Archive of films Capturing the Friedmans / Capturing the Friedmans
USA
2003, 107 min
Section:
Forum of Independents - Competition
Year: 2004
In 1987, in Great Neck, Long Island, Arnold Friedman, a retired schoolteacher in his fifties, who taught computer classes for children in his home basement, and his son Jesse, then eighteen, were arrested and charged for committing repeated acts of sexual abuse on boys who attended the classes. Despite its sensational subject, this Academy Award-nominated documentary has been made with tact, dedication, and respect. A complex and ambivalent portrait of a seemingly typical American family.
Synopsis
In 1987, in Great Neck, Long Island. Arnold Friedman, a retired schoolteacher in his fifties and his 18-year-old son Jesse are arrested and charged with committing repeated acts of sexual abuse on boys who attended the father’s computer classes in their basement. Until then the Friedmans were a typical, upper-middleclass Jewish family: a father, a mother and three sons. From that moment their world is instantly transformed. With their Great Neck community in an uproar, the family undergoes a media onslaught. Given access to their old home movies and family videos, Jarecki constructs his film as an investigation, but our expectations are constantly subverted. The film delves not just into the life of a family but also into a community, a legal system, and an era. By constantly changing perspectives and keeping the audience’s judgments and understanding in flux, Capturing the Friedmans embodies the difficulty of capturing the truth.
About the director
Andrew Jarecki (b. 1963) is a graduate of Princeton University (1985) and resides with his family in New York. He produced the short film Swimming, which screened at the Sundance Film Festival and also won the Focus Film Award. He is also a musician. Capturing the Friedmans, Academy Award Nominee for Best Documentary, is Jarecki’s first feature-length film.
Contacts
Fortissimo Films
Van Diemenstraat 100, 1013 CN, Amsterdam
Netherlands
Tel: +31 206 273 215
Fax: +31 206 261 155
E-mail: [email protected]
www: www.fortissimofilms.com
About the film
Color, 35 mm
Section: | Forum of Independents - Competition |
---|---|
Director: | Andrew Jarecki |
Dir. of Photography: | Adolfo Doring |
Music: | Andrea Morricone |
Editor: | Richard Hankin |
Producer: | Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling |
Production: | Hit the Ground Running Films |
Cast: | Arnold Friedman, Elaine Friedman, David Friedman, Seth Friedman, Jesse Friedman, Howard Friedman |
Contact: | Fortissimo Films |
Guests
Winnie Lau
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