Gimme Danger
(2016)
Oddly, given their reputation as a confrontational band, Jim
Jarmusch’s film about Iggy and The Stooges isn’t all that explosive. Perhaps it’s
down to the intervening 50 years and inevitable mellowing of the main suspects.
Certainly, a good music documentary usually involves conflicting parties and
opposing viewpoints, and Gimme Danger
never really feasts on these things.
As such, while Jim Osterberg is an infinitely more
interesting character than the Gallagher brothers, Gimme Danger isn’t as engaging a documentary as Supersonic. Jarmusch charts Iggy’s
formative years, raised in his parents’ trailer, his decision to quit drumming
(“Eventually I just got tired of looking
at someone’s butt all the time”) the origin of the Stooges name (“We don’t anything wrong, but everyone’s
picking on us” like their namesakes) and Iggy’s disavowal of much of the
music of that era, which was “more of American
Idol than people think”, citing
corporate influences and singling out Crosby, Stills and Nash’s Marrakesh Express.
He’s casually amusing on influences, from his bare torso (“It impressed me that the pharaohs seldom
wore shirts”) to wearing a dog collar after being inspired by the content
of a pet shop window, and how Ed Sanders, who was writing The Family at the time, on Charles Manson, reprimanded him with “You don’t know what that means” (“I still don’t know what it means” admits
Iggy). We hear of arrests, prodigious drug
intake and Tony Defries’ management (Bowie’s very oblique here, this not touching
on Iggy’s solo career), which was to side-line the band, eventually resulting
in Iggy being “suspended for moral turpitude”
and abandoned, the crunch coming when Defries took him aside in his limo and suggested
he play Peter Pan. “No, no no, Tony, I
gotta be Manson” Iggy replied.
There’s a nice snippet of archive interview where he
comments “I think I helped wipe out the
‘60s”, and Jarmusch is careful to note the band’s influence (The Sex
Pistols, The Damned), although the director has the same urge to unnecessarily
enliven the interview footage with rudimentary animation, much as Supersonic does, which makes it seem
like just another easily distracted rock doc on one level.
The coverage of the band’s “reunification”, all paid equally as communists, might actually be
the more engrossing part, from the first seeds with Velvet Goldmine and J Mascis. Particularly bizarre is James
Williamson’s return, having been a Sony exec and not having played guitar in 30
years. At their 2010 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Iggy
finished his speech with “Thanks for
being so… cool”; maybe that’s why Gimme
Danger isn’t as rousing or invigorating as it might be. Iggy’s just so
cool. Too cool.
Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.
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