Amateur Cinema & New media Studies Network

Several amateur films made by Dave Tatsuno between 1943-45 show scenes of the Topaz concentration camp for Japanese Americans (click here to view a clip). The Dave Tatsuno Collection is held by the The Japanese American National Museum and some clips are available on the Discover Nikkei website. For a discussion of Tatsuno’s amateur film practice see Karen L. Ishizuka and Patricia R. Zimmermann, ‘The Home Movie and the National Film Registry. The Story of Topaz’. In Mining the Home Movie. Excavations in Histories and Memories (eds. K.L. Ishizuka and P.R. Zimmermann, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008)