THE B SIDE: ELSA DORFMAN'S PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHY
The Abridged Script
FADE IN:
INT. ALL-WHITE PHOTO STORAGE ROOM
We open in an all-white photo storage and lab space, which has copious amounts of drawers full of photos. The AUDIENCE senses they are about to become VERY, VERY FAMLIAR with this single room.
ERROL MORRIS
(off camera)
Hi everyone, I’m Errol Morris. My documentaries have covered subjects as far-ranging as brutal murderers, deluded loners, and Donald Rumsfeld. I’ve used my Interrotron camera to pierce deeply into the human condition. And so I bring you my latest effort: chatting away with an old friend of mine about Polaroids. Please welcome Elsa Dorfman, renowned portrait photographer.
ELSA DORFMAN
Thank you! I’ve always wanted to experience the Interrotron.
ERROL MORRIS
Too bad I'm not using it. So show us some pics!
ELSA DORFMAN
Why sure. I have lots and lots of pictures. Like this one!
(holds photo in front of face)
And here’s someone else.
(holds so that one eye peeks out from behind photo)
Can’t forget this person.
(holds so that tip of one earlobe juuust barely extends past photo)
And here’s my husband. He was quite the hairy fucker. I had to find myself a larger camera just to get all his body hair in one image.
ERROL MORRIS
Is that why you devoted yourself to the special giant Polaroid camera that takes up half a room? The 20x24, that’s large and cumbersome and only slightly less manoeuvrable than Dion Phaneuf of the Ottawa Senators, hey-ohhhhh?
ELSA DORFMAN
It is.
ERROL MORRIS
What about getting a camera with higher resolution and then expanding the image?
ELSA DORFMAN
(pause)
Another wonderful device I found was the remote shutter release.
ERROL MORRIS
That’s the handheld thing on a cord so you can be in the photo.
ELSA DORFMAN
Correct.
ERROL MORRIS
So you invented selfies.
ELSA DORFMAN
Shit.
ERROL MORRIS
That’s OK, I’m sure it was inevitable.
ELSA DORFMAN
Even so. Shit. Although, to be fair, I also photographed myself butt naked.
ERROL MORRIS
Thus inventing the Kardashian selfie.
ELSA DORFMAN
Dammit. On the topic of famous people however, I do have many photos of them. Let’s see.
(opens drawer)
(removes 700 photos)
Ah yes. Here we have a singer/songwriter most people have forgotten. Let’s hear some of his music!
CUE: FOLK SONG
ELSA DORFMAN
And here’s Allen Ginsberg, who some people will remember. We can also afford to listen to one of his songs.
CUE: GINSBERG SONG
ELSA DORFMAN
And here’s a photo of some random lanky folk singer with stringy hair and a harmonica who became super famous, and we can’t afford to licence any of his music, or even mention him by name it seems. It rhymes with "Blob Villain".
ERROL MORRIS
Sorry about that, I blew all my “Mr. Death” money on Lamborghinis and coke. Speaking of music, why don’t you tell us about what “The B Side” refers to in this context?
ELSA DORFMAN
Sure! When I take pics of randos, I’ll do a couple and let them pick one. The one they don’t pick is sort of like a “B-side” of an album, but I tend to like them better. Isn’t that odd?
ERROL MORRIS
Odd that they paid for a formal photo, and then chose the more formal photo, leaving you the quirky one that would be more interesting to strangers with no emotional stake in how it turned out?
ELSA DORFMAN
Yes, exactly that kind of odd. For example this B-side has a dude with no head. Why wouldn’t anyone choose that?
CUE: MUSIC BY SOME GUY WHO MAKES PHILIP GLASS TYPE MUSIC BUT ISN’T PHILIP GLASS BECAUSE GETTING PHILIP GLASS TAKES SERIOUS COIN YO
ERROL MORRIS
Let’s take a moment to get deep and talk about photos as truth and people’s souls and shit.
ELSA DORMAN
Sure. Well photos aren’t truth. Ten photos taken within twenty seconds will tell ten different stories. As documentation they are bullshit.
ERROL MORRIS
So their value is the insight into hearts and minds.
ELSA DORFMAN
Nah, that is also bullshit. I just want to record the surface of people.
ERROL MORRIS
But they give such big soulful looks with their wide trusting eyes...
ELSA DORFMAN
So do puppies. Is it time to look at Allen Ginsberg’s giant dong yet?
ERROL MORRIS
He had a giant dong?
ELSA DORFMAN
Well no, I mean, I have a giant picture of Allen Ginsberg’s dong. The dong itself is medium-sized.
ERROL MORRIS
As long as it’s worth building the whole movie up to it.
ELSA DORFMAN
Oh it is. I’ve got an enormous print, it takes up a whole huge wall. In fact I’m having it specially treated and preserved because I find the idea of some curator delicately handling Allen Ginsberg’s huge floppy cock hilarious. Let’s go have a look at it now.
ERROL MORRIS
Yeah, we should leave this slow-paced extended scene inside a giant white room before one of us becomes a Star Child.
They finally go to ANOTHER ROOM and on a giant table is indeed BIG OL’ NAKED ALLEN GINSBERG.
ERROL MORRIS
Holy shit, I’ve just been told we are in fact an R-rated movie. For having utterly non-sexual nude photos of you and Allen Ginsberg.
ELSA DORFMAN
This movie of you and me talking about Polaroids and shit for 80 minutes is rated R. But Superman gruesomely murdering people with heat vision is PG-13??
ERROL MORRIS
Apparently.
ELSA DORFMAN
Society is fucked up.
ERROL MORRIS
Agreed. But that's precisely why you'll be joining forces with Randall "Thin Blue Line" Adams, Dan "Gates of Heaven" Harberts, Ray "Mole Rat" Mendez, and Stephen Hawking, to fight for justice and right wrongs in the Errol Morris Cinematic Universe!! Talks with Bruce Willis are ongoing.
ELSA DORFMAN
Oh Errol, not you too...
ERROL MORRIS
I NEEDS MY LAMBORGHINIS AND COKE, WOMAN
END