IN CINEMA
JOHNNY CASH X2!
JOHNNY CASH: THE MAN, HIS WORLD, HIS MUSIC +
BEHIND THE LENS
Tickets: $15 General Admission / $7 Reduced Price
Saturday, June 29th at 5PM
JOHNNY CASH: THE MAN, HIS WORLD, HIS MUSIC
Bob Elfstrom, 1970, 87 min.
Between August 1968 and early 1969, film-maker Bob Elfstrom got closer to Johnny Cash than any other filmmaker, documenting Cash's life on tour alongside guitarist Carl Perkins (legendary rock star of the fifties), bass player Marshall Grant, drummer W.S. Holland and the Carter Sisters, June, Helen and Anita. The film combines live concerts (21 performances!) with fascinating home, backstage, and tour bus moments playing cards and jamming with family and friends. Elfstrom also takes an interest in Cash’s then-unfashionable support of Native American sovereignty, with a meeting with Native American dignitaries and a visit to the site of the Wounded Knee Massacre.
Also of interest are the other performers that wander in and out of this travelog-of-sorts: Cash's wife, June Carter Cash, in a duet with him on "Jackson"; Cash's lead guitarist, Carl Perkins, taking the spotlight with his song, "Blue Suede Shoes"; and a glorious duet of Cash and Bob Dylan recording Billy Edd Wheeler's "Blistered."
Followed by:
BEHIND THE LENS: ROBERT ELFSTROM REMEMBERS JOHNNY CASH
Peter Davis, 2013, 42 min.
In 1969, filmmaker, Robert Elfstrom, was invited to make a documentary on Johnny Cash. At first indifferent to country music, Elfstrom, through his intimate portrait of Cash on tour, became a quick convert to Cash’s work. The resulting documentary, JOHNNY CASH: THE MAN, HIS WORLD, HIS MUSIC (1970) became the classic exegesis of Cash’s music and personality.
Throughout the succeeding years, Cash and Elfstrom relationship deepened, breeding mutual respect, affection, and good-humor between the two men. While establishing himself as a leading nonfiction and narrative cinematographer worldwide, Elfstrom filmed Cash again in THE NASHVILLE SOUND (1972) and PETE SEEGER: A SONG AND A STONE (1972).
Later that year, Johnny and June Carter-Cash invited Elfstrom to film GOSPEL ROAD: A STORY OF JESUS (1973); the ultimate expression of their religious faith, the film was shot on-location in Israel and told the story of Jesus Christ—from life to death and resurrection—with narration and music from Cash himself. In addition to producing and shooting the film, Elfstrom was given the part of Jesus.
40 years later—and ten years after Cash’s death in 2013—Peter Davis’s BEHIND THE LENS offers Elfstrom’s account of this intimate, decades-long friendship. The film is filled with new insights into the lives of the musician and the cameraman, as well as into the art of documentary filmmaking itself.
