The Typewriter, the Rifle and the Movie Camera

The Typewriter, the Rifle and the Movie Camera is a film about the American director Samuel Fuller. It differs from many similar film portraits made in recent years. Instead of a one-sided tribute to Fuller, we see here a number of people talking about different aspects of his person, his career and above all his films. Directors like Martin Scorsese, Jim Jarmusch and Quentin Tarantino talk of how Fuller has influenced their work. Though no-one speaks as often or as much as Fuller himself. Speaking to the actor and director Tim Robbins, the film's guide, Fuller talks of the similarities between war and film (!), about his background both as a journalist and as a soldier, as well as about the authors Dumas and Balzac. The film is divided into three sections, reflected in the title, and these are used to characterize Fuller's three main tools during his career(s). The Typewriter is about Fuller as a young investigative reporter with various newspapers. The Rifle concentrates on Fuller as a soldier during the Second World War, his experiences there and how they have shaped him. The third section, The Movie Camera, focuses on Fuller as film director. You could say that one of the aims of the film is to show how his role as journalist and then soldier have actively shaped Fuller into the filmmaker he is. Perhaps the most interesting sequence in the film is when we get to accompany Robbins and Tarantino in their almost archeological search through Fuller's old garage in Los Angeles. They converse and reflect upon the fragments that such a long career has left behind: notes in a diary and photographs, a bayonet and a stamp. Several of the objects are from Fuller's films and are used as links to the many film excerpts which are included in the film, such as the helmet from The Steel Helmet (1951).The combination of the film's playful structure and its mixed content makes it a conveyor for curios and anecdotes for extant Fuller enthusiasts, and as an introduction for new-comers who have here an opportunity to acquaint themselves with this most obstinate of American postwar directors and his films. PS

Premiärstatus
Skandinavisk premiär: Medverkande
Samuel Fuller, Tim Robbins, Jim Jarmusch: Producent
Colin MacCabe & Paula Jalfon: Manus
Adam Simon: Foto
Caroline Champetier: Musik
-: Talat språk
English