Generosity of Eye (Brad Hall, 2014): USA

Reviewed by Lia Durham. Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival 2015.

Generosity of Eye is a personal film about Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ father William Louis-Dreyfus. Directed by her husband Brad Hall this is truly a family project.

William is a respected art collector with a collection spanning decades and big enough to fill an entire museum. His storage space is his own museum catered to his personal tastes. But after spending so much of his life collecting pieces that mean so much to him he has decided to sell his collection and donate the money to the Harlem Children Zone. It is an organization dedicated to helping children succeed in school from elementary to the graduation of college.

The film is separated into three parts, collection, justice, connection and Julia Louis-Dreyfus is our guide throughout the film. Shot in a cinema verite style, at times she talks to her husband behind the camera and the boom mic drops into the frame. She interviews her father sometimes with the artist themselves about some of his favorite pieces. The film goes into detail about the certain artist’s style and their inspiration and why William likes that particular work of art. His relationship with artists is one of mutual respect and adoration.

The touching part for me in the film was the relationship between William and Julia. You can tell that Julia is finding out new things she never new about her dad. She sits just as interested as us during the interviews about the details of her father’s life’s work. At times she is overwhelmed by the lives her father has touched and how highly people think of him and she begins to get teary.

This film is all about outsiders. William Louis-Dreyfus feels like an outsider of the art world because he doesn’t follow their standards of what “good” art is. He likes pieces that speak to him and that’s all that matters. Also the kids in the Harlem Children Zone are outsiders because of lack of resources. So you can see why he feels the connection to this organization and why his passion for justice is just as strong as his passion for art.