Ross McElwee
Birthday: 1947-07-21 Place of Birth: Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
Synopsis
Ross McElwee is an American documentary filmmaker and cinematographer, and Harvard professor, known for his autobiographical films about his family and personal life, usually interwoven with an episodic journey of some sort. McElwee is a 1971 graduate of Brown University, and received his MS from MIT in 1977. He received the Career Award at the 2007 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival.
Acting
Bright Leaves
Ross McElwee travels through the North Carolina tobacco belt in search of the ancient southern traditions associated with tobacco growing and use, while comparing his filmmaking to commercial cinema, represented by Bright Leaf, a melodrama directed by Michael Curtiz in 1950, starring Gary Cooper, apparently based on the life of his great-grandfather.
Time Indefinite
After documentarian Ross McElwee gets married, a series of misfortunes follow: his grandmother dies, his wife miscarries, and then his father dies less than a week later. Shaken by the sudden string of deaths, McElwee becomes depressed. After spending time with his friend and former high school poetry teacher, Charlene, he goes to meet his brother, a doctor. In a series of interviews, McElwee contemplates his morbid preoccupation with death and tries to figure out how to shake it off.
