11 x 14

Director: James Benning
Year Released: 1977
Rating: 2.5

Another love letter to the Midwest from Wisconsin's own Benning (Pop to Sadie) that gives the teensiest, weensiest hint of - wait for it! - an actual narrative featuring what might be a hitchhiker and two lesbians who really want to see Mt. Rushmore.  There are plenty of shots of billboards and cars driving by, and it finishes up with footage of baseball (the auteur used to play it) and golf, though its exact purpose is annoyingly opaque (deconstructed road movie?), and I just think it's a case of Benning stapling together shots he likes (eight minutes of a smoke stack, a plane flying low) and calling it a day.  The title refers to the aspect ratio, which makes me wonder if Benning is the kind of dude who, for fun, memorizes batting averages for ball players and can recite them casually while slow-sipping cans of Schlitz.