The passion for beloved machine
Doug Nichol’s documentary “California Typewriter” is a rich, thoughtful, meticulously crafted tapestry on the evolution of the beloved writing machine for purists, history buffs, collectors and others fighting to preserve or re-embrace analog life.
The film, which first began as a look at a struggling Berkeley repair and sales shop California Typewriter, was expanded to explore the heart and soul of the device as well as to profile a variety of typewriter aficionados.
Fans here range from the famous (Tom Hanks, musician John Mayer, author-historian David McCullough, the late Sam Shepard) to the lesser-known: Toronto collector Martin Howard, Oakland-based artist Jeremy Mayer (who creates remarkable sculptures entirely from typewriter parts) and the quirky Boston Typewriter Orchestra. They prove a captivating bunch.
The film also weaves in the story of inventor Christopher Latham Sholes, who in the 1870s developed the QWERTY keyboard as well as the world’s first commercially successful typewriter.
Nichol, who also deftly shot and edited the film, never fetishizes or aggrandizes the typewriter but, instead, smartly contextualizes its place as a classic symbol of American ingenuity, practicality and style. The irony? Once Jeremy Mayer and the folks at California Typewriter embraced modern technology — that is, the Internet — to help promote their wares, their businesses really took off.
Oscar voters, keep this one in your sights. “California Typewriter.” Not rated. Running time: 1 hour, 44 minutes. Playing: Landmark, West Los Angeles; Arclight, Hollywood.