LGM Film Club, Part 66: Ornette, Made in America

The other night, I watched Shirley Clarke’s weird 1985 documentary about Ornette Coleman. Ornette: Made in America combines the classic documentary form of showing a great musician in performance and going back to his home to reminiscence with bizarre experimental editing going back and forth between Ornette and some random image for a nearly seizure-causing two or so minutes. Clarke was a pretty interesting filmmaker. If you’ve never seen her pioneering 1961 film The Connection, about guys looking to score heroin, you are missing a critical film in American film history. That film is not dated. This one has its fine moments, but there’s lots of 80s tricks that really don’t work well today.

Also, Ornette tells the story about how he went to a doctor asking if he could be castrated.

Anyway, this 5 1/2 minute clip seems to be longest section of it available on YouTube. However, you can watch it right now at The Criterion Channel.