Cucalorus response 2: Nobody

For my second viewing, I checked out the film Nobody, another documentary though this one following around Jerry Bell, a drifter whom received an inflatable raft from smoking 20,000 cigarettes and rafted down the Mississippi to Memphis where he met up with 2 documentary filmmakers. Jerry became tired of his regular home-life after his wife left him and his mother died so he decided to convert to a life on the river, living off whatever he could find. The filmmakers, Lance Murphey and Alan Spearman, were originally newspaper photographers and just happened to find Jerry and decided to make their first film about his journey. Not knowing where they were going with the doc, they followed him around until one fateful day Jerry called home to find out that his son had committed suicide leaving Jerry in shambles, deciding to stay around Memphis for awhile.
I really dug the way the doc was shot, black-and-white and every shot seemed like a portrait (I guess the photographer thing came in handy). Meeting Jerry, Lance, and Alan also at Jengo’s one night made me interested in seeing the doc because I thought it’d be interesting but comical. When I saw it, I was surprised at the somber tone and the overall message it sends about life; you don’t need a home or car to be free. I was really surprised to see how professionally shot and narrated (by Jerry of course) the film was.
Afterwards, there was a Q&A with the three guys, who were happy to answer questions about how following Jerry around was. They also informed the audience (they had told me a few nights before) that Jerry was featured on Dr. Phil, where his daughter confronted him to tell him how much of a failure he was. This really shocked me because Jerry seemed so kind-hearted to me that I could never see him being a dead-beat dad. Almost every night, I ran into him and the filmmakers and we ended up talking for awhile about almost anything. It was actually refreshing to meet such an original person here in Wilmington and I was sad to see them all head back to Memphis.