Jay Rosenblatt, Filmmaker

Historical Essay

by Paul Grammatico

Video by Paul Grammatico

Videographer: Diallo McLinn

Jay Rosenblatt (1955 -) was born In New York City. He migrated to San Francisco and became a filmmaker in 1980. He has completed over twenty-five films. His work explores our emotional and psychological cores. They are personal in their content yet universal in their appeal.

His films have received over 100 awards and have screened throughout the world. A selection of his films had theatrical runs at the Film Forum in New York and at theaters around the country.

Eight of his films have been at the Sundance Film Festival and several of his films have shown on HBO/Cinemax, the Independent Film Channel and the Sundance Channel. Articles about his work have appeared in the Sunday NY Times Arts & Leisure section, the LA Times, the NY Times, Filmmaker magazine and the Village Voice.

Jay is a recipient of a Guggenheim, USA Artists and a Rockefeller Fellowship. Jay is originally from New York and has lived in San Francisco for many years. He has been a film and video production instructor since 1989 at various film schools in the Bay Area, including Stanford University, S.F. State University, and the San Francisco Art Institute. He has a Master's Degree in Counseling Psychology and, in a former life, worked as a therapist.

Clip of Human Remains(1998):

Clip ofKing of the Jews (2000):

Clip of Phantom Limb (2009):

I first came across Jay’s films in an article in SF Gate which talked about Jay Rosenblatt’s films that were showing at the now defunct Fine Arts Theatre in Berkeley at the cross streets of Shattuck and Haste Street (It was closed on June 30, 2002 and was torn down. It is now a vegetarian restaurant.). I had never heard of Jay Rosenblatt, as he was never discussed in my film classes at CCAC (now CCA). Intrigued, I decided to attend and I was glad that I did as his films had a profound effect on me.

His films such as Human Remains and I Just Wanted to Be Somebody are short documentaries that show a different side of a known persona as with Hitler, Stalin, Franco, Mussolini and Hitler, and Mao’s personal habits in Human Remains and Anita Bryant in I Just Wanted to be Somebody with her vociferous anti-gay stance.

In films such as Phantom Limb, King of the Jews, The Smell of Burning Ants, and The Darkness of Day, Rosenblatt opens up to us about family, childhood trauma, and loss. I feel a sense of sadness and empathy for some of the issues he addresses in his films. There is no doubt that there is a catharsis contained in the frames of his films as he (and we) try to make sense of these feelings that we have in the past and how we can learn from them moving forward.

I have watched a few of Jay's interviews, but one stood out to me: The interviewer brings up that Jay was a therapist in the mental health field and how this was so different than being a filmmaker. Seeing Jay’s work, I disagree with the interviewer’s statement. He effectively incorporates his work as a therapist into his films to show that he can display his feelings…and we feel right along with him.

Filmography

Doubt (11 min., USA, 1981)

Blood Test (27 min., USA, 1985)

Paris X 2 (26 min., USA, 1988)

Brain in the Desert (5 min., USA, 1990)

Short Of Breath (10 min., USA, 1990)

The Smell of Burning Ants (21 min., USA, 1994)

Period Piece - Co-directed with Jennifer Frame (30 min., USA, 1996)

Human Remains (30 min., USA, 1998)

A Pregnant Moment (24 min., USA, 1999)

Restricted" (1 min., USA, 1999)

Drop (1 min., USA, 2000)

King of the Jews (18 min., USA, 2000)

Worm (2 min., USA, 2001)

Nine Lives - The Eternal Moment of Now (1 min., USA, 2001)

Prayer (3 min., USA, 2002)

Decidi (1 min., USA, 2002)

Friend Good (5 min., USA, 2003)

I Used to Be a Filmmaker (10 min., USA, 2003)

I Like It a Lot (4 min., USA, 2004)

I'm Charlie Chaplin (8 min., USA, 2005)

Phantom Limb (28 min., USA, 2005)

Afraid So (3 min., USA, 2006)

I Just Wanted to Be Somebody (10 min., USA, 2006)

Four Questions for a Rabbi (12 min., USA, 2008)

Beginning Filmmaking (23 min., USA, 2008)

The Darkness of Day (26 min., USA, 2009)

The D Train (5 min., USA, 2011)

Inquire Within (4 min., USA, 2012)

The Claustrum (15 min., USA, 2014)