A Walk into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory is playing at the Roxie Film Center right now, giving people a sustained glimpse of the competitiveness and back-stabbing that went on during the Factory’s heyday. Paul Morrissey in particular does not come off well, though director (and Williams’ niece) Esther Robinson’s attempts at drawing connections between Andy Warhol and her uncle’s death remain vague. If a documentary about a likely suicide can have a bright side, then Walk does: Robinson uncovers and spotlights Williams’s heretofore obscure film work, which is very impressive – as attractive and arresting in its use of black-and-white contrast as anything that ever came out of the Factory, which was essentially the MGM of underground cinema.
Andy Warhol and Danny Williams
With A Walk into the Sea currently screening, the time seems right to present a colorful but by no means definitive short guide to other docs or features about characters or Superstars perhaps best-known for floating through the realm of Warhol’s Factory: