Let Us Now Praise Famous Men: Alabama 40 Years on

Synopsis

At the height of the American depression in the summer of 1936, writer James Agee and photographer Walker Evans (1903-1975) travelled south to Alabama. They lived with a family of poor white white farmers and recorded their lives in intimate detail. What emerged was an account of personal deprivation and poverty recounted in their classic book ‘Let us Now Praise Famous Men’. 40 years later, the BBC Arena team returned to Alabama to trace the survivors of that original family. Their memories of that era, and their feelings about being covertly exploited by Agee and Evans are interwoven with texts and images from the book.

Language

English

Country

Great Britain

Medium

Film; Film. 16mm. sd. col. 35 min.

Technical information

Black-and-white / Sound

Year of production

1979

Availability

Hire

Subjects

History; Sociology

Keywords

Agee, James; Alabama; economic conditions; Evans, Walker; photography; United States of America; writers - American

Credits

Director

Carol Bell

Producer

Alan Yentob

Contributor

Ted Smith

Distribution Formats

Type

Film

Format

16mm

Production Company

Name

BBC Television

Distributor

Name

Arts on Film Archive, University of Westminster

Notes

Arts on Film Archive offers on-line access to a large range of films on art produced in the United Kingdom since the 1950s, and is a unique record of British and international post-war art, as well as of documentary film-making in the UK. In its first phase, the archive offers a complete database and an on-line video streaming of all 450 films made by the film department of Arts Council England between 1953 and 1998 and several films produced till 2003 by the dance Department of ACE. The collection is only available streamed to ac.uk domain addresses.