Notfilm

For a film revolving around three people whose work I really admire - Buster Keaton, Samuel Beckett, and legendary book publisher Barney Rosset - this documentary was a little tough to truly like. I loved the spirit of the thing, hearing Beckett's voice, and getting the anecdotes about Keaton both on the set and in his treatment for alcoholism.

THE most boring time I have ever spent doing anything including sleeping. I would rather whack myself in the head with a hammer instead of watching one minute of this boring garbage.

Ross Lipman's documentary offers itself as a 'kino-essay' on FILM, the fabulous collaboration between Samuel Beckett as writer and Buster Keaton as performer. Lipman noted the absurdity of producing a two-hour movie about a 20-minute movie, the ridiculous idea of a piece of art about art and not life.

I give this film 10 stars for efforts to create (from found audio & video) a glimpse into two important individuals in american culture.

The only thing that's clear from this film is that the narrator loves to hear himself talk. Another reviewer calls this film pretentious.

The cinema essay is a rare form. Few examples come to mind: Welles' "F for Fake," Scorsese's films on American and Italian cinema, some works by Marker, Godard, and Rossellini.

The Plot. NOTFILM is a feature-length experimental essay on FILM -- its author Samuel Beckett, its star Buster Keaton, its production and its philosophical implications -- utilizing additional outtakes, never before heard audio recordings of the production meetings, and other rare archival elements.

Notfilm is a deeply thoughtful and intriguing "Kino Essay" of Samuel Beckett's 1965 experimental film that featured Buster Keaton, and was simply entitled "Film". Through the use of archival footage, in-depth back stories and character analyses, Lipman shines much-needed light on not only the meaning of Film, but Beckett's unrealized intentions in his one-and-only foray into moving pictures.

Anybody interested in Samuel Beckett, Buster Keaton or simply literature and/or cinema will want to watch and possess this 2-disc set. Made by film restorer Ross Lipman, Notfilm is an extensive and intensive documentary about the production in 1964 New York of the short movie, Film, Beckett's only foray into the Seventh Art.