Lynne recently took part in a panel discussion at IFP Film Week in NYC called “Neorealist Features & Hybrid Documentaries” along with David Wilson of the True/False Festival, and filmmakers Lotfy Nathan, Damon Russell, & Tim Sutton. Paula Bernstein of Indiewire recapped the panel in her article here: Fact or Fiction? Neorealist Features and Hybrid […]
Lynne recently met with Karen Rester of the Brooklyn Rail to talk “Your Day is My Night”, the hybrid doc process, and UC Berkeley ’92. The Brooklyn Rail September 4, 2013 In Conversation: Lynne Sachs with Karen Rester When the experimental filmmaker Lynne Sachs taught avant-garde filmmaking at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1992, […]
Earlier this month, I attended the Traverse City Film Festival in beautiful Traverse City, Michigan. I spent three days seeing films and taking boat rides on the lake. I also had a bad case of laryngitis so spent the closing festival gala milling around, smiling on occasion, and searching for a cup of tea. Lo […]
On July 15th, Lynne and I trekked to Boston, sisters and s.o.’s in tow, to screen Your Day is My Night in my old stomping grounds; Cambridge, MA. The film showed as part of The DocYard’s summer series at the Brattle Theater, an independent and repertory house where I saw many career-affirming flicks like Andrew […]
Sachs calls the film a “hybrid documentary,” with real-life stories told by middle-aged and elderly, Chinese immigrants presented in a honed, often theatrical, style rather than as verité oral histories.
Combining scripted performance with improvisation, Your Day is My Night becomes immediately difficult to classify. Is it a documentary?
Lynne Sachs’ latest film fuses techniques of oral history and performance to achieve an impressionistic portrait of seven characters…
“Your Day is My Night” is a fascinating and innovative portrait of Chinese immigrant life in New York by Lynne Sachs. Sachs made the film through a lengthy series of workshops with Chinatown residents who became the film’s authors and performers. Most of the actors are retired people who have had some experience performing in amateur dance and theater productions, so they are comfortable as performers, without being overly polished.
When director Lynne Sachs first got the idea to make a film about shift-bed houses, she googled “hot-bed house” and got X-rated results.