Janie's Janie (Geri Ashur / Newsreel Collective, 1971) (Patreon)

This is a film I always meant to catch up with, mostly because I have been reading about it in passing for nearly twenty years. Janie's Janie is repeatedly cited in the documentary scholarship of the great Bill Nichols, who noted its unique position at the intersection of direct cinema and intimate character study. And it's true, one could never imagine Wiseman or Allen King devoting all their attention to one middle-aged mom in Newark; likewise, very few of the second-wave feminist profiles from this era are so overtly intersectional.

Janie's Janie is dated in some ways, most notably in its use of music. An uncredited singer-songwriter -- quite literally a poor woman's Joni Mitchell -- performs a tune that pretty much explicates what we're watching. Janie has left her abusive husband behind, struggled as a poor person, and discovered a community of others like her, devoted to banding together to help one another. The thing is, Janie's own words are far more eloquent than the song. In 25 short minutes, she explains to director / interviewer Geri Ashur how she came to feminist consciousness, realizing her self-worth apart from men's definitions of her; how she realized that as a poor person, she is rights, although society maintains its own interests by teaching her and others that they are worthless; and that she had been taught to look down on non-white people, only to discover they had a great deal in common, and that in fact racism is just another self-serving ideology of the ruling class.

There are telling moments in Janie's Janie that indicate that this woman's journey is not yet complete. In her interactions with her five children, she can be a bit harsh, especially to the boys. Granted, I've never had to raise that many children, much less alone. But there is a slight hint of lingering gender ideology here, a cycle that will have to be broken so that Janie's sons might grow up to be different that their father or grandfather. Still, the Letterboxd reviews that tout this film's continued relevance are encouraging to me. A small marvel, and a model for the sort of political filmmaking sorely needed today.