Beautiful Machine

There’s something beautiful about looking at something old in a new way. Which is why watching a clunky, rusty, outdated machine clicking away to an original modern score in high-def chiaroscuro is about the furthest thing from turning on a boring historical documentary. Linotype: The Film introduces viewers to a...

By Ilana Shulevitz

July 26, 2012

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There’s something beautiful about looking at something old in a new way. Which is why watching a clunky, rusty, outdated machine clicking away to an original modern score in high-def chiaroscuro is about the furthest thing from turning on a boring historical documentary. Linotype: The Film introduces viewers to a complicated typesetting device Thomas Edison once dubbed the “Eighth Wonder of the World” — and the wacky, cartoonish machinists who use it. Though Linotype machines have been eradicated from newsrooms and print shops for nearly half a century, a few stragglers continue to practice the complicated art. Filmmakers Doug Wilson, Brandon Goodwin, and Jess Heugel set out across America and parts of Germany to find the stories of these men, and they discovered some real characters.
Fri., July 27, 7 p.m., 2012

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