Viewed: 17/9/22.
Director: Brett Morgen
Actors: David Bowie
Genre: Biopic / Documentary
Rating: M
‘Moonage Daydream’ is a
not-really-documentary about David Bowie, as it doesn’t follow the traditional
talking heads of friends, family and colleagues. It’s also not a concert film,
although it does have some live concert footage, apparently much of it
previously unseen. Directed by Brett Morgen (who did ‘Montage of Heck’ about
Kurt Cobain and ‘Crossfire Hurricane’ about The Rolling Stones), it’s also not
wall-to-wall songs – I’d say there were only ~10 songs played in full, with
lots of others used as transitions.
The film does well to show his impact on
his fans, with bits and pieces from outside shows and plenty of crowd closeups
during the live bits. There’s plenty of archival Bowie interviews, much of it
overlaid with other visuals of him or with the psychedelic “screensaver”-type CGI.
It’s edited well, so it feels like he’s talking directly to you, rather than an
interviewer. Lots of his other art – paintings, video-snippets, dance – edited in
too.
It’s sort-of chronological, starting in
~’72 and the Ziggy Stardust era, covering up to the early ‘90s, but some of the
interviews jump to an older Bowie, so he can juxtapose himself and some of the
comments/views from his younger self. He was certainly a bit of a mystery and for
a lot of the film comes across as someone just trying to find his place in the
world. Good to see some of his reasoning around certain things and his genius
definitely shines through. Hard to believe he’s already been gone almost 7
years.
Overall: Different, but fitting, overview of one of the greats.
Gav’s Rating: 3.5 stars.
