Caouette shot to fame in 2004 with Tarnation, the story of his family told mainly through the home movies that he has been filming for most of his life.
While I sadly missed Tarnation yesterday, I was lucky enough to today be part of the first audience ever to see the new cut of Caouette's latest work, Walk Away Renee. This film follows Jonathan's journey across the country moving his severely mentally ill mother Renee from a home in Houston to one near him in New York. At the same time, it recaps and adds to the story of Jonathan's upbringing and Renee's condition that he detailed in his first film (I followed the film perfectly without having seen Tarnation first).
The result is completely engaging, not only because the story is so moving and treated with equal frankness and sensitivity, but because it is visually stunning. It should already be clear from the above trailers that Caouette has a unique visual style, a flare for montage that distinguishes his films from the staid style of the traditional documentary. Caouette described his film-making as "idiosyncratic", which perfectly summarises his distinctive style. Even at about two hours long, the film kept me captivated and never felt like it was dragging on. Quite the opposite - Caouette reveals so many facets of the 'characters' and makes them so engrossing that at the end of the film I still longed to know more about them.
In interviews after Tarnation, Caouette argued that people who suffer from mental illness deserve more empathy and understanding. With Walk Away Renee, he has once again created a film that will raise awareness of what it is like both to be afflicted with mental illness and to care for someone who is. It is heartfelt yet never preachy or didactic films like these that will hopefully change public opinion. The fact that on top of this Caouette has managed to create a genuinely mind-blowing piece of visual art is just the cherry on the cake.
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