Garrett Scott
United States | 2001 | 57 min
Language : English
Subtitle : French
On May 18th, 1995, Shawn Nelson, a 35-year-old plumber from California, emerged from the mine he had dug in his garden to search for gold, stole a tank and rampaged through his neighbourhood, destroying everything in his path. Cul de Sac peels back the layers to frame this highly personal act of rage within the historical context of a working community in decline.
You’ll be hard pressed to find a wilder story than that of former veteran and unemployed plumber Shawn Nelson, an eccentric 35-year-old Californian whose life was cut short following the events of 18 May 1995, when he stole 60-ton tank from the local National Guard armoury before engaging in a destructive rampage through the streets of his neighbourhood. Director Garrett Scott’s interest lies much deeper than any superficial fascination for the spectacle of this extraordinary event, but rather in attempting to peel every layer that might shed light on what might lead someone to commit such an apparently reckless gesture. What emerges is a cinematographic act of compassion, in which the director lucidly examines the dangerous cocktail that was the convergence of deindustrialization, psychological trauma, the decline of the American Dream and the rise of methamphetamine use in 90s United States.
James Berclaz-Lewis
James Berclaz-Lewis
Occupation: Dreamland, 2005
Cul de Sac: A Suburban War Story, 2002
