[vimeo id=”149111507″]
CHRISTMAS
Lawrence “Skip” Hawkins, ca. 1968, Super 8, color, silent, 4:21
Location: Santa Cruz, California
Shown at Home Movie Day Bloomington, Indiana
Film scan by Movette Film Transfer
Film courtesy of Joan Hawkins
Thanks to: Joan Hawkins
About the Film
One of the most common types of home movie is the Christmas morning film. Something about the rituals of the holiday are irresistible to home movie makers, who delight in capturing children as they open their presents around the brightly decorated tree. This reel is a prime example, since it contains all of the requisite elements of the genre, but infuses it with a strong sense of late 1960s style, combined with the look of experimental filmmaking, with its whimsy and skilled editing.
Filmmaker Lawrence “Skip” Hawkins (1932-2012) was born in Oakdale, California and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. After serving in Korea, he moved to Santa Cruz, California where he taught Art, Drama, English and Yearbook in the Santa Cruz City Schools, where he started both a Ham Radio Project and instituted Peace Studies as a part of the curriculum. After his retirement in 1993, he moved to Bloomington, Indiana with his wife, Joan, where he continued making films and ceramics, and working for peace and justice.