on its own a terrific story of this group staging these protests (taking as direct influence the Act Up protests of the height of the AIDS crisis); what takes it into feeling so important and unique is how Poitras weaves Goldin's recent times, and how harrowing and terrifying it becomes for people in the group (spoiler, the Sackler's were spying on Goldin and others), with her story as told through the thousands of photographs she took over the years. Just the use of the sound of that slide projector with those clanks immerses you into her memories and the rich, daring, wonderful and sometimes very tragic tales she had of those she knew (not least of which John Waters collaborator Cookie Mueller).
It's an equally inspiring and devastating portrait of a life - among other lives - where there was almost no other way to go except to create and find a voice through artistic expression. It doesn't take long for one to be taken with her storytelling, not just her story, and because Poitras is careful with using music and needle drops, like they are there but used to emphasize a particular time or place like "Sunday Morning" over footage of Provincetown in the 70s, you have an intimacy, like you are with her in the room seeing these slides and seeing an entire world that is now more celebrated of course (what Hipster or borderline Hipster hasn't said "damn I wish I could've lived in New York in the 70s and early 80s), but then it was such that, as Goldin says, they were seen as the outsiders, but they saw the Normies of the world as those outside of their world.
What's also so great is how the storyline of the Sackler/Opioid protests and that entire campaign - which turned out to be a mixed success, sadly Purdue and the Sacklers got a way with a lot and it's frustrating to see that (it doesn't make the film frustrating, it actually is good that nothing is sugar-coated and, ultimately, the outcome of the names being taken off like the Met and the Louvre is as good as they might very have expected - does dovetail into how Goldin found her voice as an activist, past just with her artistic/erotic photography, into that exhibition that caused a mountain of controversy. You almost may take for granted how skillfully and seamlessly Poitras brings the strands of history and governmental and business-related chicanery, and despite the several important supporting characters, like the journalist and the one woman who are central to the Sackler case, Goldin never gets lost as the subject.
This is sensational documentary filmmaking because of how it draws us in thematically, politically, and personally and emotionally. This is a story of a hero who wasn't in her early years always but bared witness always. And I'm sure Goldin would bristle at anyone calling her that, but she went through a lot of pain and struggle (and addiction and isolation), and it cant help but feel *monumental as a saga of what is possible in America (against what many in the Powers that Be would want to see or know in art, culture or from victims of addiction). I knew very little about her going in and I suspect many will become absorbed as I was; moreover, you may find yourself affected by the heart-break that these families shown on camera confronting the Sacklers. Or, if not that, the catharsis that Goldin comes to regarding her sister and her parents.