The night began with a compilation reel of Macdonald's films, starting with "One Day in September" (1999) and ending with a sneak peek of his next film "Marley" (2011). Afterwards, Macdonald received the Dartmouth Film Award from Hopkins Center film director Bill Pence.
Pence and Macdonald had met at the Telluride Film Festival many years ago when Pence was on the board of directors of the festival. He told Macdonald that Macdonald should come to Dartmouth to receive the award during his next visit to the United States.
After receiving the award, Macdonald introduced his newest film, "Life in a Day," which was then screened in Spaulding.
The film is notable as it is made entirely of videos submitted by people over YouTube. Macdonald, in conjunction with producers Ridley and Tony Scott, invited anyone to upload videos depicting their normal routines on July 24, 2010. What resulted was almost 4,500 hours of video from 192 countries, which Macdonald then used to edit together a 90-minute film.
Though "Life in a Day" lacks a coherent plot and the videos themselves vastly differ in terms of culture, language and content, the single underlying theme of the shared human experience crosses these barriers. What results is a poignant look at humanity as a whole and the similarities that override many of the differences that divide people.
Although Macdonald said he felt the honor came too early in his career, he was extremely appreciative and later called the ceremony a "tremendous experience."
Macdonald is the grandson of Emeric Pressburger, the late British film producer and writer best known for his role in The Archers, his production collaboration with legendary British filmmaker Michael Powell. Their films were never quite popular on initial release, but are now considered classics of world cinema.
Macdonald wrote a biography of his grandfather and used the book as a basis for his first documentary, "The Making of an Englishman" (1995). He directed a handful of documentaries for the BBC before hitting it big with "One Day in September" (1999). The film focuses on the massacre of the Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany and won an Academy Award for best documentary.
After directing another documentary, "Touching the Void" (2003), which follows two mountain climbers as they fight for survival on an Andean mountain, Macdonald broke into fictional films with "The Last King of Scotland" (2006). The film, focusing on Idi Amin's dictatorship, brought particular praise to Forest Whitaker's portrayal of Amin, for which Whitaker won the Academy Award for Best Actor.
Macdonald then went on to direct the political thriller "State of Play" (2009) and the swords and sandals epic "The Eagle."
Prior to the event, Macdonald and professor Jim Brown also taught a short workshop in filmmaking.
After the screening, a reception was held at the Top of the Hop featuring a question and answer session with Macdonald and Australian reporter Kylie Boltin. During the session, Macdonald said he had originally wanted to be a journalist, but couldn't find a job. As a result, he wrote the biography on his grandfather which eventually kick started his filmmaking career.
Macdonald also described the arduous 18-month process of tracking down Jamar Al-Gashey, the only surviving perpetrator of the Munich Massacre for "One Day in September." When Macdonald finally met Al-Gashey, he was taken to a discreet hotel room in Jordan and given 45 minutes with Al-Gashey. Macdonald did not know what Al-Gashey said in his answers until Macdonald returned to the United Kingdom and hired an Arabic translator, as Al-Gashey insisted on answering the questions in Arabic.
In regards to making "Life in a Day," Macdonald remarked that he had watched 350 hours of video himself and slowly began forming the film in his mind as he watched the clips. He wanted it to be "a work of cinema" and have "importance in life," he said during the interview.
"[It was] a breathtaking experience from start to finish," Alex Stockton '15 said.
Up next for Macdonald is a documentary on the life of Bob Marley, titled "Marley" (2011) and "How I Live Now" (2011), an adaptation of Meg Rosoff's teenage romance novel.
Past winners of the Dartmouth Film Award have included Johnny Depp (1995), Meryl Streep (1997), Ang Lee (2000), Sean Penn (2001) and Kevin Bacon (2008).
