Uncropped | Vancouver International Film Festival | September 26 – October 6, 2024
From lunch with Liberace, to travelling the world, to working on set with Wes Anderson, James Hamilton’s photography career is a series of enviable experiences. It’s like something out of the Dos Equis Most Interesting Man in the World commercials. Watching Uncropped is like looking through a giant photo album while hearing stories about Hamilton’s life and work, organized chronologically based on the stages of Hamilton’s career. Anyone who loves photography or journalism will love this film.
It’s the kind of story that seems unrealistic today: drop out of college, happen upon an apprenticeship with fashion photographer Alberto Rizzo, learn on the job, and end up becoming a renowned photographer. It’s also a story of the glory days of print media and renegade journalism.
Hamilton quickly fell in love with photography after his summer apprenticeship. He stayed in New York when his roommates went back to finish college at the Pratt Institute. He has kept the same apartment to this day, with a tiny kitchen that also serves as a dark room.
In 1969, Hamilton hitchhiked to the Texas Pop Fest. He forged a press pass and took photos from the front row. Upon returning to New York he approached Crawdaddy, a music magazine; not only did they buy some of his photos, they offered him a job as staff photographer.
After a couple of years at Crawdaddy, Hamilton joined The Herald, where he could exercise his journalistic skills documenting life on the street in New York. It’s also where he met his wife, a journalist, who he sometimes collaborated with.
At Harper’s Bazaar from 1971-1973, Hamilton photographed celebrities, attended lavish galas, and hung out in hotel rooms. The publication he spent the most time at is The Village Voice. From 1974-1993, Hamilton’s work was in every section of the paper from news to arts to features. It’s fascinating to learn about the culture of the Voice and hear from others who worked there at the same time. That style of journalism is truly lost in time.
While at the Voice, Hamilton also freelanced for New York Magazine. In between all of that he went to Ethiopia to cover the war. He seemed able to capture extraordinary images in any environment. Then the New York Observer offered Hamilton something he couldn’t pass up: two photos per week of anything he wanted. He would often make a game out of it, having the two photos relate to each other in some way.
After being assigned to photograph him, Hamilton became friends with Wes Anderson and was invited to be his stills photographer. Hamilton has a cameo appearance in almost every film he worked on.
When Anderson met Hamilton, he thought, ‘this is James Stewart in Rear Window.’ In fact, Hamilton lives in the same block where that film takes place. And just like Stewart, he suffered a leg injury that prevented him from working. In 2008 while crossing the street, he was hit by a car. His first thought was that he was glad he didn’t have to work at the Observer anymore, which had changed as the journalism industry was hollowed out. He didn’t feel like he was doing good work anymore.
Hamilton’s archive, filling stacks of plastic bins in a storage unit, is a time capsule of a kind of golden age of journalism. A time when James (Stewart or Hamilton) could devote themselves to their craft and have ample outlets for it.
