Really Back in the USSR

In August 1962, young filmmaker Leslie Woodhead captured two minutes of a young Liverpool band playing in The Cavern Club. Now, after decades of filming documentaries, he’s returned to examine the impact that this footage and the band called The Beatles had in the USSR. Officially, the Beatles were a big nyet for Soviet citizens, denounced by the Communist Party as “capitalist pollution.” But culture seeps and there were all sorts of underground Beatlemaniacs with bootleg tapes on old x-ray film and guitars carved from old kitchen tables that helped the band’s influence spread. And in this doc premiering tonight on PBS (check local listings), Woodhead argues that the music and spirit of The Beatles played a key role in giving a window of freedom eastward and helping to wipe away totalitarianism. Overstated? Check out the doc tonight. (Moment of regret: We tried to do a similar film about the fall of the Berlin Wall, where rock’s general influence seemed equally meaningful, but couldn’t find the funding…)

This is Not A Blog Post

That headline is in the spirit of the new R.E.M. concert film This Is Not A Show: Live at the Olympia in Dublin. The 60 minute film took place during “working rehearals” where the band tested new material in front of fans during a five day stretch. Those noodlings later turned into the album Accelerate ). The Dublin CD/DVD was released on Tuesday but the film is also traveling to various towns and cities for single night screenings based on fan solicitations in a funky crowdsourcing approach. Upcoming screenings include Anchorage, Oxford (MS), Chicago, Philly, Sante Fe, Dallas and maybe your town if you fill out the application with Cinema Purgatorio the distributor. More preview material available at REMDublin.com.

Some films to catch at CMJ

When a bajillion up and coming bands descend on the Apple for the annual CMJ Music Marathon, it’s hard for the music buff to focus on anything else. But this year, I noticed/awakened/realized that there is a pretty descent film festival attached to the fun. Maybe there have always been films? In any case, amidst the features and shorts here are some documentary highlights from the festival that kicks off tonight in NYC:

• Leonard Cohen: Live at the Isle of Wight 1970
  Reaching way back in the history books is Murray Lerner’s 77 minute concert recording of one of Cohen’s many fine moments (don’t all Cohens know how to give fine moments?) Apparently, this perfromance followed a raucous Jimi Hendrix set but Cohen mesmerized the crowd with his dirgy lullabies, such as in the clip above. This film is also being released on DVD today. Premieres October 20.
• Speaking In Code
  Per the program, “a vérité glimpse into today’s world of techno from Boston to Berlin.” For those of you like this sort of stuff. Premieres October 21.
• D-Tour
  Pat Sturgeon’s dedication to his band, Rogue Wave, is put to the test as he searches for an organ donor for his failed kidney, performs dialysis daily, and tours with his band. Premieres October 21.
• Pardon Us For Living But The Graveyard Is Full
  Biodoc on the Fleshtones. NYC Premiere October 22.
• Kid Creole And My Coconuts
  Focusing on Adriana Kaegi’s adventures as Mama Coconut, the co-founder of Kid Creole and the Coconuts. Premieres October 22.
• Mellodrama
  A look at the Mellotron, which changed the production and texture of popular music, with converts like Radiohead and Kanye West. NYC premiere October 23.
• Searching For Elliott Smith
  Smith’s former girlfriend and musical peers talk about the artist who most likely committed suicide in 2003. Wonder if they got the rights to use Smith’s music. Premiere October 23

Those Muslim Punks (Literally)

Rare is the book that inspires a social movement or even a musical genre. But that’s what happened with Michael Muhammad Knight’s 2005 book The Taqwacores. An invented work, it tells the tale of a Pakistani-American student living in a house with Muslim punk rockers. When groups of readers couldn’t find the music (because it was a work of fiction) they started to write their own songs. That birthed Muslim punk bands like Vote Hezbollah and Secret Trial Five, which are followed in Omar Majeed’s new film Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam.

Majeed followed bands with Knight in 2007 to document this unseen community that shows the diversity within Islam. Like traditional punk (if there is such a conceit!), Muslim punk seems to blast both U.S. government and rigid Islamist ideology. He follows a tour bus through the U.S. with the ultimate goal of playing a show in Pakistan. One of the film’s highlights is when some bands are shut down at an Islamic Society of North America convention in Chicago for playing with women on stage, which violated the so-called dictat against women singing and dancing in public. It’s unlikley that Muslim punk could become a mass movement but as a microcosm of tensions within Islam, it encapsulates pretty fascinating stuff.

Funniest line comes from an interview with Majeed who says there are few mohawks in Muslim punk (save for the guy on the front of the above trailer.) The director told the Canadian Press that one musician told him, “‘if you want to go out in the streets and shock The Man in this day and age, a Mohawk isn’t going to do anything. You want to shock The Man, I’ll go outside and wear traditional Pakistani dress and grow my beard.’”

The film just opened in theatres in Montreal and Toronto this week after film festival showings Vancouver and Montreal and hits the Sheffield Doc/Fest in early November. No U.S. dates yet.

Jack Johnson Returns and So Do I

So sorry loyal readers (Mom). The day job has overwhelmed this blogging hobby as of late. But there is a lot to post and I’ll do my best to keep up with it.

First up, a new concert flick by everyone’s favorite guy who never appears in any magazines or gets any radio play but is wildly popular: Jack Johnson. How to dislike his groovy beach dreams? I don’t..but I also don’t listen to him a ton. But the visuals to this new concert flick En Concert directed by Emmett Malloy has some wild crowd shots – and surfing shots (natch.) It all took place during Jack’s 2008 European tour and features special appearances by G. Love, Ben Harper, and others. Fans can get this DVD when buying the deluxe edition of Jack’s new album.

MJ Docs: This Is It Trailer released

So I was more excited before seeing the trailer for the last MJ documentary Monday night during MTV’s VMAs. (I even stayed up late to watch it.) But while this teaser promises viewers great rehearsal dancing, it doesn’t seem to have any backstage intimacy, which is what I was most curious about. What was MJ’s physical and mental state during those rehearsals? Think that if they had some gotten a great interview they would have hyped it. Instead, we get MJ’s bromides like “It’s all for love. L-O-V-E.” Sigh. I’m still gonna see it though. Film premieres October 28.

Beatles Anthology is Back

The Beatles Anthology, a nine part, six hour documentary about the Fab Four is on our network VH1 this week, fifteen years after it debuted on ABC. Exclusively a musical and historical doc, its a cooperative effort by the then-three remaining Beatles, so most controversial topics don’t get the definitive insider historical analysis (for instance, Yoko doesn’t speak in the doc, nor does any other wife/girlfriend of the band.) Articles like the latest Rolling Stone cover by the awesome rock journalist Mikal Gilmore about how the Beatles broke up has dish a formal doc treatment will never have because the Beatles control so much of their music and footage rights. Usually this pains me but for the Anthology, I’m OK with it. The footage is so rare, the historical moments and screaming fans are such a head trip (even today) and most of all, this doc lets the music play. It’s much easier to do a great music doc over six hours when the songs don’t need to be chopped up. And while I like my inside scoop, when it comes to the Beatles, I’ll gladly trade it for the tunes.

Watch Rare Rolling Stones Doc Online Before it Vanishes!

The Rolling Stones doc with the unfriendly family name has been such a subject of mystery because it’s basically a lost artifact. Filmed by famed photographer and filmmaker Robert Frank during the band’s 1972 tour after Exile on Main Street came out, it’s a true cinema verite doc in a day when there weren’t a thousand publicists, tour managers, label executives, etc. surrounding a band and making sure nothing spontaneous or interesting happens in front of a director. Of course, when seeing the final cut, the Stones and their people were horrified since its depicts the guys using drugs and having wanton sex with fans. They tried to block its release it but after a pushback from Frank, an odd deal was reached: the film can be shown only if Frank is physically present. He shows it every now and then at a film festival but he’s also 84 years old.

I was so fascinated by this film that I helped develop a doc around it at VH1. I thought its lore and unvarnished showcase of rock decadence gives a rare insight into one of music’s greatest bands, and its existence speaks a lot about celebrity culture and the filmmaking process. I thought doing a documentary about the documentary would be much better than ever showing the actual film (not that we could on VH1 because of standards issues) but also because its best been described by Ray Young as “less a film than a chattering cocaine hum.”

But the key was convincing Frank to let us license parts of the film. While we had a grainy bootleg copy on VHS (obtained from eBay if I remember correctly), we needed a better version for air and also needed to excerpt longer pieces than a few fair use snippets. Frank refused. Wasn’t interested at all. No earnest talk about our intentions could convince him. Another project that died on the development vine.

While the film has surfaced on YouTube and has been taken off, now its appeared online again, split into nine parts on a French site wat.tv. The resolution is still pretty subpar (Frank would be bummed if he knows) but at least it’s up. For now. So watch it so you can say you’ve seen one very samizdat piece of pop culture.

Demme leaves Marley

I’m back from vacation and getting back into the posting spirit. So prepare for some quick hits out of the gate this week, as well as the resumption of the MJ docs retrospective and maybe some new featurettes…this is the little blog with big plans.

The biggest news while I was gone: Page Six says that the doc on Bob Marley, first helmed by Martin Scorsese, is now being abandoned by his replacement Jonathan Demme. The piece says a bad rough cut screening spelled his doom with the film’s financiers. SlashFilm wonders if tough standards caused Scorsese to leave, rather than just scheduling problems. Not sure yet who is going to take over this long waited project with such an exacting estate.

MJ Docs: The Jackson 5 Go to Africa

On the heels of the Soul Power post, worth mentioning that other American artists have gone to Africa to play, including MJ! In the continuing series about MJ documentaries, his appearance in Jackson 5 in Africa is not well remembered. Probably because the film is kind of like an outdated classroom social studies film about a journey in Africa. The narration reveals such insights as “This is Africa, land of all black people” and w/r/t to the Jacksons “Even those who could not speak English managed to call their names!” Along with the Jacksons performing and verite travel, there’s lots cross cultural dancing, an examination of Senegalese weaving techniques and papa Joe Jackson recieving the Medal of the Lion, a Senegalese honor.

But with MJ fever, the film is relevant again. It was recently announced that the Jackson 5 in Africa will close out the Downtown LA Film Fest on August 22. And the program notes that when the African investors who originally financed the film, ran out of money, the new, anonymous owner got the footage in exchange for a rough diamond.

The doc does have its fans. In a pre-Twitter era a few years ago, Questlove of the Roots wrote to Rolling Stone to hype the film:

i could NOT keep this to myself. this MUST be seen.

hey guys.

its me the ultra rare connoisseur of fine treat.

this is a never seen before rare docu about the J5 pilgrimage to africa in 74.

awesome!!!!!

share this.

Of course!