![]() ![]() Four of the band’s principals- Lou Reed (guitar/vocals), Sterling Morrison (guitar), Nico (vocals), and Andy Warhol (impresario/genius)-died before the documentary was made. The film’s late arrival does create some unusual narrative challenges. Although the film was long in its coming, the exciting trailer, released in August, and the awareness that the film was directed by Todd Haynes, the virtuoso behind two powerful, quixotic rock-and-roll movies-“Velvet Goldmine” (1998) and “ I’m Not There” (2007)-suggested that the half-century-plus wait may have been worthwhile. ![]() ![]() You may have heard the classic songs a million times - "Heroin," "Venus in Furs," "I'll Be Your Mirror" - but after "The Velvet Underground" has made you more fully aware of what each person brought to the table, and the incredible ways these different flavors complimented each other, it's like you're hearing them again for the first time.More than a half century after the Velvet Underground’s obscure rise and spectacular implosion, one of the most storied American bands of the nineteen-sixties finally has a proper documentary. He made it possible for us to make a record without anybody changing it or anything, because Andy Warhol was there." "Andy produced our first record, in the sense that he was there breathing in the studio," recalls Reed, who died in 2011 but is nonetheless present via archival interviews. Somehow, as if by miracle, all this was brought together - Cale, Reed, Nico and all the rest - and engineered by Warhol, whose leadership style seemed to consist of keeping the cameras rolling, and holding back enough approval that everyone would work harder to get it from him. Don't walk around with your flowers in your hair." "Everybody wants to have a peaceful world and not get shot in the head or something, but you cannot change minds by handing a flower to some bozo who wants to shoot you. There was also a deep hatred of hippies - the prevailing force in music and counter-culture at the time. "This 'love, peace' crap, we hated that. In their own twisted, bizarre way, each of these people were born to do this - and the final result is something none of them could have achieved with anyone else, under any circumstances other than Andy Warhol's freewheeling Factory. By the time "The Velvet Underground" finally does, and their music is finally unleashed on our ears, it feels like the first action scene in a superhero team-up movie. It's an incredibly effective way of introducing each "character" and telling the audience their backstory, before finally bringing them together. So, we meet the Velvets - Lou Reed, Cale, Sterling Morrison and Tucker - with sound working alongside their steady faces on one side of the screen, experimental or period images often counterbalancing the other side and driving the narrative forward. Although Warhol was known for being prophetic, even he could never have imagined how useful this footage would be nearly 50 years later to a filmmaker with a fondness for split screens. Can you imagine a documentary on the Beatles, Rolling Stones or Bruce Springsteen ever attempting such a thing? Instead, Haynes relies heavily on Warhol's single-shot, silent experimental films " Sleep" and " Empire," but even more on his " Screen Test" films, which often consisted of several minutes of the subject sitting in front of the camera, simply existing. ![]() The most notable creative flourish, right off the bat, is that you don't hear any Velvet Underground songs until over 45 minutes into the film. Like "Montage," "The Velvet Underground" is driven by the families and/or surviving members (John Cale and Maureen Tucker, both still quite feisty, give great new interviews), and much as "Montage" heavily featured Kurt Cobain's home movies, "Velvet" utilizes so much Andy Warhol-shot footage that it feels like he should be credited as a posthumous co-director. The only comparison that feels anywhere in the same ballpark, as far as tone and format are concerned, might be the 2015 Brett Morgen film "Cobain: Montage of Heck." It similarly blends mixed media, interviews with those who were there, and personal materials to give you a sense of the musical act, rather than a retelling of their public persona. To his credit, Haynes chooses to unfurl his tale as if the documentary itself was a Velvet Underground creation: at times it sings, at others it becomes an endurance test it frequently feels like an exercise in stream-of-consciousness, but look closer and you'll see a confident, magnificently orchestrated blueprint there is an infectious melody to be found, but it stubbornly refuses to give you things the easy way. ![]()
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