Six O'Clock News Movie Review

Six O'Clock News has often been called Ross McElwee's least "personal" film: That is, it's the film that has Ross McElwee and his friends and family in it the least.

That's true, but rest assured, the first from of Six is a lingering photo of McElwee's son. Six O'Clock News follows McElwee's formula of voice-over and interviews (with other people or with himself, when no one else is around) fairly faithfully.

That said, there are fewer of McElwee's usual pals in the film, though Charleen Swansea has a good 15 minutes of screen time. At least it makes sense: In Six, McElwee becomes fascinated with the news, and in particular, natural disasters. When Charleen's house is damaged by Hurricane Hugo, Swansea earns her talking time.

More interesting are moments he spends with other victims: a man who was trapped under a fallen parking garage after the L.A. earthquake, a widower who made it through a long legal battle to put away the man who murdered his wife. McElwee asks (out loud) the deep questions about how things like this can happen, and whether it's inevitable that we end up on the six o'clock news like these poor saps do.

Of course, since this isn't really a movie about McElwee -- rather, it's about God, the universe, life, and everything else -- he can't really answer any of the questions he poses. That makes the film a bit less fulfilling and ends things on a more sour note than in McElwee's more uplifting movies about the human condition, but it's still a pretty good film.

The DVD is part of the exhaustive Ross McElwee Collection.