Documentary filmmaker Brian Lindstrom has died after battling a rare brain disease, progressive supranuclear palsy, and his wife, Wild Writer Cheryl Strayed revealed. Lindstrom was 65 years old.
“Brian Lindstrom passed away this morning the way he lived — with kindness, courage, grace, and gratitude for his beautiful life,” Stride wrote in an Instagram post announcing his death. “Our children, Carver and Bobby, and I held him as he took his last breaths, and we will forever hold him in our hearts. The only thing sadder than our grief that progressive supranuclear palsy took our beloved Brian from us is the endless love we have for him.”
Lindstrom was diagnosed with what Stride referred to as a “deadly disease” just two weeks before his death. Progressive supranuclear palsy is a frontotemporal disorder caused by damage to nerve cells in areas of the brain that control thinking and body movements. PSP has some symptoms similar to those of Parkinson’s disease and affects walking and balance.
Lindstrom’s work as a documentary filmmaker has focused on telling the stories of people who, Lindstrom said, “society marks with an X,” Stride said.
“He erased the X with his camera and his amazing heart,” Stride wrote. “He made films about incarcerated mothers and their children, about people with mental illness and substance use disorders, about teenagers living in homeless shelters, foster care and adoption centers, about people who have been at the bottom and trying to climb back up.”
She added: “He showed them for us so we would see what he saw: that each one of us is worthy of love, respect, compassion, and honor. Time and time again, he went into the darkness to show us how much light there is. He was of service. He spoke truth to power. He measured his success by asking whether his films made an impact — and they did. They saved programs and people, changed lives, policies, and minds. They made people feel seen, heard, and believed. They softened the world with their compassion.”
His credits included documentaries The Odd Boy: The Life and Death of James Chase (2013) and Lost Angel: The Genius of Judy Sell (2022), his latest project, is about the late singer-songwriter and includes interviews with Linda Ronstadt, Jackson Browne, David Crosby and Graham Nash. Strayed served as executive producer on both projects and served as associate producer and executive producer, respectively, on the screen adaptations of her books. Wild and Beautiful little things.
Stride praised Lindstrom as a husband and father, writing, “What an enormous fortune to have been his partner for more than thirty years. We loved each other and our children with profound devotion and true happiness. He was an excellent husband. He was a wonderful father. He was a man whose every word and action were motivated by kindness, compassion, and generosity. He saw the good in everyone. He believed we were all sacred and redeemable.”
His children, whom Stride called his “greatest legacy,” “embody everything good and true about their father.”
“Their extraordinary grace, courage and fortitude during this horrific time were unwavering and grounded in the undying love that Brian poured into them every day of their lives,” she wrote. “We don’t know how we would live without him. We are completely bereft. We can only walk down this dark path and search for the beauty that Brian knew existed there. It will be his eternal light that guides us.”
