MARY JANE’S NOT A VIRGIN ANYMORE (1997)
Sundance is a phenomenon largely because of the buzz and excitement surrounding million dollar jackpot acquisitions, iconic crossover hits like Napoleon Dynamite and star-studded “indie” darlings like Garden State or Little Miss Sunshine. Lost amid the hype are films like Mary Jane’s Not A Virgin Anymore, a humble, charming work of DIY guerilla filmmaking by the late, lamented “Queen of Underground Film” Sarah Jacobson (who died far too young of endometrial cancer in 2004). Lisa Gerstein, as the titular virgin, is gawky, sincere and loveable, just like the accessible, naturalistic movie she inhabits. Sure, the production values are rough and the only real “star” power is a cameo by Jello Biafra, but the low-rent Northern California rock scene Jacobson captured feels like a real place, populated by actual humans, unlike the over-the-top quirksters and too-pretty people filling much of the rest of the indie cineverse.
THEREMIN: AN ELECTRONIC ODYSSEY (1994)
I’m afraid that no clips of this movie (winner of the Filmmakers Trophy: Documentary) are available for posting, although you can find scenes on YouTube here and here. The above clip is Clara Rockmore, the virtuoso thereminist, performing Saint-Saëns’ “The Swan.” You may notice that one of the links includes footage of Leon Theremin playing the same composition in the 1920s. Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey is the story of the theremin (that’s the odd electronic instrument Rockmore is playing, if you’re not in the know) and the creator for whom it was named. His story is even more bizarre than you can guess, and I fear that revealing some of the odder elements here could take away from their surprise in the movie. The film also features talking-head segments from Robert Moog (the creator of the Moog synthesizer), Brian Wilson (the fractured genius behind the Beach Boys), and Todd Rundgren (who is, get this, Todd Rundgren). The Wilson interviews are especially interesting for fans, as director Steve M. Martin (who is not the guy you’re thinking of) lets Wilson ramble off on tangents far and wide in a way that his handlers rarely allow. Anyway, this is a beautiful documentary, full of twists and surprises and an terrifically emotional climax.
DiG! (2004)
Proving that a compelling documentary can be made about two extremely (for me, at least) uncompelling bands, DiG! (winner of the 2004 Grand Jury Prize: Documentary) pits the keepin’-it-real psychedelic band The Brian Jonestown Massacre against the ready-to-sell-out Dandy Warhols. The Brian Jonestown Massacre is the brainchild of one Anton Newcombe, a guy who seems to believe that acting like a self-indulged, petulant asshole is exactly the same as being a genius. His sidekick is Joel Gion, who adds little to the music (being a non-singing tambourine player) but who Newcombe apparently keeps around because of Gion’s God-given gift of mugging for the camera and making playful comments during interviews. All of the other members of the BJM appear to be either stoned or barely holding their hatred of Newcombe in check. The BJM’s music is devoid of dynamic, interest, and a third chord. And yet in DiG!, they play the part of the authentic band a little too pure for the corporate scene. The Dandy Warhols, on the other hand, appear to be composed entirely of models or exhibitionists and make music that sounds like the product of a Clear Channel focus group. DiG! seems to view them as the band that does everything more or less right, and maybe by some metrics they are, in the sense that the Dandy Warhols are rock stars and the BJM are still relatively obscure. Anyway, the documentary shows the early camaraderie between the bands, which quickly devolves into a bitter rivalry, as the Dandy Warhols’ slick pseudo-psychedelic pop leads them towards a popularity that the BJM’s gritty (and dull, don’t forget) psych-sludge will never achieve. I’ve wondered whether fans of either band would see the movie differently, but I think the viewer may enjoy the drama more without feeling inclined towards either band.
THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON (2005)
There are a few mentally ill performers who fans have embraced out of a sense of irony, and this has always reeked to me of exploitation. Wesley Willis, for instance, was an obese paranoid schizophrenic busker when he became semi-popular, and I rarely got the sense that many of his fans could separate the songs he wrote from these essential facts. Daniel Johnston is also a songwriter who struggles with mental illness. However, Johnston's songs are beautiful, lyrically profound, and more sophisticated than his rudimentary musicianship can convey. Don't believe me? Check out Kathy McCarty's album Dead Dog's Eyeball, in which she and producer Brian Beattie arrange Johnston's songs to give them the context they deserve. Actually, many, many artists have covered Johnston's songs (and very few have covered Willis). The Devil and Daniel Johnston (winner of the Sundance 2005 Documentary Directing Award) is more or less a biographical documentary about Johnston's life, but documentarian Jeff Feuerzeig, who also directed a movie about the band Half Japanese, spices the story with animation, talking head interviews that include a picture-in-picture frame that illustrate their comments, and a deep sensitivity to Johnston's plight and the toll that it's taken on everyone who loves him. The movie has almost as much to say about the effects of mental illness as it does about Johnston's musicianship.
ONCE (2007)
The music is from the U2 School of Anthemic Irish Rock Songs, so your appreciation may vary depending on how you feel about U2 (or lead actor Glen Hansard’s band The Frames, to be more accurate). But the relationship is pitched just right. A girl meets a busker and helps him to move on with his life. But she’s not just any ordinary manic pixie dream girl (thanks for the phrase, AV Club). She has her own reasons for helping the guy -- a toddler, an absent husband, a love of music, and fundamentally not enough joy in her young life. It helps that the director, who was formerly the bassist in the Frames, also loves the music. By all rights, the above scene, in which our scrappy underdogs record their first song in the expensive studio they’ve rented, should not work. The engineer’s reaction is too broad. See, at the beginning of the song, he’s a jaded insider, completely uninterested in the music. Then the drums kick in, and he seems to hear the song for the first time, dropping the magazine to start fiddling with the knobs, finding himself becoming a fan despite his years behind the board. That turnaround shouldn’t work, but it gets me right where I live. I love that moment, and I love that song, too, even if only for the time it’s on-screen. The overall restraint in the central relationship works well for the movie, too, because yearning for something or someone is better for your music than having the object of your desire. (Winner: Sundance 2007 World Cinema Audience Award: Dramatic)
MAN ON WIRE (2008)
In the early dawn of August 7, 1974, Philippe Petit strung a wire between the World Trade Center towers and walked between them, a quarter of a mile over Manhattan, for about 45 minutes. He was all of 24 years old. Perhaps you saw him on The Colbert Report earlier this week, so you already know that he didn't fall. The movie somehow makes an end-run around your knowledge, presenting the difficult logistics of Petit and his crew sneaking into the yet-unfinished towers with a 450-lb steel cable and several crates of equipment as nothing less than a caper movie with the intensity of Rififi or Bob Le Flambeur. You feel the excitement and fear when Petit steps out over the yawning chasm between the towers, but you already know he's going to survive because you've already seen the older Petit pop up as a talking head. It's a clever conceit, and it pays off in spades. On a note of personal pimpage, my book Shoot Out The Lights (about Richard and Linda Thompson's album) includes a section about Petit and his walk, as Thompson has written a few songs about tightrope walkers. Thompson, of course, did the soundtrack to Werner Herzog's documentary Grizzly Man, and Herzog is apparently a good friend of Petit's. In retrospect, Petit seems like the classic Herzog subject, brilliant and obsessive, and in this world but somehow not of it. Man On Wire is completely unlike a Herzog documentary, but it certainly has a Herzog-like appreciation for the holy madness of the man at its core. The film just came out on DVD within the last week, so be sure to check it out. (Winner: Grand Jury Prize: World Cinema Documentary, 2008 World Cinema Audience Award: Documentary)
Click Here For Part One, Two, Four & Five
Contributors: Andrew Osborne, Hayden Childs