Well, How Did I Get Here?

Before I get to my next movie review, a short notice.  Due to the fact that I work retail and the Christmas shopping season is here (Black Friday is next week!  Yay!) I may not get to work on this blog as much as I’d like.  I will still watch and review stuff, but at a slower pace (no more 9-posts-per-month stuff) and more irregularly (meaning no more updating every week on Saturday like clockwork).  With that being said, let’s get to this week’s movie and

Theatrical Film, 1984

Director: Jonathan Demme

The Story

All of the mental patients in a state asylum seem to be sharing the same dream.  They all dream that they are mythic warriors in a fantasy kingdom chosen to do battle with the forces of darkness.  However – when they sleep in that world, they all dream that they are patients in an insane asylum.  Are all of these people insane?  Does it have to do with the drugs that they’re given by the doctors?  Or are they being attacked mentally by the evil sorcerer K’rush, who –

Nah, I’m just messing with you.  This is a concert movie of the band Talking Heads.

And the people in this movie aren’t insane.  Just on a lot of drugs.

Review

Talking Heads are one of my favorite rock bands.  In fact, I’ve been a Talking Heads fan since I was two years old, when my favorite song was “Psycho Killer.”  So there you go.  That explains a lot about me, doesn’t it?  I have grown up with this movie, or more accurately with the soundtrack of this movie – my parents had it on LP.  I used to own the first CD edition of it but got the expanded version a while back.  In fact, if they released a Super-Duper-Deluxo-Collector’s Edition where the only addition was an audio outtake of David Byrne farting on stage I’d probably buy that too.  I didn’t get the chance to see the actual movie until a few years ago when I found it on VHS (it had been out-of-print for a while by then, so it was a major find for me).  When the DVD came out I had to get that too.

Why?  Simple.  Stop Making Sense is my favorite concert movie.  There’s no bullshit here.  No audience reaction shots (at least until the very end).  No interviews backstage.  No fan interviews.  No flashy camerawork.  No cutaway sequences.  Just music.  Glorious, glorious music.  And one crappy song.  But more on that later.

I’m not going to over-analyze this movie, oddly enough.  Other people have done that.  If you wonder why David Byrne wiggles around on the stage the way he does or why the stagehands all wear black or why all the bandmembers come out one at a time or whatever, just do some research on the internet.  Or you can listen to the audio commentary on the DVD, I believe some of these questions are answered there… I don’t know for sure though as I have never listened to the commentary all the way through – I always switched back to the music.

This is the greatest concert movie ever, with some of the greatest rock music ever.  In fact, I don’t even think you could call this rock, since there are so many genres of music blended into this magnum opus.  Frontman David Byrne is a genius.  That word is thrown around way too much, but here it’s true.  He’s crazy and on drugs (in this movie at least) but the man is a genius.  In fact, I got the chance to see him on tour last year and he is just as awesome today as he was when he fronting the Heads.  The only time I have ever danced in public was at that concert (and I made a complete fool of myself as I tend to dance like a spastic idiot.  Oh well, I still had fun!)  If you ever get a chance to see him live do not pass it up.  Part of what makes this movie work though is not only the genius of the band (and the man fronting it) but the genius of the director as well.  Jonathan Demme knows how to use a camera in a rock concert.  He doesn’t get flashy or show off… he simply shows you what’s on stage.  This shows remarkable restraint and the movie is so much better for it.

The one down moment in Stop Making Sense though is the one song done by the side project of band members Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, The Tom Tom Club.  “Genius of Love” sucks.  And not just because of the song itself (which I have never liked) – It’s because it completely messes up the flow of the whole movie.  Before you’re grooving along to the music of Talking Heads and the subdued staging and the flow of it all and then suddenly you’re confronted with the hideous, hideous embarrassing vocal stylings of goofball doofus Chris Frantz and the over-the-top use of STROBE LIGHTS which jolts you right out of the movie and into pissed-off land.  In fact, speaking of the strobe lights, here’s an announcement I am compelled to make in complete seriousness (this is not a joke):

WARNING:  If you have epilepsy or are prone to epilepsy DO NOT watch “Genius of Love.”  The strobe lights used in this sequence will probably induce seizures and cause possible death. 

I found it extremely uncomfortable and I am not prone to epilepsy whatsoever.  In fact, you should probably skip this song altogether as it brings the movie to a grinding halt.

…Which luckily picks up again the moment David Byrne comes onstage again in his infamous Big Suit to sing “Girlfriend is Better.”  And the concert stays awesome ‘till the end.  Yay!

If I haven’t yet made it clear, see this movie.  It is the greatest rock concert movie ever.  Just skip “Genius of Love.”  Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go dance spastically to the soundtrack again.

Screenshots

Note:  Merely looking at these screenshots is not enough to gauge this movie as it is a concert film, after all.  To get the best experience, get a copy of the soundtrack album or find some sound clips of the album on the internet and listen while looking at these pics.  You can call it "Stop Making Sense, the Mini-Experience."

Our frontman, David Byrne, looking like something out of a horror movie.  Creepy!

 

Even creepier, though:  bassist Tina Weymouth.  I don't know whether she is stoned throughout the entire concert or whether she's just really focused, but Ms. Tina just looks intense and only cracks a smile twice in the entire movie.  This is odd as everyone else looks like they're really getting into it and having a lot of fun.

Only this movie could make dancing with a lamp look completely natural.

Just an artsy pretentious shot from an artsy pretentious rock movie.

....I want ...a Big Suit....

A cool moment:  during "Girlfriend is Better" Byrne briefly offers the mike to one of the crew...

...then to you, the viewer!  Isn't that awesome?

I guess David is a big Linux fan.

Next Week:  I don't know.  I don't know anymore.  My life is so full of uncertainty!  I can't handle it anymore!!  I think I'm going to – hey!  Thanksgiving is right around the corner!  Alright!  PIG OUT!!

(Consumes mass quantities.  Sleeps in turkey-induced coma for a week)