Readers

James Benning has created over twenty-five feature-length films during his forty-year-career and continues to be viewed as an avant garde pioneer. His distinctive, aesthetically rigorous, single-shot cinema is subtle yet audacious, resonant, and unforgettable, and moreover, a lesson in stillness and observation. His approach begs the viewers' patient, undivided attention. In Readers‎, candid portraiture meets naturalistic performance: several people read from a wide range of books. They read - not aloud, but to themselves - as viewers "read" them.‎ At times confounding, absurd, frustrating, hilarious, and endearing, Benning's alt-doc masterpiece evokes humanity and mystery and draws this everyday action into the light.