Good Morning, Be Careful!
Experimental Ethnographic Documentary, Super 8mm
A film by Jackson Cropper and Isaac King
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Welcome to Bill’s Place! Since 1966, Bill Clark has owned and operated a one-room dive bar in the small rural town of Fitzgerald, Georgia. During the course of its 58-year run, Bill has been the sole owner, operator, and bartender of the small beer joint, which allowed it to blossom into a local institution and community stronghold. The beer is cold, the darts are bent, the jukebox kicks on through the day, and Bill greets every customer with a “Good morning!” and, at every departure, ushers the cautionary “Be careful!” Now, at the age of 93, the happy-as-ever electric-scooter-bound Bill decides to officially close the bar for good right before the New Year.
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Good Morning, Be Careful! is an ethnographic document of one day in the life of Bill’s Place during that last month of operation. Filmed on Super 8mm and shot asynchronously, the work aims to grasp the customs of rural entrepreneurship after its heyday and to preserve the story of a bar that impacted four generations of Southerners.
