Five Year Diary Reel 83

Anne Charlotte Robertson’s primary body of work is her FIVE YEAR DIARY, an approximately 37-hour film which spans the years from 1981 to 1997. REEL 22 of the DIARY includes the audio from a cassette that would have been played during the screening. Robertson would have narrated the reel from a seat in the audience. THE DIARY was already into its second year when Anne began graduate school at Massachusetts College of Art. The audio is a tape recording of the review board for her film thesis. She discusses her work with Super 8 auteur and professor Saul Levine and a second faculty member. Does a diary ever end on purpose, or does it just tend to fade away? Robertson continued to make films after she completed this untitled final reel of the DIARY and shot material for REEL 84, but never finished it. Her final completed films, funded by a Guggenheim fellowship, are from 2001; she died from cancer in 2012.

Introduction by David Pendleton, Harvard Film Archive.

From the collection ot the Harvard Film Archive