Alone In Kyoto

This is a straight up repost of J. Martinez and Like Cool:

"Jeff Altman is a film colorist from Chicago. These scences were shot by his grandparents in 1958. This footage features only his grandfather; both behind and in front of the camera. He says:

'It was edited by hand some 50 years ago by my grandfather shortly after shooting it. Judging by the 3 minute length, I would say its safe to assume you're seeing all the footage he shot. 100 foot rolls of 16mm are of about 3 minutes in length. The order of the shots were probably changed, as well as removal of flash frames and other junk. '"

I used to wonder why tourists bothered filming their entire rides on the San Francisco Cable Cars; it just seemed so pointless. But now I know why they bother filming anything at all: it's so their grandchildren can find the footage, edit it, and post the video on the Future-Internet over 50 years later.

This video is amazing (and so are Altman's grandfather's other clips). It is littered with several beautiful shots--especially the smoker with the Bay Bridge in the background--but it's the time travel-like effect that really had me hooked. It's interesting to see how different, yet how similar, San Francisco was in the 1950s. I just love that the footage consists of things I see on a daily basis, like city streets filled with cars and people riding the trolley. Only here, the cars are old classics and the people are dressed stylishly in suits and dresses. The overall tone and feel of this video is great as well (in large part due to the excellent selection of Air's "Alone In Kyoto" as the score). It's relaxing and eye-opening at the same time. I feel like this is exactly what many musicians and directors are trying to achieve when filming music videos for indie rock records.

This makes me want to start taking more pictures again and shooting short crappy videos whenever I'm out and about. And one other thing is for sure: I will never make fun of video-happy tourists again. Ever.