Grey Gardens (1975)

Grey Gardens (1975): directed by Ellen Hovde, Albert and David Maysles, and Muffie Meyer; starring Edith "Little Edie" Bouvier Beale and Edith Bouvier Beale: Albert and David Maysles, brother documentarians perhaps best known for the Rolling Stones documentary Gimme Shelter (aka the Altamont documentary), also gave us this disturbing piece about Edith "Little Edie" Bouvier Beale and Edith Bouvier Beale, cousin and favourite Aunt of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy. 

At the time of filming, the Beales lived in their decaying Long Island mansion (the 'Grey Gardens' of the title because rich people and Englishmen name their homes) . Jackie Kennedy had just paid to have the grounds and exterior of the house cleaned up so that mother and daughter wouldn't be evicted. 

The interior of the house is a colossal wreck, the power apparently cut off and perhaps the water too, ceilings falling in, seemingly only the one room where they sleep comfortably livable. They have money to feed the colony of cats that now live with them. Mementos of the past are scattered everywhere or arranged carefully in the bedroom.

The Maysles pretty much just document the lives of these two recluses in all their tragic, voluble, endlessly talking sadness. The documentary never stoops to bathos or exploitation, but boy, is it hard to watch. Highly recommended.