Michael's Movie Grade: B+
An excellent music documentary for a very talented band that deserves to be better known than they are.
Sparks has often been a band that has been on the verge of a breakthrough very often since the 1970's, yet strangely they never had that breakthrough. This has not stopped them from having very devoted fans for the length of their career (including this film's director Edgar Wright (Scott Pilgrim, Baby Driver, Shaun of the Dead)) and having inspired many more famous bands. If this movie gains the band more fans then I assure you that it did exactly what Wright planned it to do. And I assure you many who see this movie will become fans of the band.
While when we think of Edgar Wright, we do not think of documentaries, it is hard to think of a better director for this film. Sparks is extremely quirky, creative and not afraid to be silly. Therefore Wright's similarly quirky sense of humor works exceptionally well here. From the band themselves taking parts in puns to the humorous introductory subtitles to many of those being interviewed to visual references to the art house films that the band are huge fans of, this film definitely stands out as something different and more daring than the average music documentary and a good companion to the band's music. There is also Wright's clear passion for the subject matter and how clearly this passion comes across.
Of course every music documentary clearly depends on how good the music it is about is. Luckily Sparks is a darn good band and we get to here some excellent music from them here. It is clear to see why all the people interviewed here are such fans.
Interviews have become a staple of music documentaries and somehow it seems appropriate that this the most conventional part of the film is also the weakest part. While many well respect artists are interviewed here, most have them simply say the same things. Especially considering the long runtime (2 hours and 21 minutes), this can be more than bit repetitive. We hear that they are brilliant, original and should be better known too times throughout this movie without one ounce of criticism of any of their work. It wouldn't have hurt to trim these interviews to cut out these more repetitive bits.
This movie will make fans out of newcomers, will please die hard fans and will widen the appreciation of causal fans. That is of course just what a film like this should do.
-Michael J. Ruhland
No comments:
Post a Comment