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“Reaches far beyond personal narrative, blooming into a moving meditation on memory, interpretation and the nature of photography itself.
– Alissa Wilkinson, The New York Times
“Eerily soul-stirring.”
– Robert Daniels, RogerEbert.com
“A sumptuous piece of nonfiction”
– Carlos Aguilar, Variety
Zeitgeist Films in association with Kino Lorber have acquired North American distribution rights to Rachel Elizabeth Seed’s debut documentary feature A Photographic Memory. Winner of the Truer Than Fiction Award at the 2025 Film Independent Spirit Awards and a New York Times Critic’s Pick, A Photographic Memory is an intimate, genre-bending portrait of the filmmaker’s trailblazing mother, Sheila Turner Seed – a vibrant and pioneering journalist, photographer, and filmmaker, who died suddenly and tragically when Rachel was just 18 months old. Zeitgeist Films is planning a theatrical release in early summer 2025.
Uncovering the vast archive Turner Seed produced, including lost interviews with iconic photographers Henri Cartier-Bresson, Bruce Davidson, Cecil Beaton, Lisette Model, Gordon Parks, and others, Rachel attempts to build a posthumous relationship with her mother through her interviews, photographs, journals, films, and the stories of those who remember her. The result is an unlikely mother-daughter conversation that evades time and space, exploring universal themes of memory, loss, and legacy.
Featured in the film is Sheila’s most important work – a series of audiovisual films she directed, produced, and edited on the great 20th-century photographers, called Images of Man, which was the first series of its kind to pair a photographer’s philosophies with their pictures. Co-produced by Cornell Capa’s Fund for Concerned Photographers (now the International Center of Photography) and Scholastic, it is through these never-before-heard raw interviews that Rachel hears her mother’s voice for the first time since she was a baby. Now a filmmaker, photographer, and writer herself, Rachel draws parallels between her mother’s path and her own, using the extraordinary archival material not just as an inheritance but as an illuminating collaboration between two generations of visual storytellers.
The deal for A Photographic Memory was negotiated by Zeitgeist Co-Presidents Emily Russo and Nancy Gerstman and filmmaker Rachel Elizabeth Seed.
Zeitgeist Co-Presidents Russo and Gerstman are “thrilled to discover this unknown story of an important artist and look forward to bringing this incredibly moving journey of director Rachel Elizabeth Seed as she comes to know the mother she never knew to both theaters and festivals in the coming months.”
“Ever since I was a kid I have cherished the movie theater experience — from the smell of popcorn to the shared gasps, giggles and tears — and I believe films seen together in person unite and move us exponentially,” said Rachel Elizabeth Seed. “We are happy to partner with Kino Lorber and Zeitgeist for their unwavering commitment to championing independent voices and their deep appreciation for cinema as art. Their legacy of distributing bold, thought-provoking storytelling aligns perfectly with A Photographic Memory, and I can’t wait to continue sharing this film with audiences in theaters across the country and beyond. ”
A CAPARIVA FILMS, Bow & Arrow Entertainment, Real Lava, Chicken & Egg Films, and Hazel Pictures Production. Executive produced by Kirsten Johnson (Cameraperson, Dick Johnson is Dead), Maida Lynn, Hinda Gilbert, Robina Riccitiello (Sugarcane, Black Box Diaries), Corie Adjmi, Betsy Sherman, Jonathan Logan, Dan Logan, and Charlie Taberle; produced by Sigrid Dyekjær (Apolonia Apolonia, The Cave), Matt Perniciaro, Michael Sherman of Bow & Arrow Entertainment (The Truffle Hunters, Skate Kitchen), Rachel Elizabeth Seed, Beth Levison (Grand Theft Hamlet, The Martha Mitchell Effect), and Danielle Varga; edited and co-written by Christopher Stoudt; edited by Eileen Meyer, Tyler Hubby, and Will Garafolo; original score by Mary Lattimore; cinematography by Joseph Michael Lopez, Rachel Elizabeth Seed and Drew Gardner.