Vernon, Florida (1981)

Vernon, Florida is one of the rare documentaries that gets funnier every time it's seen. Errol Morris simply invades a small town in the Florida Panhandle, turns on his camera, and lets things go from there. To those uninitiated in the ways of Morris, the first reaction upon viewing the film is that it all has to be staged. There is simply no way that any of the people who appear in the film can be telling the tales they tell without their fingers crossed behind their back. That lack of conviction simply grows as the film moves along and we are introduced to characters whose stories grow stranger and stranger. It might seem cruel or exploitive at first, especially given the advanced age of some of the interviewees, but in reality and in the grand scheme, it's more of a celebration of a slice-of-life that most of us would find to be as alien as if we set foot on Mars. Perhaps that lends to a sort of condescension on the part of those who laugh uproariously at some of the situations, but given the similar pattern established by past Morris films such as Gates of Heaven, it seems that the director is suggesting that we laugh simply because we are not familiar. It is up to the individual viewer to decide if this presentation is cruel or not. The highlights include the couple whose souvenir of sand from the A-bomb test site in Los Alamos is, by their description, growing in its jar because of its radioactivity, and the turkey hunter, who revels in the glory of the hunt. Originally Morris planned a different film than the one that emerged from his footage, but thankfully he recognized what he had on his hands. ~ Dan Friedman, All Movie Guide