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Martin Scorsese
is familiar with the rock music of his generation, and
he's been no stranger to using it in his movies. As with
many of his films, rock-and-roll can be frenetic, loud,
and often wonderfully seductive. It's kind of surprising
that it took so many years for Scorsese to team with the
iconic Rolling Stones for a concert film. The Stones
have been rocking for so many years with daring riffs
and fast playing, pairing with Scorsese seems like a
given.
"Rolling Stones: Shine A Light" is now available on Blu-ray disc.
Concert films are usually hard to watch. See concert.
See band mates interviewed. See archival footage. See
more concert footage. Unless you're a fan of the group in
question, concert films are usually dull to watch. There
have been exceptions. "Stop Making Sense" (1985) is
pretty incredible. "U2: Rattle and Hum" (1988) was
fairly slow going, but some of the concert footage was
well done. Now with Scorsese behind the camera and
taking in the Stones, we have a very good concert film.
Not much is original. We've heard most of the Stones'
songs hundreds, if not thousands, of times. The flying
cameras and Scorsese's fast moviemaking style is
familiar. What is likable about "Shine A Light" is the
energy of the film. It's also nice to see the Stone's
being themselves. Outrageously famous and rich, the
Stones come across as normal "blokes."
The film offers some excellent performances from the
Stones. Mick Jagger's voice has changed a
bit over the years, but he still has the power to
captivate the audience. Keith Richards still is amazing
on guitar and just looks cool. Ronny Wood and Bill Wyman
are at their best.
The film seems a little bit set-up with the footage of
Scorsese worrying about how he's going to coordinate the
film with the Stones. It does give you a sense that even
the authority of Scorsese still has to work around the
Stones, and perhaps not the other way around.
"Shine A Light" is pretty much aimed at Stones fans, but
that shouldn't stop non-Stones fans from buying the
Blu-ray disc for demo material. This is one you can turn
up and probably not annoy your Baby Boomer parents.
Well, except for mine who never got into the rock scene
of the 1960s for some reason. If you love good old
rock-and-roll, this disc is a real treat. I particularly
enjoyed the two-channel PCM mix. I know -- it goes
against home theater thinking that anything under 5.1
channels is blasphemy. But the PCM mix sounds incredible
and natural. The audio is nicely staged between two
speakers. The Dolby TrueHD and DTS-Master Audio mixes
are very good if you really want to utilize your
surround sound system, which I'm sure most people do.
The picture quality is top-notch. Robert Richardson, ASC
looks like he used a few different film formats and film
stocks to go from grainy black-and-white to crisp color.
Some infrared video cameras to capture the director
putting the film together.
The film was shown in IMAX (shot mainly in 35mm) and
didn't do very good business. I didn't catch it
theatrically, and I'm sure it was quite an experience.
The film fits well at home on the small screen, that is
if you have a small screen these days. Turn up the
volume and get rockin' with the Stones.
Bill Kallay
Special thanks to Click Communications
Photos: © Paramount Vantage. All rights reserved.
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