10/17/2016
A sample from The Criterion Collection edition of Boyhood; A Photo Essay by the film´s still photographer Matt Lankes Photography with a verbal essay/commentary by the films lead, subject, Ellar Coltrane, talking about playing and portraying the character of Mason over the series of time. Speaking about how we all play characters, rolls, and how he is slowly moving away from that character. That and with the other features on the blu - ray, of the film´s, director, Richard Linklater, speaking about the autobiographical nature of the film, I can´t help but make a comparison to photographer Sally Mann and her ¨Family¨ series. Works where like Linklater, she tries to capture, reimagine, her childhood memories, featuring her children as her models - over the course of several years. Who themselves are playing a role, while working and collaborating with there mother, the photographer. In the same way that Linklater collaborates, on his art, his story, memories with his actors. Playing roles, who are and at the same time aren't to much like themselves.
Maybe in a strange way I also feel that is why, like the photographs of Mann´s, Linklater´s Boyhood is also telling my story too. No matter how distance my childhood was from Mason´s and that of childhood depicted in the photographs of Mann´s children.
In this excerpt from a piece on our edition of Richard Linklater’s BOYHOOD, actor Ellar Coltrane reflects on his evolving relationship with Mason, the charac...