I will never view a documentary film in the same way.
I’ve thought of myself as an experienced and sophisticated viewer: fact-focused, attentive to accurate detail, appreciative of a story well told, critical of both overindulgence and insufficiency of material, appreciative of novelty, and not easily seduced by a documentary that prohibits suspension of judgement.
That was me in a comfortable theater seat or easy chair in front of my flat screen TV. But in October, 2023, the NY Times article reported that a film-maker, Eduardo Montes-Bradley, was making a film about the Piccirilli brothers. I was soon to find myself somewhere else in that room.
Attilio Piccirilli was a personal friend of my family and something of a legendary figure as I came up in the Italian colony of the Bronx during and after WW II. Though I have no direct memory of him, I do have many memories of having Piccirilli work pointed out to me in my teen years. But because the Piccirilli name was never in evidence on their public works, they seemed a bit of treasured esoterica.
So, making contact with Eduardo was irresistible. My awareness of the Piccirilli brothers had seemed privileged information; contacting another who shared it intrigued me. I dropped him a note, a “calling card”:
The NYTimes story that featured your work on a Piccirilli documentary caught my eye and peaked my memory of a small slice of his interactions with my mother and her family. He was a family friend; she was that person in a small organization that runs the whole show from behind a small desk at the “Leonardo” in the 1930s. . .
Now it was Eduardo’s turn to be enticed as my “calling card” referred to a slice of the Piccirilli story crying out for exploration. “The Leonardo” is the familiar shorthand for the Leonardo DaVinci School of Art. Founded in 1924, it was Attilio’s educational contribution to the Italian colony in New York. I also name-dropped that my mom, Antoniette (‘Tina”), was the de facto COO of the Leonardo. She essentially ran the school until she left in early 1936 to give birth to my older brother. He carries a middle name, Leonard. Mom’s sister, my aunt Claudia, then replaced her. It was all paisani and parenti right up to the shuttering of the Leonardo in early 1942. I was four years old.
Eduardo, Attilio, The Leonardo, and, me.
This is the cast of characters: Eduardo, Attilio, The Leonardo, and, me. Quickly assembled, the plot developed in a way that is a microcosm of the of the whole film-making process for Eduardo Montes-Bradley. It is multi-media. It is a world in which vision trumps concept without sacrifice. The subject on the screen may be a piece of marble, carved or not; a group photo; a talking head; or it might be a montage contrasting new and old, B&W and technicolor, a depiction of an historic event or the symbol of an historic event. Did I mention the monumental carved marble commemorating the event? All elements the same, equal in some sense, until it finds its rightful place in the Rubik’s cube of film frames. Then it is unique, transforming Eduardo’s choice into the viewers’ illusion of inevitability.
This process also became a meeting of four personalities and the making of a friendship.
To Eduardo, I think I was seen as what we historians call a “primary source,” a contemporaneous artifact, an eye-witness. And, as we engaged around this one special element of the Piccirilli
story, I saw myself as an anthropological “participant-observer.” For as I rummaged through family papers and photos and produced Leonardo-related materials, part genealogy, part my immersion in the literature of the Italian colony of the Bronx, Eduardo plunged into his task of selection and integration.
We researched together behind Prudence and Fortitude and we FaceTimed our discoveries and insights for many weeks, melding our respective linear and intuitive proclivities. Sharing his visually-based and instinctive conceptualization, he let me into his processes, techniques and manipulations that make up the concrete elements of a documentary film. He let me watch him, mousing about on his computer screen, maneuvering images and sounds thorough centuries and across oceans and continents forming a cohesive understanding of the Piccirilli Factor.
I will never view a documentary film in the same way.
Art School, Piccirilli, Documentary
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