David Holzman's Diary

An enduring delight from the Underground era, cleverly sowing arrant lies at the then-sacred 24 fps. McBride's good-humoured gag on 'personal cinema' and the diary genre casts a wry sidelight on a generation's self-obsession and cinephilia. David Holzman commits his life (film-making) to film - directing and starring in the film we're watching, his home-movie autobiography. So far, so faddish. But 'David' is actor Kit Carson, behind the camera he's apparently twiddling is Michael Wadleigh, and the auto-vérité amounts to as much of McBride's script as could be filmed before his $2,500 ran out. Retrospective ironies pile up with interim career leaps: Carson shot a documentary on Dennis Hopper, married Karen Black, and is now a Hollywood screenwriter; Wadleigh tripped through Woodstock to Wolfen; and McBride has limped through sci fi and softcore satire to the added narration credit for The Big Red One and the remake of Breathless. The illusion is complete.