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jake schreier

Review: Crossfire Hurricane, Robot & Frank, Wuthering Heights, Elena & I, Anna

By Cinema and Reviews

Has any rock group inspired – and paid for – as much cinema as the Rolling Stones? From Jean-Luc Godard’s Sympathy for the Devil to Scorsese’s gil­ded con­cert foot­age for Shine a Light in 2009, the Stones have woven them­selves into film his­tory at the same time as they became rock legends. The Maysles Brothers’ Gimme Shelter is even in the Criterion Collection and foot­age from it informs a cent­ral chapter in Brett Morgen’s doc­u­ment­ary (auto)biography of the band, Crossfire Hurricane.

As the 1969 Altamont free con­cert deteri­or­ates into mur­der­ous anarchy, the still-living Stones provide their own 40-year-on per­spect­ive in croaky voi­ceover and it’s these audio-only remin­is­cences that provide the main nov­elty of a film that – at only two hours – struggles to con­tain the full majesty of “the greatest rock and roll band in the world”. There’s plenty of unseen (by me at any rate) new back­stage and behind-the-scenes foot­age too, in an intric­ately edited por­trait which is as hon­est as any band-authorised and Jagger-produced doc­u­ment­ary is likely to be.

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