You will see a people trying to reconstruct a community despite overwhelming obstacles. That, I feel, is the essence of these home movies. This set of characteristics have both denigrated and endeared home movies in the field of film study and preservation. When viewed against big bucks and high art these qualities infer them to be inferior, inconsequential, and unworthy of serious study and preservation. And yet it is specifically their uncalculated sensibility, directness of gaze, and intimate nature that make them true cultural artifacts and historical documents, or ultimately endow them with the potential to actualize the intrinsic magic of the medium - to transport the viewer to another time and place without leaving their seats.
Home movies provide extraordinary views from within.
When carefully considered and contextualized with other documentation and understanding, home movies constitute unique and evocative insights into issues of culture, concepts of place and constructions of communication and meaning. Home movies function as triggers of memory, help place the past within the present, connect the self with others. Consideration of these and other more critical concerns such as rights of privacy, the danger of mythologizing the medium, questions of objectivity and subjectivity, issues of gender and class as well as race and ethnicity and many more are our stimulating tasks for the future. I look forward to joining you in these dialogues. Los films de amateur constituyen asimismo un juicio de valor sobre la cultura.