Documentary Educational Resources - Filmmaker / Marshall, John / All Films

901/904

Wed, 10 Oct 2018 09:18:00 GMT

In this film we accompany patrol cars 901 and 904 as they ply the streets of Pittsburgh. The diversity of situations to which the policemen are called upon to respond are striking: from a man who is furious because he can not get his twenty dollar deposit refunded on an exhaust system that does not fit his car, to an elderly white man who says he wants to shoot the black teenagers playing handball on his house wall, to a group of white teenage youths loitering in the street on a sultry summer day.

Scenes from short films such as Henry is Drunk and A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding are intercut with other material, including footage in the police station where the men talk about their experiences.The striking element in many of the scenes is the level of frustration, anger, and at times a feeling of impending violence. This is true of the policemen themselves (from "I'm not talking nice no more" to some brutal beatings), as well of the people of the city, who speak of guns and fear.

As Laura Nader points out in the film Little Injustices, the typical American ignorance of, and lack of access to, the law so often leads not to the resolution of but to the escalation of conflict. As one irritated man exclaims to the officer who seems to dismiss his complaint as though he were just a cantankerous old pest, "That's where I'd like to know the definition of breaking the law!"Viewing this film, we also understand the exhaustion that police work often entails, for the policemen often have no real solutions themselves. It is clear why policemen are so often the victims of public rage, and why they in turn may vent their own frustrations on the public.

Films in the Pittsburgh Police series

901/904

After the Game

A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding

The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule

Henry is Drunk

The Informant

Inside/Outside Station Nine

Investigation of a Hit and Run w/ Legal Discussion

Manifold Controversy

Nothing Hurt But My Pride

Three Domestics

Twenty One Dollars or Twenty One Days

Youth and the Man of Property

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!Kung Short Films

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

!Kung Short Films
Buy Now: $545.00

Between 1950 and 1958, John Marshall made four expeditions to film the Ju/'hoansi (a group of !Kung Bushmen) of the Nyae Nyae region of Namibia (then South West Africa). Marshall and his family, who together undertook an extensive multi-disciplinary study of Ju/'hoansi, spent the greatest amount of time with the people of /Gautcha, including ≠Oma, !U, Tsamko, N!ai, and /Gunda. During this time, Marshall shot over 300,000 feet of 16mm film (157 hours). He later produced a total of 23 films exclusively from this footage. 15 of those are short films that Marshall referred to as "sequence films." Each focuses on a single event, providing the viewer a brief introduction followed by an uninterrupted sequence.

Although Marshall recorded some sync sound between 1955 and 1958, sync recording in the field was difficult and cumbersome. As a compromise, Marshall made non-sync recordings at the time of filming and later joined this audio to the edited films. Soundtracks were sometimes enhanced with additional ambient sound or sound effects recorded after the fact. This method allowed Marshall a major innovation in ethnographic and documentary film - his subjects could speak for themselves, often accompanied by subtitles.

These shorts were intended as educational films, to be viewed multiple times and with the aid of a study guide. The introduction to each film might identify major characters, outline the basic plot, or offer background information about the event to follow, but then viewers are left to experience the film for themselves, to form their own impressions of what is happening and why. Of course, the films have proven to have a life well beyond the classroom. They are intimate portraits of the daily life and ritual life of ≠Oma and his band during the 1950's. Rich in ethnographic detail, the films' beauty and high emotional content are indicative of the close bond that Marshall had formed with his subjects - a bond that would last all his life.

This collection combines fourteen of Marshall's short !Kung films onto two remastered/re-authored DVDs, complete with a full-color booklet containing photos, writings, and additional information about the series.

Disc One:
A Curing Ceremony (bw) (9:00)
Group of Women (6:00)
A Joking Relationship (13:00)
N/um Tchai: The Ceremonial Dance of the !Kung Bushmen (bw) (20:00)
N!owa T'ama: The Melon Tossing Game (15:00)
The Lion Game (5:00)
An Argument About a Marriage (18:00)
Men Bathing (14:00)

Disc Two:
Playing with Scorpions (5:00)
A Rite of Passage (15:00)
Debe's Tantrum (9:00)
The Wasp Nest (13:00)
The Meat Fight (14:00)
Baobab Play (8:00)

Orthography Note
The group of people depicted in these films are the Ju/'hoansi, speakers of the Ju/'hoan language. Ju/'hoan is part of the !Kung language group; the term !Kung was previously used by the Marshall family and others to refer to Ju/'hoansi. Although the term is outdated, it has been retained here for the sake of consistency with John Marshall's previously published work. The films and their related printed materials also employ antiquated spellings of names and places. For current Ju/'hoan orthography, please see the Ju/'hoan - English Dictionary, compiled by Patrick Dickens and the Ju/'hoan Peoples Literacy Committee.

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A Kalahari Family

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

A Kalahari Family
Buy Now: $1,200.00

A Kalahari Family is a five-part, six-hour series documenting 50 years in the lives of the Ju/'hoansi of southern Africa, from 1951 to 2000. These once independent hunter-gatherers experience dispossession, confinement to a homeland, and the chaos of war. Then as hope for Namibian independence and the end of apartheid grows, Ju/'hoansi fight to establish farming communities and reclaim their traditional lands. Through depiction of their efforts of the Ju/hoansi to participate as farmers in the contemporary economy and advocate for their rights to do so, the series challenges stereotypes of primitive and unchanging "bushmen."

"There are two kinds of films. Films that show us in skins are lies. Films that show the truth show us with cattle, with farms, with our own water, making our own plans." —Oma Tsamkxao

"The old life was too thin. We wanted foods that made us strong. We wanted clothes like other people... A new life called us to Tjum!kui." —Oma Tsamkxao

"We heard stories about whites killing Ju/'hoansi. We were traveling to find bush foods when /Ui Legs told us white people had come. He said you would return to look for us and stay a long time. We were afraid you would capture or kill us. I'm glad you whites were different." —Oma Tsamkxao

John Marshall's documentary shows the objective story of one Namibian family and testifies to the challenges and the effects of changing times on the entire nation. This not only supports the constructive political revelations preached by our first president but is a touching testimony seen from within and without our society how it changes without reflection to its past history sacrificing part of its capacity to the demands put to them by the fast changing environment making it impossible to keep up and adjust. There is no progress possible if any help from the outside does not generate capacity building from within. This documentary shows that listening to the local voices and capacity building is the only answer to sustainable development. Such help is this documentary, so that each Namibian irrespective of any rank should be obliged to see it several times and keep it for generations to come. This is part of our invisible history innocently captured to testify in vision what has so far been invisible to the naked eye.

We owe enormous gratitude to the Marshall family for this valuable contribution to the History and welfare of our nation.
— Levi Namaseb, Namibian Visiting Scholar, University of Toronto

Films in the A Kalahari Family series:

Part One: A Far Country
Part Two: End Of the Road
Part Three: Real Water
Part Four: Standing Tall
Part Five: Death By Myth

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

Best Environmental TV Series, FICA - International Festival of Environmental Film & Video, Brazil, 2003

Special Prize: Homage to the Films of John Marshall; Bilan du Film Ethnographique, Paris, 2003

Grand Jury Award (Best in World Cinema), DC Independent Film Festival, Washington DC, 2003

Basil Wright Film Prize, RAI Ethnographic Film Festival, England, 2003

Beeld Voor Beeld, Ethnographic Film Festival, Amsterdam, 2003

Jury Award, Athens Film Festival, 2003

Best Film - Jury Award, XII International Festival of Ethnographical Films, Nuoro, Italy, 2004

Planet In Focus Film Festival, Toronto, 2003

Margaret Mead International Film Festival, NYC, 2002

Sithengi International Film Festival, Capetown, 2002

African Film Festival, Seattle, 2003

Boston Premiere, Museum of Fine Arts, 2003

Archaeology Channel Film Festival, Oregon, 2003

Beeld Voor Beeld, Ethnographic Film Festival, Amsterdam, 2003

Harvard Film Archive, Cambridge, MA, 2004

Göttingen International Film Festival, Germany, 2004

Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival, Greece, 2005

Ecocinema Festival, Athens, Greece, 2005

This film is part of the !Kung Series.

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Pittsburgh Police Series

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

Pittsburgh Police Series
Buy Now: $1,895.00

The Pittsburgh Police series offers a raw and often intimate window into policing during a time before the War on Drugs and subsequent militarization of the police.

Produced in the late 1960s, the project was sponsored by the Lemberg Center for the Study of Violence at Brandeis University in an attempt to study police conduct in the wake of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. In spite of the racially tense climate in the city, following civil disorders in which 2,000 people were arrested (although no one was killed), permission to film was granted by the Director of Public Safety and by each Station's Inspector. The films were intended for use by law schools, community relations projects, sociology and urban studies programs, and by the police themselves, to provoke discussion about policing practices.

Marshall accompanied Pittsburgh Police officers over a nine month period of time between 1968 and 1969 as they responded to calls in the community. Individual officers provided access to their everyday work, allowing Marshall to ride in the back of their squad cars and film their interactions with community members. Marshall's footage was edited into seventeen films falling into three categories. Some of the films such as After the Game and A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding are short films that focus on single sequences and events within the project. Other films such as 901/904 and Inside/Outside Station 9 are longer films made up of a variety of these sequences with the intent to give off an overall impression of police work. The third category of films within the series are educational films, such as The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule and Investigation of a Hit and Run with Legal Discussion, which consist of clips of Marshall's footage intercut with discussion and analysis of the footage.

In Pittsburgh, sequences shown to recruits in training and to off-duty officers provoked lively discussions about the conduct and decisions made by police officers in the actual filmed events. Opinions were often divided on particular cases, as well as on the basic issue of police roles. Recruits and officers argued about the extent to which the police must function as "social workers", becoming involved in domestic situations, and about their biases about men and women. "We always believe the woman and arrest the guy," said one policeman. Several years later, the Department and individual policemen were invited to participate in the discussion film, The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule, but the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association would not allow participation. The Pittsburgh Police Department now has copies of most of these films, all of which have been shown to Department members.

John Marshall and Emile de Brigard wrote in their 1973 article "Idea and Event in Urban Film" that "In its capacity as an eyewitness report, film is an experience. The object of using film is to untangle impressions, to analyze the facts and implications of an event." The films in The Pittsburgh Police series remain powerful documents for reflecting on society then and now and allow for potent discussions about the place of police within communities as well as issues and biases within the criminal justice system.

The films may be grouped into several clusters that address various dimensions of these broad issues:

The Job: These films focus on the variety and ambiguity of police roles. (A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding; Vagrant Woman; Nothing Hurt But My Pride; Youth and the Man of Property; Inside/Outside Station Nine)

Searches and Seizures: Fourth Amendment issues are addressed in these films. (Three Domestics; Wrong Kid; After the Game)

Asking Questions: Fifth Amendment issues are at stake in situations in these films. (Investigation of a Hit and Run; The Informant; The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule)

Public Places: These films dramatize the issues of civic order versus civil liberties, of public versus private. (You Wasn't Loitering; Henry is Drunk)

The films in this series lend themselves especially well to analytical treatments in "clusters" such as these, since many are short sequences and none are narrated. The groupings suggested here represent examples, and numerous other combinations can be constructed in order to explore and illustrate particular themes.

Eleven of these films are also available on the Pittsburgh Police Shorts DVD, a 2007 re-mastered/authored set which also contains additional information about the series.

Films in the Pittsburgh Police series

901/904

After the Game

A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding

The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule

Henry is Drunk

The Informant

Inside/Outside Station Nine

Investigation of a Hit and Run w/ Legal Discussion

Manifold Controversy

Nothing Hurt But My Pride

Three Domestics

Twenty One Dollars or Twenty One Days

Youth and the Man of Property

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Pittsburgh Police Short Films

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

Pittsburgh Police Short Films
Buy Now: $340.00

Featuring John Marshall's hallmark intimate camerawork, these shorts offer a unique perspective on both sides of law enforcement, and on some of the social issues facing American cities during the late 1960s. This 2007 re-mastered/re-authored compilation contains additional information about the series.

This DVD combines the 11 short films from the Pittsburgh Police series:

After the Game

A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding

Henry is Drunk

Manifold Controversy

Nothing Hurt But My Pride

Twenty One Dollars or Twenty One Days

Youth and the Man of Property

Other films in the Pittsburgh Police series:

901/904

The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule

The Informant

Inside/Outside Station Nine

Investigation of a Hit and Run w/ Legal Discussion

Three Domestics

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!Kung Series

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

!Kung Series
Buy Now: $3,250.00

Over the course of his career, filmmaker John Marshall shot more than one million feet of film and video (722 hours) of the Ju/'hoansi (!Kung Bushmen) of Namibia's Kalahari Desert. This body of work is unrivalled as a long-term visual study of a single group of people. Contained in Marshall's footage are the personal histories of individuals, documents of a now non-existent way of life, and the unfolding of massive social and economic change as experienced by one group of people over a period of fifty years.

A frequent innovator in the field of ethnographic film, Marshall produced twenty-three films and videos and one multi-part series from his extensive footage archive. Marshall's approach to filmmaking evolved alongside changes in film and video technology, in the fields of anthropology and ethnographic and documentary film, and on a very personal level, in Marshall's relationship to the Ju/'hoansi. These shifts can be seen throughout the course of his career, as he moved from the almost scientific, observational style of First Film (his earliest footage), to the nuanced and self-reflexive epic, A Kalahari Family.

Films in the !Kung series

An Argument about Marriage

Baobab Play

Bitter Melons

Children Throw Toy Assegais

A Joking Relationship
A Kalahari Family

!Kung Bushmen Hunting Equipment

The !Kung San: Traditional Life

The !Kung San: Resettlement

Lion Game

The Meat Fight

Men Bathing

N!ai, The Story of a !Kung Woman

N!owa T'ama: The Melon Tossing Game

N/um Tchai: the Ceremonial Dance of the !Kung Bushmen

Playing with Scorpions

Pull Ourselves Up or Die Out

A Rite of Passage

To Hold Our Own Ground: A Field Report

Tug-Of-War (Bushmen)

The Wasp Nest

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A Curing Ceremony

Thu, 30 Aug 2018 08:16:00 GMT

A Curing Ceremony
Buy Now: $545.00

Sha//ge, a very young woman about to have her first child, falls ill, probably with malaria. /Ti!kay, a relative and healer, enters a mild trance, without the stimulus of dancing, in an attempt to cure her. Sha//ge lives but the baby is stillborn. Part of the !Kung Series.

This film is available as part of the !Kung ShortFilms set. This collection combines fourteen of Marshall's short !Kung films onto two remastered/re-authored DVDs, complete with a full-color booklet containing photos, writings, and additional information about the series.

DiscOne:
A Curing Ceremony (bw) (9:00)
Group of Women (6:00)
A Joking Relationship (13:00)
N/um Tchai: The Ceremonial Dance of the !Kung Bushmen (bw)(20:00)
N!owa T'ama: The Melon Tossing Game (15:00)
The Lion Game (5:00)
An Argument About a Marriage (18:00)
Men Bathing (14:00)

DiscTwo:
Playing with Scorpions (5:00)
A Rite of Passage (15:00)
Debe's Tantrum (9:00)
The Wasp Nest (13:00)
The Meat Fight (14:00)
Baobab Play (8:00)

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Children Throw Toy Assegais

Thu, 30 Aug 2018 08:16:00 GMT

Children Throw Toy Assegais
Buy Now: $295.00

Young boys throw toy spears into a tree, trying to make them stick in the bark. A girl watches.

This film is part of the !Kung Series.

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Debe's Tantrum

Thu, 30 Aug 2018 07:04:00 GMT

Debe's Tantrum
Buy Now: $545.00

In this film a five-year-old named Debe refuses to let his mother Di!ai go gathering without him. Di!ai appeals to her daughter N!ai to entertain the child but Debe resists. In the end Di!ai leaves with Debe on her back. This is a companion film to The Wasp Nest which shows Di!ai, Debe, and other women and children on the subsequent gathering expedition.

Part of the !Kung Series.

Thisfilm is available as part of the !Kung Short Films set. This collection combines fourteen of Marshall's short !Kung filmsonto two remastered/re-authored DVDs, complete with a full-color bookletcontaining photos, writings, and additional information about the series.

DiscOne:
A Curing Ceremony (bw) (9:00)
Group of Women (6:00)
A Joking Relationship (13:00)
N/um Tchai: The Ceremonial Dance of the !Kung Bushmen (bw)(20:00)
N!owa T'ama: The Melon Tossing Game (15:00)
The Lion Game (5:00)
An Argument About a Marriage (18:00)
Men Bathing (14:00)

DiscTwo:
Playing with Scorpions (5:00)
A Rite of Passage (15:00)
Debe's Tantrum (9:00)
The Wasp Nest (13:00)
The Meat Fight (14:00)

Baobab Play (8:00)

This film is part of the !Kung Series.

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A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding

Wed, 29 Aug 2018 14:52:00 GMT

A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding
Buy Now: $340.00

Policemen intervene when a woman calls to complain that her boyfriend stole forty dollars. The argument soon escalates as the man refuses to admit that he took any money, and the woman, losing her temper, crashes a glass window and cuts her hand. The police try their best to diffuse the situation and eventually take the woman away from the scene.

This film is included on the Pittsburgh Police Short Films DVD collection.

Films in the Pittsburgh Police series

901/904

After the Game

A Forty Dollar Misunderstanding

The 4th and 5th and the Exclusionary Rule

Henry is Drunk

The Informant

Inside/Outside Station Nine

Investigation of a Hit and Run w/ Legal Discussion

Manifold Controversy

Nothing Hurt But My Pride