|
|
|
Crumb -
Special Edition (Coming April '06)
"Crumb is a meeting
between two eccentrics in sympathy with each other. The artist R.
Crumb
created such
bizarre images in his underground comic books that the art critic Robert
Hughes named him 'the Brueghel of the last half of the 20th century.'
The director Terry Zwigoff knew him before he had any notion
of making this
documentary. They shared a love for obscure musicians on 78 rpm records
from the 1920s and 1930s, and they once played in the same band. Long
before he knew the inhabitants of Crumb's childhood home would be the
keys to this film, Zwigoff had slept the night there and met Crumb's
brother Charles, who is perhaps the key to the whole Crumb story."
"The old 78s led Zwigoff to his first film, 'Louie Bluie' (1986)
about a musician named Howard Armstrong, whose forgotten recordings
from the 1930s fascinated him. Learning that Armstrong was still alive,
he made a film about a man who was ageless, gifted in music and art,
a clown and mimic, a life force. Zwigoff was now a filmmaker, and knew
that his next subject was obviously his fellow music lover, Robert
Crumb."
"This was not obvious to Crumb, a legendary underground artist from
San Francisco whose 'Keep on Truckin' image had become
a 1960s icon, and whose cover for Janis Joplin's 'Cheap Thrills' album
was a classic even apart from the music it enclosed. Crumb had little
interest in success, turned down countless offers to license 'Keep
on Truckin',' turned down an offer to host 'Saturday Night
Live' with his band, drew compulsively all the time, produced
small-press graphic novels of startling, often pornographic, weirdness
and listened to his old records."
"Art may have saved Crumb from madness, turning private neurosis into
public validation. Zwigoff is unsparing in showing Crumb's more transgressive
work; the camera follows panel by panel through comic books as Crumb
narrates stories of incest, necrophilia, scatology, assault, mayhem
and sexual couplings as unlikely as they are alarming. To call some
of his images sexist, racist and depraved is putting it mildly."
"Yet the women who knew him best seem fond of him, especially his first
wife, Dana, and current wife, Aline, who see him (as we do in the film)
as a smart and entertaining companion who has transformed his demons
into his work. Yes, he has sexual hangups, but not ones they find unpleasant
or painful."
"Crumb's art and career would define the limits of this film if it had
been made by someone else. What deepens Zwigoff's work are the scenes
with the family members. There is in Charles such a gentle sadness, such
a resigned acceptance of his emotional imprisonment, that we sense how
Robert's art has saved him from a similar destiny. In the fondness of
his wives and girlfriends, there is a redemption to be sensed. As the
film ends, Crumb is moving with his family to the south of France, where
in the last 10 years he has not produced so much, perhaps because, let
us speculate, he is happier." ------ Roger Ebert
DVD
- Available Subtitles: English, French
- Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo)
- Audio Commentary by Roger Ebert & Terry Zwigoff
- Sneak Peek at the new feature film: "Art School Confidential"
Curator's Comments:
Read
Roger Ebert's essay on this DVD Classic.
Director: Terry Zwigoff
Color
121 minutes
Released: 1995
Rated: R
Country: U.S.A.
Language: English
Genre: Documentary
|
