Still in its dust jacket.

Film Yesterday I went charity shop diving in Waterloo and Formby and found a first edition paperback of Much Ado About Nothing from 1938 in the original Penguin Shakespeare series edited by GB Harrison. Still in its dust jacket. It's something I didn't think I'd ever hold in my hand. So I understand the relish with which documentarian Adam Curtis must have written these words:
"I have just got my hands on something wonderful and precious. It is five computer drives containing the unedited rushes of everything shot by the BBC in Afghanistan over the last thirty years.

It fills 18 terabytes of space.

It has been put together by Phil Goodwin who has worked for 14 years as a cameraman for the BBC in Afghanistan.

What Phil Goodwin has done is incredibly important. I cannot praise him or thank him enough. He has rescued moments of experience - both grand and intimate, sometimes intense or odd, or sometimes where nothing happens at all.
He's posted some examples. Some are very graphic in places, especially the footage of the attempted assassination of Hamid Karzai in 2002. Given the amount of film to be worked through, I don't know if we can expect another Power of Nightmare any time soon ...

No comments:

Post a Comment