Herman's House

2012 film by Angad Singh Bhalla
Running time
80 minutesCountriesCanada
United Kingdom
United StatesLanguageEnglish

Herman's House is a documentary film, directed by Angad Singh Bhalla and released in 2012.[1] An American, British and Canadian coproduction, the film profiles Herman Wallace, a member of the Angola Three who had been in prison for over 40 years after his shorter prison term for bank robbery was extended with a disputed conviction for a murder he did not commit, and Jackie Sumell, a conceptual artist who has launched a project of building the dream house Wallace wishes he could live in if he is ever released from prison.[2]

Wallace is never shown in the film, and instead is heard only in recorded telephone conversations with Sumell.[3]

Distribution

The film premiered at the 2012 True/False Film Festival,[4] and had its Canadian premiere at the 2012 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.[2]

It was broadcast in July 2013 as an episode of the PBS documentary series POV.[5]

Awards

Bhalla was the winner of the Magnus Isacsson Award at the 2012 Montreal International Documentary Festival.[6]

The film was a Donald Brittain Award nominee for best social or political documentary at the 2nd Canadian Screen Awards in 2014.[7] Ricardo Acosta was nominated for Best Editing in a Documentary Program or Series, and Ken Myhr received a nomination for Best Music for a Non-Fiction Program or Series.

The film won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Arts and Culture Programming at the 2014 News and Documentary Emmy Awards.[8]

Legacy

Following Wallace's death of cancer in late 2013, Bhalla and digital media producer Ted Biggs created the interactive documentary project The Deeper They Bury Me: A Call from Herman Wallace, which was based around Wallace's time in solitary confinement, for the National Film Board of Canada.[9]

References

  1. ^ Mark Jenkins, "Building A Home For A Client Who Can't Live In It". NPR, April 18, 2013.
  2. ^ a b Kevin Ritchie, "Hot Docs 2012: Reimagining the prison flick with Herman’s House". Playback, May 3, 2012.
  3. ^ Stephen Holden, "Dreams From His Cell". The New York Times, April 18, 2013.
  4. ^ Hannah Spaar, "T/F Review: Herman's House". Vox Magazine, March 2, 2012.
  5. ^ Fausto Giovanny Pinto, "PBS to air documentary on NY artist's project". Newsday, July 7, 2013.
  6. ^ T'Cha Dunlevy, "A fitting finale for late director Magnus Isacsson; Weeks before his death he was happily involved". Montreal Gazette, November 23, 2012.
  7. ^ Manori Ravindran, "'Watermark,' 'My Prairie Home' up for Canadian Screen Awards". RealScreen, January 13, 2014.
  8. ^ Julianna Cummins, "NFB, Herman’s House win Emmy Awards". Playback, October 1, 2014.
  9. ^ Lauren Wissot, "An Interactive Journey Through Solitary Confinement: 'The Deeper They Bury Me: A Call from Herman Wallace'". Global Comment, October 23, 2015.

External links

  • Herman's House at IMDb Edit this at Wikidata