Tuesday Oct 14, 2008 (7:30pm)
Canny critics have long noted the overlapping late-19th-century technologies of railroads and motion pictures, but James Benning's RR is a more fluid integration of the two than anyone could have imagined. The film, reportedly the last he will shoot in 16mm, keeps with Benning's structuralist landscape works. In films like Casting a Glance (2007) and 13 Lakes (2004), land, sky, and time put audiences into a uniquely meditative relationship with the American West. Benning spent several years collecting the 43 shots that comprise RR — a portrait of the rails' alternately romantic and consumerist connotations.
– Max Goldberg