- Description:
- DVD - Region free. viewing copy. 1 videodisc of 1.
24 fps
- Notes:
- This compilation of five early Sadie Benning works illustrates the artist’s teenage isolation and sadness in the form of the video diary. Addressing the camera, Benning allows the viewer the sense of anxiety and delight in coming to realize queer identity.
Titles
+ A New Year
- Director:
- Benning, Sadie
- Running Time:
- Short. 6 minutes
- Sound:
- sound - Dolby
- Color:
- b/w
- Country:
- USA
- Year:
- 1989
- Language:
- English
- Genre:
- Documentary, Experimental / Avant Garde, Queer Cinema, Feminism
- Notes:
- In a version of the “teenage diary,” Benning places her feelings of confusion and depression alongside grisly tales from tabloid headlines and brutal events in her neighborhood. The difficulty of finding a positive identity for oneself in a world filled with violence is starkly revealed by Benning’s youthful but already despairing voice.
+ Living Inside
- Director:
- Benning, Sadie
- Running Time:
- Short. 5 minutes
- Sound:
- sound - Dolby
- Color:
- b/w
- Country:
- USA
- Year:
- 1989
- Language:
- English
- Genre:
- Documentary, Experimental / Avant Garde, Queer Cinema, Feminism
- Notes:
- When she was 16, Benning stopped going to high school for three weeks and stayed inside with her camera, her TV set, and a pile of dirty laundry. This tape mirrors her psyche during this time. With the image breaking up between edits, the rough quality of this early tape captures Benning’s sense of isolation and sadness, her retreat from the world. As such, Living Inside is the confession of a chronic outsider.
+ Me and Rubyfruit
- Director:
- Benning, Sadie
- Running Time:
- Short. 6 minutes
- Sound:
- sound - Dolby
- Color:
- color
- Country:
- USA
- Year:
- 1989
- Language:
- English
- Genre:
- Documentary, Experimental / Avant Garde, Queer Cinema, Feminism
- Notes:
- Based on a novel by Rita Mae Brown, Me and Rubyfruit chronicles the enchantment of teenage lesbian love against a backdrop of pornographic images and phone sex ads. Benning portrays the innocence of female romance and the taboo prospect of female marriage.
+ If Every Girl Had a Diary
- Director:
- Benning, Sadie
- Running Time:
- Short. 9 minutes
- Sound:
- sound - Dolby
- Color:
- b/w
- Country:
- USA
- Year:
- 1990
- Language:
- English
- Genre:
- Documentary, Experimental / Avant Garde, Queer Cinema, Feminism
- Notes:
- Setting her pixelvision camera on herself and her room, Benning searches for a sense of identity and respect as a woman and a lesbian. Acting alternately as confessor and accuser, the camera captures Benning’s anger and frustration at feeling trapped by social prejudices.
+ Jollies
- Director:
- Benning, Sadie
- Running Time:
- Short. 11 minutes
- Sound:
- sound - Dolby
- Color:
- b/w
- Country:
- USA
- Year:
- 1990
- Language:
- English
- Genre:
- Documentary, Experimental / Avant Garde, Queer Cinema, Feminism
- Notes:
- Benning gives a chronology of her crushes and kisses, tracing the development of her nascent sexuality. Addressing the camera with an air of seduction and romance, giving the viewer a sense of her anxiety and special delight as she came to realize her lesbian identity.