Ned Abdul Needs More Retail Space
2013 · 10m · USA
Directed by Dan Schneidkraut
Genres: documentary, essay film, experimental
Tones: contemplative, melancholic
A first-person narrated slideshow diary about working at a movie theater — coworkers, secret backrooms, assigned seating, theater conflicts. A sentimental documentary about the labor underneath the cinema.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A slideshow essay about working concessions, narrated like a Marker piece — that title alone is funnier than 90% of comedies. Slow, earnest, and refusing to perform; that's the move.
Narrated-slideshow as legitimate essay-doc vehicle, Chris Marker rerouted through a multiplex breakroom — exactly the kind of formal-tradition revival I want to see.
Narrated slideshow form treating itself like a documentary essay — Chris Marker still-image lineage rerouted through a multiplex breakroom. The 'assume only friends and family will watch' technique is a sharp intimacy device.
Reviews
The film is never in a hurry, and we should be thankful for films that aren't. It's a slideshow diary piece of video art, lived-in, earnest.