Documentary

• Title: Danny Says
• IMDb: link

The documentary Danny Says takes a look at the life and work of music manager Danny Fields who discovered signed, and managed a variety of noteworthy bands in the 60s, 70s, & 80s including Iggy and the Stooges, MC5, and the Ramones, and also worked with Jim Morrison, the Velvet Underground and the Modern Lovers.

Spending as much time discussing Danny’s sex and drug use than the music, Brendan Toller‘s documentary includes several photographs and recordings Fields has kept over the years. It may not be the in-depth look at the music scene of that time period I expected, but it is an intriguing (if completely self-congratulatory) glance at one man’s impact on the music scene. Presented entirely from Fields’ point of view, some of his stories (such as how he hid Jim Morrison’s keys) are more entertaining than others (such as him struggling to justify his role in the storm up after the Beatles “more popular than Jesus” remark”). Music fans and historians should get a kick out of it.

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• Title: The First Monday in May
• IMDb: link

The subject of Andrew Rossi proves to be more fascinating the the movie itself. Following the near-year-long process of creating The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s most attended fashion exhibition in history, “China: Through The Looking Glass,” the highlights of the documentary are the exhibits themselves while the behind-the-scenes of time and budget constraints, the jockeying of celebrity attendees (without ever naming names), battles with China of the historical (not modern) nature of the exhibit, the struggle to pay the headline act, and the actual design of the various pieces in the exhibits aren’t explored in much more than superficial detail. Like much of the fashion it highlights, it’s great to look at but doesn’t always have much to say.

As a snapshot into a world most won’t ever see personally, The First Monday in May is interesting (if never all that compelling) look at some of the work that went into The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s most profitable exhibit. Available on DVD and On-Demand.

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• Title: The Walk
• IMDb: link

Through the use of interviews, stills, and reenactment footage, the 2008 documentary Man on Wire offered audiences an excellent look back at wire walker Philippe Petit‘s high-wire walk between the two towers of the World Trade Center. The Walk, writer/director Robert Zemeckis‘ biopic starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Petit, may not be as engaging as the documentary, but Zemeckis (using similar set-up same set-up with Gordon-Levitt narrating past events) still manages to capture a bit of the magic by recreating Petit’s improbable stunt.

Without attempting to explain Petit’s obsession or the drive behind it, Zemeckis takes us along on the man’s journey as he attempts to achieve his dream. Beginning with a bit of a backstory for Petit including the relationships with his mentor (Ben Kingsley), girlfriend (Charlotte Le Bon), and the co-conspirators (Clément Sibony, César Domboy, Steve Valentine, James Badge Dale) who would eventually help him pull of his high-wire act, the movie doesn’t kick into high gear until its second hour where the caper truly begins.

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