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A Letter To True

2004, Movie, NR, 78 mins

A Letter To True: Review

LETTER TO TRUE, A
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Dog lovers will be thrilled with photographer, filmmaker and, most recently, clothier Bruce Weber's often beautiful cinematic scrapbook. Others could be forgiven for writing off Weber's gushing love letter to the noblest of beasts as anthropomorphism run amok. Much like his previous documentary essay, CHOP SUEY, this 78-minute crazy quilt of classic Hollywood film clips; home movies (albeit actor Dirk Bogarde's); readings from Rilke and Spender; jazz and cabaret standards and lyrically shot footage of dogs romping in the surf at Montauk is essentially a collection of the things Weber loves. And Weber really loves dogs, especially the five golden retrievers with whom he and Nan Bush, his professional and personal partner of more than 30 years, share their lives. Structured as a letter to the youngest of these pups, the soulful, sweet-faced True ("the only one who'll listen to me"), Weber explains how the security of his hearth and home have been forever shaken by the surprise attacks of 9/11, and how he now fears leaving his family behind whenever he's called away on assignment. This new uncertainty on the home front probably accounts for Weber's inclusion of WWII-era footage of handsome American soldiers waging war against the Japanese in the Pacific; that and the fact that these powerful young men fit neatly into the idealized retro-vision of mid-20th-century America that threads through so much of Weber's work. His fondness for wholesome American masculinity might also explain why Weber spends so much time with colorful farmer Kelly Ammann and her large family. Kelly, who's been married four times (she hates having a husband, loves weddings), has a cute dog, but she has an even cuter bunch of strapping, corn-fed lads hanging around her place; they could easily have stepped out of one of Weber's catalogs for Abercrombie & Fitch. In between we get Australian surfers, a topless fashion model and a lovely black-and-white montage celebrating the dogs of New York City. Careering about such a wide variety of subjects, however, has a flattening effect — the film is as two-dimensional as a photo album — and certain juxtapositions suggest such shallowness that one can only hope they're accidental. A description of an afternoon spent photographing Elizabeth Taylor, during which she graciously phoned Weber's terminally ill friend, precedes a sermon by Martin Luther King, and, in the film's most self-serving moment, Weber's tribute to the great war photographer Larry Burrows, who was killed while trying to bring the suffering caused by the Vietnam War to the world's attention, is followed immediately by photos Weber took of Haitian detainees. And no matter how deep one's affection for man's best friend, there's something undeniably fatuous about considering the emotional impact 9/11 has had on a dog named Rain. leave a comment --Ken Fox
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