Entertainment Weekly
Sundance: Stars on parade, and the Doors doc
Jan 19, 2009, 08:16 AM | by Owen Gleiberman
Categories: Sundance Film Festival 2009
You're either a Beatles person or a Stones person, and when it comes to the Doors, you're a true believer or you're not. Either you think that Jim Morrison was a lugubrious hippie who wrote overblown '60s doom poetry, laid over music that sounded like a calliope from hell. Or -- like me -- you believe that Morrison, though he certainly did write a lot of overblown '60s doom poetry, also led the Doors in recording some of the most incandescent music of the 20th century.
Just think of the spangly stoned grandeur of "The Crystal Ship," the driven ecstasy of "Take It As It Comes." I was 8 years old the summer that "Light My Fire" first came on the radio, and I remember feeling that I could listen to those two glistening back-and-forth minor chords forever -- Morrison, with his lordly sex-on-peyote baritone, seemed to be entering hell and heaven at the same time.
When You're Strange, a documentary history of the Doors directed by Tom DiCillo (Living In Oblivion), is for people like me, who can stumble onto the scrappiest Doors video on VH1 Classic at 3 in the morning and still sit there, mesmerized.
As a chronicle, the movie is ardent and fairly well done, an obvious labor of love that includes never-before-seen home-movie footage of the Doors backstage and in the studio. There are fluky clips, woven throughout the film, of Morrison, bearded but not yet bloated, driving a blue Mustang through the desert (they're from an aborted 1969 film project called Highway), and DiCillo does a haunting job of reconstructing, through films and photographs, the legendary Miami concert where Morrison was arrested for an indecent exposure he never actually got to commit.
The singer's elevation into a leaping, writhing Dionysian prince in dark curls, conch belt, and leather pants is one of the great operatic-erotic spectacles in rock, and the movie does justice to it, and to his descent as well. It's clearer now that Morrison's over-devotion to improvised apocalyptic dirges onstage was, in fact, an expression of his alcoholic despair masquerading as creativity.
Yet for all the tantalizing moments on display, When You're Strange is a bit impersonal. There are no interviews -- with anyone at all -- a decision that might have been more justified had DiCillo not stitched the movie together, in lieu of talking heads, with a narration that sounds like a Wikipedia entry read by the melodramatic narrator of a cable-TV serial-killer special. And though it's fine, to a point, that DiCillo doesn't even attempt to psychoanalyze Jim Morrison's demons, I wish that he had presented the music with more of the momentousness it deserves.
Too much of it is just there in the background, and there are too many '60s montages, which end up reducing the Doors to dark freedom fighters, rather than the gorgeous mystic spellbinders who first called out to me 40 years ago in the night.
hollywoodinsider.ew.com/2009/01/sundance-stars.html---------------------------------
The Vancouver Sun
New Doors documentary recalls strange days when Jim Morrison ruled the stage
By Katherine Monk
Canwest News Service
January 20, 2009
PARK CITY, Utah — Even for a member of The Doors, the Sundance Film Festival can be a strange place. Fortunately, for former band member John Densmore, the stranger the better.
After all, where else would you see Samantha Power, one-time foreign policy adviser to Barack Obama and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, politely tapping Densmore on the shoulder for an autograph?
Densmore had no idea who she was, but that only made for a richer Sundance moment — especially since Densmore had just finished talking about how he was feeling a little off-centre ever since Barack Obama had been elected president of the United States.
"As a child of the Vietnam War, I grew up believing your leaders lie. I've been cynical my whole life, and this is really forcing me to do some rethinking. I mean, the audacity of hope — that's something I'm still trying to wrap my head around," Densmore says from a sponsor lounge awash in media chaos.
With When You're Strange, a new documentary from indie circuit regular Tom DiCillo (The Real Blonde, Living in Oblivion) premiering here at the festival, Densmore says he's been thinking a lot about the band and the Vietnam era in recent years — not just because he's written a second book of his memoirs, but because he wondered if there was any good reason to make a new film about the minstrels of California psychedelia.
"Having seen all the (archival) footage and knowing every frame, I didn't think there was anything left to say. But then I read Tom's narration and he created a new kind of magic — especially with Jim," says Densmore, referring to the romantically damaged lead singer, Jim Morrison.
"He may have been a kamikaze drunk, but Tom's picture of him has a sweetness to it that I really liked. Jim was actually a very sensitive, almost shy guy . . . and this is the first time you really see that quality in him."
Produced by Peter Jankowski, part of Dick Wolf productions of Law & Order fame, When You're Strange is the first film to feature unseen documentary footage — as well as a wall of remastered Doors music backing up almost every minute of the movie.
Densmore says Morrison has been mythologized from the moment he died in 1971, and while he's always been happy that his old bandmate won't be forgotten, he felt most portrayals left out big chunks of the real story.
"I mean, Oliver (Stone) did his thing — and that sat with me fine — because I'd given him the galleys of my book Riders on the Storm. I think Val Kilmer should have actually been nominated for an Oscar for that performance because it gave me the creeps. It actually made me nervous. He really captured Jim. As for the movie, you can love it or hate it," says Densmore of the movie, The Doors.
"If I had my druthers, I wish the movie had been more about the '60s too — and not just about the self-destructive artist — but hey, Oliver says if you don't like my foot on your throat, don't see my movies."
For Densmore, and the rest of the surviving band members including Ray Manzarek and Robby Krieger, the new documentary is so entirely different from any other Doors portrait, it could be seen as an antidote to everything that has come before — and it's about time.
"There are a lot of misconceptions out there. Jim was a genius, but he was also sick. He was an alcoholic. And to see a friend in the band self-destruct is horrendous. There's nothing romantic in that," he says.
"But I've come to understand that creation and self-destruction go hand in hand. I still don't have any idea what (the whole Doors experience) was all about. I don't know why the music is still relevant — but it must be the drumming."
A Cheshire grin curls across Densmore's mouth. "No, I don't know what the big to-do was. We were kids in a garage in Venice (California) and it's been chaos ever since. I thought it would be good to last 10 years and pay the rent . . . but it's been a lot more than that."
Even though Morrison died at 27, Densmore says he still misses his friend — and he really misses his creative spirit.
"Jim would come up to me with lyrics scribbled on a matchbook, 'You know the day destroys the night, night divides the day' . . . and he'd ask, hey, John, can you play drums to this? And just reading the matchbook, there was rhythm in the words," he says.
"That's the part of Jim I still miss. But, as I grow older, I've come to believe that maybe he was meant to go early. It's still sad, but I can look back with a bit more fondness now," he says.
"I'm not dead. I'm not one of the 27s. I'm here for the long run and there's a lot I want to do. Looking at this movie, I still have no real distance — but I do like what I see."
When You're Strange has no firm release date as yet, but once it wraps in the documentary competition here at Sundance, it heads to Berlin. After that, it could hit more festivals, theatres, or a small screen near you.
www.vancouversun.com/Entertainment/Doors+documentary+recalls+strange+days+when+Morrison+ruled+stage/1198627/story.html--------------------------------------------------
The Star News
SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
TheStar.com | Movies | Opening the Doors on '60s rock band
Opening the Doors on '60s rock band
Ray Manzarek likens doc to acid flashback
Jan 19, 2009 04:30 AM
Peter Howell
MOVIE CRITIC
PARK CITY, Utah–The Doors members Ray Manzarek and Robby Krieger experienced more than tears watching the Sundance Film Festival world premiere of When You're Strange, Tom DiCillo's documentary of their fabled band.
"I felt that I was having an LSD flashback!" keyboardist Manzarek told the Star yesterday, as he and guitarist Krieger sat for a morning-after interview.
It was indeed a weird scene inside the gold mine Saturday night at the Temple Theatre, as Manzarek and Krieger sat on the opposite side of the room from The Doors drummer John Densmore, the other surviving member of the band fronted by the late Jim Morrison.
The three didn't meet at the screening or at Sundance – bad vibes with Densmore remain from years of artistic and legal squabbles – but "it's getting better," Krieger said, declining to elaborate.
If anything could smooth band relations, it would have to be When You're Strange, a film that fondly puts you right back in the moment from 1965-71 when The Doors were America's answer to the Beatles or the Rolling Stones. The band's popularity has never really dimmed; it still sells one million albums per year.
DiCillo made the radical decision not to include on-camera interviews with the three surviving Doors, even though all three were more than willing – and Manzarek was initially downright determined to do one.
Instead, Sundance regular DiCillo wanted to show the band as it was in its heyday, without the distraction of being viewed through the purple haze of nostalgia.
Now that they've seen the finished work, Manzarek and Krieger are delighted with DiCillo's vision. The director made extensive use of archival material, much of it never seen by the public and about a third of which came as a surprise to Manzarek and Krieger.
DiCillo was careful, unlike Oliver Stone with his 1991 biopic The Doors, to show that the band was very much a partnership of four musicians, not just Morrison fronting three anonymous sidemen.
"I thought (When You're Strange) was very unusual and very different," said Manzarek, 69.
"Reliving your life there on the screen was very affecting. It was a deeply emotional and heart-rending experience seeing our friend Jim Morrison alive again."
Krieger, 63, is thankful that the film makes a point of noting he was the writer of "Light My Fire," the band's first big hit, and not singer Morrison, as is often presumed. He's hoping the film clears up many such misconceptions about the band.
"Yes, this film is definitely going to help," he said, "but nobody really understands The Doors, not really."
"Not like we do!" Manzarek interjected. "We're on the inside, man!"
There was a time when it seemed that the other Doors resented the iconic stature of Morrison, who died in Paris in 1971 and remains forever young at age 27. But if that were ever true, getting older and greyer has certainly mellowed attitudes.
"It never really bothered us. It didn't bother me," Krieger insisted.
"It didn't bother me, either, man," Manzarek said.
"I took a look at the guy (Morrison) on the beach (in 1965) ... and I thought, `Oh, he's handsome. The girls are going to love this guy.' I didn't say that to him, because you don't want to say that to your lead singer."
The other three Doors had a different relationship than anybody else with Morrison, whom they still refer to in the present tense.
"Jim is so charismatic, people have to know about him: `Tell me about Morrison,'" Manzarek said.
"But for the band, it's a different perspective ... for the four of us as musicians, we were all equal partners. We never looked up to Jim Morrison as an idol."
Manzarek and Krieger continue to perform as a Doors-styled group called Riders on the Storm, titled after one of the band's hits.
They might hit Toronto this summer, this time backed by an orchestra, and there are plans to re-release the band's six studio albums in vinyl.
What about any future collaboration with Densmore? Would that be out of the question?
Krieger and Manzarek smile and answer the question by simultaneously singing a classic Doors lyric:
"The future's uncertain and the end is always near ..."
YELLOW IS THE NEW BLACK: Celebrity sightings have been few at Sundance this year – Denise Richards caused a paparazzi frenzy on Main St. – so it's nice to see SpongeBob SquarePants keeping the glitter quotient up.
Nickleodeon celebrated the square-faced cartoon character's 10th anniversary yesterday with a full-on party at The Yard that included a live story performance by original cast members, a SpongeBob ice sculpture, pineapple vodka drinks and more swag than you could shake a crab at – a perfect event for sponges.
www.thestar.com/Entertainment/Movies/article/573260 ----------------------------------------
Lime Wire On-Line
New Doors Documentary at Sundance
By Al Sotack
Posted on
January 20, 2009
Amassed from more or less unseen archival footage from 1966 and 1971, Tom DiCillo's When Your Strange was unveiled this week at America's most famous film festival, no doubt to the much-practiced eye rolling of every know-it-all hipster in attendance. The former Jim Jarmusch cinematographer and auteur of Johnny Suede was accompanied to its premier by Robby Krieger and Ray Manzarek themselves. Whether or not the film lives up to Manzarek's claims last May that this would be the "real Doors story," as he pitted the film with typical lack of perspective against Oliver Stone's 1991 biopic, remains doubtful. The film apparently eschews interviews totally, likewise taking a stand against what's been characterized as the VH1 talking heads paradigm. Instead of letting classic footage of one of classic rock's most enigmatic acts stand on its own, the film does include voiceover narration attempting to contextualize the Doors place in the annals of pop history. My guess is that this will probably feed the sarcasm of the film's younger yet faux-jaded audience. In case you haven't been paying attention, it's not so cool to like the Doors these days. Morrison who spent a lot of time studying the psychology of crowds might have more aptly entitled his song "People Are Stupid."
One can't even begin a bar chat about the or perform a simple google search without being inundated with reaction: "overrated," being the seeming consensus. One wonders why this is, when so many of the elements that the the California group introduced to mainstream audiences remains so fashionable among today's serious rock fans, from the Brecht/Wild melodrama to grinding dirge to stoned organ arpeggio. The simplest reason is that most of us already knew about the band before we hit puberty, and coupled with the sort of rabid small town fan so hilariously parodied by Bruce McCullough on the Kids In the Hall (see below), its easy to purposefully overlook that without Jim Morrison there would have been no Iggy Pop. And for those who so casually echo Lester Bang's sentiment ("drunk buffoon posing as a poet") might I suggest they do a bit of research? Morrison did. Until he drank himself to death he spent a lot of time reading, with subjects as diverse as anthropological studies of shamanism to Colin Wilson to his favorite poets (most of whom were likewise drunken buffoons, with the notable exception of Mr. Bill Blake, rest in conflict. The question remains: Will DiCillio's new pic shed insight on one of the most maligned yet intriguing American acts of the late sixties, or simply drive further the nails in Morrison's ironic coffin of mass opinion?
blog.limewire.com/posts/4620-New-Doors-Documentary-at-Sundance----------------------------------------
Hit Fix, CA
Tuesday, Jan 20, 2009
Sundance Review: 'When You're Strange'
Posted by Daniel Fienberg
Credit: Sundance
I need an explanation for this: Tom DiCillo tracks down a wealth of never-before-seen footage of The Doors. He decides that he's going to build a documentary largely around that footage, eschewing traditional talking-heads documentary naval gazing.
It's an admirable enough goal, to let the mystique of The Doors either rise or fall on their actual performances and on unguarded moments from their 1966-to-1971 run.
Then DiCillo goes and undermines his film's strengths in the most excruciating way possible, over-stuffing the film with a voiceover he both wrote and narrates. The voiceover is a mixture of oft-repeated factoids about the band, unsubstantiated and unsourced speculation, remedial (and again unsubstantiated) psychoanalysis of Jim Morrison and period details that never get any deeper than "The '60s Were a Tumultuous Time..." platitudes.
The resulting film, "When You're Strange," is one of my biggest Sundance disappointments so far.
[More after the bump...]
If DiCillo had just been able to hold back and leave the self-indulgence to Lizard King Morrison, "When You're Strange" would have worked just fine.
Look, as ways to spend 100 minutes go, there are many worse than listening to The Doors' greatest hits and watching Morrison spasm around the stage. Even the stuff any half-way Doors fan has seen before -- the Ed Sullivan or Smothers Brothers performances -- are welcome reminders of an artistry and stagecraft matched by few subsequent bands (if any). And DiCillo is respectful enough to mostly let whole songs play out from start to finish (though he sometimes blathers over them). DiCillo lets most songs play out, even if he just uses one classic track after another as vehicles for montages.
Montages aside, DiCillo's storytelling isn't just linear, it's episodically linear. The voiceover is all told in the present tense and follows a this-happened-then-this-happed-then-this-happened structure (i.e. "Morrison is no long just drinking, he's descovered cocaine), recounting the same events that were featured in the Oliver Stone film. It's an E! True Hollywood Story or VH1 Behind-the-Music treatment.
DiCillo's a fan, but he's a gushing fan, not a fan with anything insightful or reflective to say.
Morrison, in case you didn't know, was a poet and his genius was in his ability to connect with audiences. Really? Wow. And he was inspired by William Blake. Really? Wow. And Mr Mojo Risin is an anagram of Jim Morrison? Oh come on. In terms of basic facts, the documentary didn't contain a single revelation I didn't know. DiCillo has a couple insights into the musicianship of the group and the things that made their sound different, but that's almost an afterthought, a single scene, really.
Mostly, DiCillo is wedging The Doors into their historical milieu, which means he has to introduce all of required '60s themes, from Kennedy's assassination to Vietnam to the birth of the counterculture, tidbits accompanied by still pictures and video so familiar it's practically clip-art at this point. By the time he got to 1968 and used images of Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy accompanied by gunshot sound effects, I'd lost all patience. That's all still better than showing a close-up of an extinguished match to illustrate Morrison burning out.
Ugh.
"When You're Strange" would make a good bonus feature, a supplement to a Doors CD reissue, or maybe accompanying a new DVD of the Stone movie. But it should never be showcased on its own. I know DiCillo is a Sundance favorite for his narrative work, but somebody on the screening committee should have at least kept this dud out of competition.
www.hitfix.com/blogs/2008-12-6-th....-you-re-strangeLAist at Sundance: Day 3
wake up (or come to) at around 11 am. The dry air has turned my throat into chalk and a dull headache is throbbing in my head. This is going to be a great day! Since I'm in no condition to brave society (and would probably fall asleep if I tried to catch a movie), I decide to settle onto the couch for a long day of football. Both games turned out perfectly and, feeling better and a bit guilty, I brave the long, two shuttle bus journey to the Yarrow Theater to see the new Doors documentary directed by Tom DiCillo, When You're Strange.
As a long-time and fairly intense Doors fan, this is one of the films I highlighted when the festival roster was first announced. I'd hoped to see the actual premiere of the film which was attended by all three living members of the band, but had to settle for the press screening instead. I was not disappointed. While some early reviews of the film have carped that no new real information was divulged or uncovered by the documentary, I was thrilled by the sheer volume of previously unreleased footage of the band.
Ray Manzarek has complained for years about Oliver Stone's rendering of the band's history in his film, The Doors, feeling that Stone focused far too narrowly on the negative aspects of Jim Morrison's character and behavior. While When You're Strange doesn't shy away from discussing Morrison's alcoholism, it does offer a more complete portrait both of Morrison and the band. Morrison has been so shrouded in icon status for so many years, that it was great to peek behind that manufactured veil and see the man himself.
DiCillo (who also narrates the film from his own script) tells the story in a fairly linear fashion, from the band's early beginnings in Venice Beach to their meteoric rise to the top of the music world to Morrison's eventual death in Paris. One of the more whimsical departures from that narrative, however, is the utilization of material from the band's unreleased films, Highway and Feast of Friends to suggest the possibility that Morrison actually faked his death in Paris and took to the road.
When You're Strange is obviously required viewing for any Doors aficionado, but even casual fans will enjoy this tale of what is probably still the most successful American band in history (as the film notes, The Doors still sell a million albums every year). In between his clipped narration, DiCillo floods the screen with fascinating footage of the band and backs it with the constant thump of their music. Expect to see this documentary find its way into theaters and be sure to check it out.
laist.com/2009/01/19/laist_at_sundance_day_3.php------------------------------------
Variety Jan 19 2009
Sundance
When You're Strange
(Documentary)
By ROB NELSON
Powered By
The Doors are the subject of documentary 'When You're Strange.'
• All Sundance Coverage
A Wolf Films/Strange Pictures production, in association with Rhino Entertainment. (International sales: Rhino, Burbank, Calif.) Produced by Peter Jankowski, John Beug, Jeff Jampol, Dick Wolf. Executive producer, Bill Gutentag. Directed, written by Tom DiCillo.
The Lizard King is a bummer in "When You're Strange," Tom DiCillo's disastrously inane documentary ode to reptilian rocker Jim Morrison and his mellower bandmates in the Doors. Primo footage of recording sessions, concert perfs and various backstage trips is ubiquitous -- and sadly squandered -- amid wall-to-wall voiceover narration, written and spoken by indie vet DiCillo ("Johnny Suede"), that is punishingly banal when not factually sketchy or flat-out false. Diehard fans of the Los Angeles group's late-'60s psychedelic pop will rush to spin Rhino's inevitable DVD, to varying degrees of disappointment or outrage. Doors to theatrical distribution deserve to stay shut.
Opening with images of the long-dead Morrison speeding along a desert highway while reports of his own fatal overdose emanate from the car radio, this purportedly chronological docu takes vast liberties with U.S. history in order for the director to put the band's tonally diverse tunes in contexts of peace, love, war, love, peace and, finally, love. To hear DiCillo tell it, the Vietnam conflict ended in 1972 -- three years early, and one year after Morrison died. Tech credits vary wildly according to source material.
More than one option(Person) Jim Morrison
Special Effects
(Person) Jim Morrison
Song, Swing Gang
(Person) Jim Morrison
Actor, Song, Song PerformerCamera (DV), Paul Ferrara; editors, Mickey Blythe, Kevin Krasny. Reviewed at Sundance Film Festival (competing), Jan. 17, 2009. Running time: 88 MIN.
www.variety.com/review/VE1117939383.html?categoryid=31&cs=1---------------------------------------
Screen Daily UK
When You're Strange
David D'Arcy in Park City
19 Jan 2009 15:20
Dir.Tom DiCillo. US, 2009, 90 minutes.
With archival footage from The Doors set against scenes of the violence of their times, When You're Strange tracks the brief rise and fall of the band whose sound helped define the era's altered state. Tom DiCillo's debut feature-length documentary after six comedies has a built-in audience of fans who bought Doors recordings and those who still buy them today. The film also has Jim Morrison, a bona fide martyr/star with Caravaggio looks, to add to the sheer novelty of Doors footage after all these years. Home video sales in particular should be very healthy.
DiCillo's film has a small window in which to tell its story, Morrison's short life which ended in 1971 at the age of 27 in Paris, where the singer had gone to write poetry after leaving the band. The Doors formed in 1965 when Morrison and keyboard player Ray Manzarek teamed up with jazz drummer John Densmore and Robby Krieger, who had played guitar for all of six months. (Light My Fire was the first song Krieger wrote). They were sacked as the house band of the Whisky a Go-Go in Los Angeles, but not before a record executive saw them.
In the studio, a memorable sound emerged from their three instruments. Soon the hits rolled out, thanks to the iconic Morrison as much as to the music.
When You're Strange relies mostly on footage of the band and its performances shot by Paul Ferrara, a friend of Morrison's from their days at UCLA Film School. Often hallucinatory, it will win over anyone who doubts the intensity of Morrison's appeal. Woven through are news video clips of the crises of the time - Civil Rights demonstrations, bloody student unrest, and the Vietnam War. Bookending the film are unidentified scenes from Morrison's own 1969 film, HWY: An American Pastoral, a solemn, meditative journey through the desert.
Besides its archival richness, the strength of DiCillo's documentary is that it is genuinely cinematic, a visual journey. Magnificently edited by Mickey Blythe and Kevin Krasny, it captures the seductive mood of Doors concerts, which often collapsed into anarchy as Morrison improvised and the band just kept playing. In Miami in 1969, when a drunken Morrison threatened to expose himself, the camera caught the chaos that followed.
When You're Strange observes but never penetrates the mystery of the US Navy admiral's son who became the rebel of his generation. Other mysteries are more problematic. We are never told clearly where the Morrison film footage at the beginning and end comes from, or if the bearded figure who looks something like Morrison is indeed the man himself.
A utilitarian voice-over narrative by DiCillo spoon-feeds information, presumably to those who were born long after Morrison died. And the director's solemn efforts to link Morrison's destiny to his cataclysmic era through news footage don't say much more than that it all happened at the same time.
Production Companies
Wolf Films/Strange Pictures
Rhino Entertainment
International Sales
Submarine Entertainment
+ 212 625-1410
Producers
John Beug
Jeff Lampol
Peter Jankowski
Dick Wolf
Screenwriter
Tom DiCillo
Cinematographer
Paul Ferrara
Editors
Mickey Blythe
Kevin Krasny
Narrator
Tom DiCillo
www.screendaily.com/ScreenDailyArticle.aspx?intStoryID=42684Cinematical On-Line
Sundance Review: When You're Strange
by Scott Weinberg Jan 19th 2009 // 10:02AM
Filed under: Documentary, Music & Musicals, Sundance, Theatrical Reviews
The sad irony of the new Doors documentary When You're Strange is this: While it'll almost definitely appeal to old-school fans of the legendary band, it's that precise fan-base that'll probably finish with the flick and think ... yeah, but I knew all that stuff already. Informationally speaking, there's next to nothing here that a loyal Doors fan doesn't already know, which in a way makes When You're Strange come off as little more than a glorified DVD supplement.
The big selling point of the film is that When You're Strange contains a ton of archival video footage that's never been seen before. And if you're a serious fan of this excellent band, then of course you'll want to see the scratchy old clips of Jim Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robby Kriger, and John Densmore as they ascend the ladder of rock stardom. So while this recently-unearthed material may prove to be a gold mine for the fans, the documentary is also saddled with a generally flat voice-over narrative that doesn't add much to the final product. If the selling point of this documentary is this previously-unseen video footage (and it is), then just lose the Cliff's Notes narration and simply chart the band's trajectory using only the videos and the music.
If anything, the endless voice-over nuggets just gave me more respect for the research that Oliver Stone did when he made his Doors movie back in 1991. In other words, I'm just a casual fan of The Doors, but even I knew most of the trivial tidbits that are offered within When You're Strange. Written and directed by Tom DiCillo (a fine filmmaker* who, in my opinion, should probably stick to the narrative projects), When You're Strange was clearly a labor of love for the filmmaker (and his team deserves high praise for tracking down all this old footage), but one can't help but wish he'd been a little more "experimental" on this project.
The scratchy old footage of The Doors playing gigs and hanging around backstage is pretty fascinating all by itself, but the images are often upstaged by DiCillo's over-reliance on lecture-style narration. The film is also completely lacking in the "retrospective" department, as you'll find not one "talking head" interview in When You're Strange. And really, I'd much rather hear anecdotes from Ray Manzarek or some journalists than from a disembodied voice that speaks over the top of some really solid rock songs. Sure, a bunch of interviews could be just as basic as a voice-over track, but at least you'd be getting some different shades from some pertinent people.
A relative disappointment but (yes) still recommended to the hardcore Doors fanatics, When You're Strange is jam-packed with cool video clips that you've never seen before -- and of course the documentary is knee-deep in great Doors tunes -- but the voice-over "Doors for Dummies" narration track sucks a whole lot of spontaneity out of the film. Frankly I think you could just yank the narration straight out of the movie, telling the story in only songs and pictures, and When You're Strange would be a much better film. Especially for those old-school Doors fans who don't really need a refresher course.
www.cinematical.com/2009/01/19/sundance-review-when-youre-strange/
