Adrienne

Andy Ostroy's 2021 documentary is about the actor and director Adrienne Shelly. Shelly became known through Hal Hartley's films of the late eighties and had moved into a new phase in independent cinema with Waitress, which she wrote and directed. She was murdered in 2006, shortly after finishing it. The documentary was made by her husband, which is both its strength and its limit. Ostroy has access to the personal archive, home videos and Shelly's notebooks; but his own grief also sits at the centre of the narrative and in places the film cannot move away from it. The best sections are those given to Shelly's own working method. The obstacles a woman faced in moving from acting to directing in the nineties and early 2000s say something concrete about the industry of the period. Paul Rudd, Keri Russell and Nathan Fillion speak. Who it's for: those interested in the history of independent film and in personal documentary. Who it's not for: viewers who do not want to approach murder and grief; the film places both at its centre.