Stop watching the LipTV interview between D.A. Pennebaker and Ondi Timoner at the 5:08 mark. Because that’s when it shifts into footage from Pennebaker’s Don’t Look Back (’67), except some rocket scientist forgot to adjust the aspect ratio so it looks all horizontally taffy-pulled. Brilliant!
Pennebaker began filming docs in 1953, and he kept working right until the end. (Or close to it.) Everyone mentions Don’t Look Back (’67), Monterey Pop (’68), Town Bloody Hall (’79) and The War Room (’93) as Pennebaker’s career highlights, but I would argue that Primary (’60), a Pennebaker-edited doc about the 1960 Wisconsin primary election between John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey, was the biggest groundbreaker of all.
Wiki excerpt: “Produced by Robert Drew, shot by Richard Leacock and Albert Maysles and edited by D. A. Pennebaker, the film was a breakthrough in documentary film style. Most importantly, through the use of mobile cameras and lighter sound equipment, the filmmakers were able to follow the candidates as they wound their way through cheering crowds, cram with them into crowded hotel rooms, and to hover around their faces as they awaited polling results. This resulted in a greater intimacy than was possible with the older, more classical techniques of documentary filmmaking; and it established what has since become the standard style of video reporting.”