The Devil and Daniel Johnston

[w/o horse]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436231/
http://www.apple.com/trailers/sony/thedevilanddanieljohnston/

Is there really not a topic for this?  There must be right.

It was better than Ray.  It somehow made me believe in art and its power to change, was about the art in us, the art that wants to get out, the art of suffering and believing.  That art comes to us in a natural way, and we nurture art.

Things like that.  It'll make you feel like you can create anything, should create everything.  Also the guy is crazy.

[RegularKarate]

http://xixax.com/index.php?topic=781.15

The Devil in Daniel Johnston: This was the best film I saw at the festival.  Amazing doc that deserves to at least be nominated for an Oscar.  If you know who Daniel Johnston is, you'll be very pleased and get to listen to his music throughout the film.  If you don't know who he is, I'm not going to say... just see this film.  It's like the Brian Wilson story, but more amazing.  The subject matter is enough by itself to carry this film, but the execution makes the exploration that much better.  Once you get a chance, SEE THIS FILM!!!

I still really want to see it again and feel it's an amazing documentary, but I talked to someone who worked on it and he said that the directors line fed a lot of the subjects.  They would ask them to say something a certain way.  He said it made people feel uncomfortable and some would refuse to participate.

I guess he did this to intentionally break rules because in an interview with Documentary magazine, Jeff Feuerzeig says " I was trying to break new ground between documentary and narrative"

anyway, great movie.

[w/o horse]

The Devil in Daniel Johnston:

You must have seen it back when it had an X rating.

Also, the dentist's office scene with the Butthole Surfers singer.  I forgot to say how much I hated that scene.

[RegularKarate]

The Devil in Daniel Johnston:

You must have seen it back when it had an X rating.

Also, the dentist's office scene with the Butthole Surfers singer.  I forgot to say how much I hated that scene.

haha, yeah, I went a few months before I realized what I had done there.

I thought that scene was funny... oddly enough, he was in like three movies at SXSW last year... all docs.

[pete]

I still really want to see it again and feel it's an amazing documentary, but I talked to someone who worked on it and he said that the directors line fed a lot of the subjects.  They would ask them to say something a certain way.  He said it made people feel uncomfortable and some would refuse to participate.

I guess he did this to intentionally break rules because in an interview with Documentary magazine, Jeff Feuerzeig says " I was trying to break new ground between documentary and narrative"

anyway, great movie.

herzog freaking wrote monologues for his subjects.

[matt35mm]

This finally started playing here.  For me, the idea of Daniel Johnston and his music inspires a sort of deep sadness, so more than half of this movie's work was already done for it.  I think that as a documentary, it was okay... standard, really... but the subject was so fascinating that the film is still very strong.  Whatever the director was trying to do in terms of "blending narrative and documentary" didn't really, um, show to me.  It was the standard talking heads, home videos/tapes/drawings, and symbolic imagery (the pile of tapes that make up a heart) that you always see.  I don't think that this film needed to be anything else or anything, but i can't take the director's claim of breaking new ground as anything more than a bit of P.T. Barnumship.

I agree that it makes one think more on the nature of the artist... especially the crazy or misunderstood artist.

[pete]

I really liked the depiction of the parents though--in the beginning they come off as these real crazy fundamentalists, but then gradually they opened up and you realized how wonderful they were.  the scene in which daniel was performing at the packed show and killed the crowd, that really got to me.  it was so natural and he was so good.  and then the subsequent twist inside the plane, the the dad recounting it, also got to me.