With a running time of just under 200 minutes, Frederick Wiseman‘s new film can be regarded as an epic film. But how else can you do justice to an institution that‘s the third biggest library in the modern world with around 53 media items and 92 branches? Wiseman shows the NYPL from an unexpected side. Scenes of halls filled with readers do appear in his film, but they don‘t take up much time. He prefers looking behind the curtains, showing the librarian who answers whether unicorns are real and spontaneously summarizes a text in Middle English, and a huge sorting and sending system where the media is sent to the branches.

The main focus is the meetings and talks: EX LIBRIS shows talks by authors like Susan Sonntag and Richard Dawkins and always gives the impression that there‘s a heterogenous audience: the Public Library is a meeting point for New Yorkers from all social classes. This is why the library management meeting also focuses on how NYPL should deal with increasinging digitalization and how it is possible for New Yorkers who still live in “digital darkness“ as well as the blind and the deaf to access the media that‘s in the library‘s stock. Wiseman‘s decision to completely do away with commentary makes it somewhat difficult for those unfamiliar with New York to understand the relevance of all the events portrayed. But altogether the film gives the impression that the New York Public Library is a monumental democratic institution that informs an increasingly fractured population and wants to bring them together.

Christian Klose (INDIEKINO MAGAZIN)

Translation: Elinor Lewy