flamencoprof Shot into car from through the windscreen, someone is playing someone else their latest song, someone else didn't react, according to the voice-over. I just wonder how that came to be made. There were too many scenes in this movie that I wondered about how come a camera was there. If the scenes shot where the Warhols descended on a BJM post-party are true then that was inexcusable exploitation to the max, if not, then it was a total fabrication, either way it made me uncomfortable, if that was the purpose? All the way thru this movie I kept wondering how the footage came about. Taken at face value, a nice portrait of the (tortured) genius we all believe ourselves to be.

forestar44 I see too many people proclaiming this documentary as some kind of insight into the music business. Unfortunately it is a complete misrepresentation of underground music and the term 'genius'. The film offers two dubiously talented bands and the diverging paths they take. There's no mention of the many truly great independent bands that choose neither of these paths and become relatively successful in their own right.(see: Built To Spill, Yo La Tengo, Red House Painters, Belle and Sebastian) BJM and Dandy Warhols are too firmly set in rock-and-roll clichés for me to care about them. I'm still waiting for a great documentary that takes an intelligent look at the current state of the rock music industry. This film was only useful as a documentary of the egotistical, delusional and mediocre artist who is so prevalent today.

kmlewis-1 why did Ondi focus on all the gossip and stupid crap! she had an amazing band to work with (BJM) wheres all the music. wheres the concert footage.why so negative Ondi.i thought i was going to be watching a music documentary. not jerry springer. its frustrating more than anything. i think Ondi didn't like Anton and this movie was like revenge for her. its crap. don't watch but do go and buy or download all of BJM's music. PS who cares about the dandy's all Coutny dose is wine about his "career" PPS i love the line by Anton when he looks at capitol records "i'm not letting some square in a round building tell me what to do.

Zen Bones The filmmakers started out on their project by wanting to cover various underground bands and how they survive in the music industry. They settled on The Brian Jonestown Massacre and the Dandy Warhols. The BJM are a band whose stubborn idealism and integrity (and lack of commercial accessibility) keeps them in the underground, and The DWs are a band who sell out what potential they had in order to assimilate into the pop, easy-to-market, vacuous-MTV-wannabe-hip world of super-adoration and fame. The film mostly focuses on The BJM's leader, Anton Newcombe, who is Iggy Pop, Jim Morrison, Klaus Kinski and Anton Artaud all wrapped in one. Of course a colorful, often frightening figure like that is going to make for some cool footage, but the film is extremely unbalanced in the way they present the artists and the world they inhabit. The entire film gets stuck into either exploiting every single conflict that ensues or in including endless clichéd footage of partying-down scenes. These could be any bands, but the filmmakers DID choose these particular bands so… why not show us why? It's hard for me to fathom how those who aren't familiar with The BJM's music will be able to grasp how great the band is simply from the intermittent snippets of songs that we get to see and hear. If we didn't constantly have people telling us how great Anton and The BJM are, it would be difficult for us to know. The first rule in making a documentary is to SHOW why the subject you are documenting is worth documenting (and not simply inviting a bunch of pundits to tell us why). Is it too much to ask that a documentary about musicians actually show the bands performing at least a few songs uninterrupted? Are audiences attention spans really so limited these days? Perhaps I have a chip on my shoulder because like Anton, all I care about is the music. I don't care how cool someone's hair looks or if they are "post-modern retro whatever". I don't watch music videos or even notice album covers. But this whole film is stylized to fit the sort of disheveled "I just woke up with a hangover and I'm too f**ked up to care" look (in other words this will certainly be a hit on MTV). It's so consumed in its anti-style and sensationalism (oh good, it's another fight scene!), that it completely forgot about what counts: the music. I think I'd be afraid to meet Anton Newcombe in real life, but I certainly embrace his musical spirit. I hope he continues making great music and that one day, some filmmakers will give his genius a chance to speak for itself.