Making light of it

James Broughton, with life partner, Joel Singer, created some of the most avant-garde films of the 1950s, 60s & 70s and fathered a child with legendary film critic, Pauline Kael. He was a "Walt Whitman of film" and received the American Film Institute Lifetime Achievement award in 1989. No discussion of the spirituality of film and cinema can be complete without his contributions being taken into consideration. Making Light of It, Broughton's book on filmmaking, first appeared from City Lights in 1977 under the title "Seeing the Light." Rewritten, with a new title, this book appeared again from City Lights in 1992. This new version began with a glance at Dante's Vita Nuova: "On a foggy morning in 1946 Sidney Peterson took me to an abandoned cemetery in San Francisco where I discovered a new life." As he did with everything, Broughton constantly mythologizes cinema, seeing it in relationship, not only to himself, but to various worlds and contexts.