Strange Weather

The fascinating thing about this 50-minute documentary (1993) by Peggy Ahwesh and Margie Strosser — about the everyday lives of four Miami crackheads, three women and a man — is the offbeat intimacy they create with their imaginative and resourceful use of a Fisher-Price Pixelvision camera. The crackheads are mainly glimpsed goofing off, talking about themselves, and trying to coax money out of family and friends during a severe hurricane. {2011 postscript: I’ve belatedly discovered, from Ahwesh herself, that this is in fact a pseudodocumentary in which the four characters weren’t crackheads at all.] On the same program, Ahwesh’s short film From Romance to Ritual (1985), a personal documentary involving travels and friends in England as well as some ancient history. Chicago Filmmakers, 1543 W. Division, Friday, February 18, 8:00, 384-5533.

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