Dick Johnson Is Dead
Director: Kirsten Johnson
Year Released: 2020
Rating: 2.0
Cinematographer/documentarian Johnson sees that her beloved father, Dr. C. Richard Johnson, a psychiatrist, is starting to lose his memory (and his body is breaking down), so to alleviate her worries about losing him, she stages his death in a variety of ways: hit by a falling air conditioner, in an auto accident, clobbered by a construction worker, falling down the stairs, etc. Johnson previously recorded her Mother suffering from Alzheimer's in Cameraperson, and while her love for her father is genuine, it's certainly a peculiar (and ethically questionable ... if not totally tone-deaf) way to commemorate his life (and his deformed feet), becoming more about her than her subject. I'm a little surprised, considering the profession he was in for decades, that he didn't pick apart her motivation for doing this project - which is purely emotional and barely intellectual - but maybe he was just humoring her the way a Good Parent can.