James Benning Movies

Amy is ravaged by the notion that she is going to die tomorrow, which sends her down a dizzying emotional spiral. When her skeptical friend Jane...

In 1985, former oil rig worker Richard Linklater began a film screening society in Austin, Texas, that aimed to show classic art-house and...

Looping, chugging and barreling by, the trains in Benning's latest monumental film map a stunning topography and a history of American development....

Experimental filmmaker James Benning returns with this abstract documentary about California's Central Valley, part 1 of his "California Trilogy"....

Benning continues his examination of Americana in this film through the stories of two murderers. Ed Gein was a Wisconsin farmer and multiple...

In the fictional city of Santa Teresa, located on the border between Mexico and USA, the researcher Juan de Dios Martínez straddles the line...

Sixty one-minute shots with no camera movement. This tension between painterly and cinematic space is not only experienced as an intellectual...

This is multifaceted look at the landscape and history of Utah (or Deseret, as the Mormon Church prefers to call it). Benning condenses 93 news...

One day, father makes a shocking decision in a family gathering. The family disagrees with it and against him in the very beginning. However, they...

Lengthy static shots of various backroads, smaller interstates, quieter roads, and lonely highways.

Director James Benning turned his attention to the digital world in YouTube Trilogy, organizing found material around three thematic clusters.

Ten shots of skies.

Shots of 13 great lakes in the USA, with each shot containing half water and half sky or land.

It centers on Allensworth, the first self-administered African-American municipality in California, showcasing the buildings of the now-abandoned...

A film looking at the past to warn about the future, from a little boy's point of view. A companion to ‘American Dreams (lost and found)’...

Los Angeles is depicted in 35 stationary shots, each 2 1/2 minutes long, in this non-narrative film, part 2 of Benning's "California Trilogy".

Seven entirely static shots make up James Benning's quiet reflection on existence in the Ruhr Valley.

A crisscross through the USA, carving it up into a series of static shots of just under two minutes, one for each state, presented alphabetically,...

A three hour shot containing light, dark, and a BNSF train in the desert.