Product Description

Nominated for an Oscar® and the winner of the Pulitzer Prize for its musical score, Robert J. Flaherty’s last masterpiece is a visually stunning, lyrical tribute to a land and its people. Flaherty’s poetic vision of nature and the human spirit fills every frame of this amazing film. Through the eyes of a young Cajun boy living on the Bayou, Flaherty tells a story of disruption and change when an oil rig brings industry into his pristine world. Listed on the National Film Registry as a national treasure, Louisiana Story has finally been restored to its original glory.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #44192 in DVD
• Brand: FLAHERTY,ROBERT
• Released on: 2003-05-20
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .26 pounds
• Running time: 78 minutes

Amazon.com
Languid, raw, and majestic, Robert J. Flaherty's final documentary is something to behold. Shot in Cajun country in 1948, Louisiana Story is a tale of modernity intruding on an isolated river habitat for crocodiles, catfish, raccoons, and trappers. Within the setting's primitive and dangerous beauty we meet a shy young hero (played by a non-professional actor; a local river rat named Joseph Boudreaux), who spends lonely days steering his raft and padding along banks with feline authority. Into this rustic paradise comes a noisy oil derrick, pounding pipe through the riverbed toward subterranean pools of black goo. Funded by Standard Oil, Flaherty was accused of selling out and fabricating a pro-development "true story" about the boy's friendship with wildcat oilmen. But such complaints overshoot the poetic luster of Flaherty's nature visions: the mysterious interplay of moonlight, reflective waters, black currents, and swaying reeds. Superficially fact or fiction, this film is its own gorgeous truth. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

Beautiful and lyrical
This film is visually stunning. The images are quite simply breathtaking - the black and white photography is crisp, clean, and luminous. The film seems to have been lit from within. Our first view of the Cajun boy in his pirogue is touching and jaw-droppingly beautiful. The opening sequence has got to be one of the loveliest things ever filmed, and for that reason alone it's worth a look. The nature scenes are the most evocative, but I found the images of the men working on the oil derrick beautiful and strangely sublime as well.

The film is also a brief snapshot of what life in south Louisiana was like at that time - unspoiled and rustic and filled with a raw sort of beauty. The "actors" used in this film are achingly real. (And thus they are not always very good at what they are doing, especially the men on board the derrick - who are clearly more Texas than Louisiana.) I particularly enjoyed the boy's father and the scenes in which Cajun French is spoken; my mother is Cajun and let me tell you - this is the real thing. But the boy himself turns in the best performance - at times he is innocent and filled with awe, at other times he is full of mischief and "trop canaille" (to use his papa's words).

The story itself isn't really a story in the traditional sense, though there is enough of a narrative thread there to keep you entertained if you're in a quiet, patient mood. The scene where the boy tries to trap a gator is actually quite exciting, underscored as it is by the original score (which is excellent throughout).

In short, this film is perfect for anyone who truly understands and appreciates south Louisiana and its culture and is looking for something quiet and unique.

Louisiana Story by a Louisianne
This is a random film about life in rural Louisiana during the invasion of the "big oil" boom after World War II. The director focuses on how simple and unchanged life in the swamp state was until the first oil derrick appears, and then the old life rapidly merges into the modern life of motor boats, electricity, and common prosperity. The quiet, solemn swamp is transformed into a noisy, bustling water highway. Robert Flaherty films local citizens in their natural habitat, speaking unrehearsed lines with natural French accents. This is the appeal of the film- all natural people, all natural settings, and improptu speech and action. For film study in black and white, and for the sheer simplicity of life before industrialization, this is the perfect choice. You will be left with an impression of innocence, of a time that is encapsulated in this film.

Another Robert Flaherty work of art

The Bayou, Louisiana.

This documentary is shot with a beautiful black & white photography. The music perfectly matches the tempo and feeling of the story. Lasts only 75 minutes but captures our emotion and interest right from the first scene.

The box of the dvd misleads. It made me expect some kind of social reportage on the impact of oil industry in the pristine bayou wildlife. On the contrary (but that's for you to check).

The story is basically the life of a young and enchanting kid in the Bayou. His daily occupations, his relation with surrounding nature (its enchants and perils). It provokes an emotion similar to the reading of Huckelberry's adventures.

Again, as in all of Mr. Flaherty's documentaries, it's the sheer beauty of the photography and the wonderful capture of the expression of people's faces, real people, that make the viewing a humanly enriching experience.

I have to recommend, also of Mr. Flaherty, "The Man of Aran" and "Nanook of the North".