Mistaken for Strangers

Music docs have a checkered history. Dig! might be the best of the recent bunch, but nobody came out of that looking good, lest of all the people it was intended promote. Spinal Tap and A Mighty Wind were at once far too farcical and far too realistic, and really the whole "rockumentary" genre wasn't left with much wiggle room.

This isn't a rockumentary. It certainly doesn't provide much of an insight into the National, although there are the odd interview with the lesser members who look, more often than not, drunk or confused or bored. No, this is about the Berninger boys. It's a study of how an overweight college dropout copes in the presence of his universally adored, alpha-male brother. It's very hard not to come out on Tom's side. Matt is aloof, pretentious and very egotistical (although at times he shows immense sensitivity to his brother's latent depression). Tom wants what Matt has. And this film is his personal journey into that. There's a deeply psychoanalytical element to this, which, intended or no, places it above say, Standing in the Shadows of Motown or Dig, which are straight up music profiles.

Two scenes stand out for me. One, a drunken conversation between Tom and Matt's wife, both of whom are drunk. She knows that in most battles the alpha male wins. Look who she picked. The second, when Tom screws up and leaves Werner Herzog locked outside an LA gig.

This film is terribly made; the director himself admits this. But in the end, for some reason, he's produced a profoundly moving portrayal of two brothers, and a world in which alpha males win. Fans of the National will be relieved to know that their favourites come across as nothing worse than somewhat humourless - a far cry from The Brian Jonestown Massacre. But fans of the National will appreciate the depressive undertones which are beautifully and subtly brought to the foreground.

Wow, this was not what I expected. I haven't laughed this hard at a documentary since Michael Moore stopped doing them. Briefly, it's loosely based on Matt Berninger's brother Tom's attempts to make a movie about the band.

I have to admit, I had to suppress my inner cynic at many points (who's doing all the filming of Tom? Who's idea was it to come on tour really? Is he really that thick??) but whoever came up with the idea of having Tom do this obviously had some idea what the results would be. I mean one meeting with Tom would have indicated that he would not be capable in pulling together some kind of coherent documentary. As they say, it takes a very smart person to act dumb. But then again some people are just dumb.

When Tom is behind the camera he is strangely reminiscent of Jack Black at his bratty best. He's disappointed that being on tour with a rock band is actually quite boring. He doesn't really have much interest in any band members other than his brother and he uses these conversations to try and understand his relationship with his brother a bit better. The most arresting scenes are when Matt loses it with Tom - they feel very real and you know you are watching that fraternal relationship that has a lot of history.

I love the National but, to be honest, that's of little consequence. Love them or hate them, you will laugh at this (very short) film.

Full disclosure: I am a longtime National fan, and I personally think that Matt Berninger is a genius. I watched this movie expecting a traditional band documentary, but even though I would have liked to see more live songs and other musical stuff, I found "Mistaken for Strangers" to be very entertaining and well crafted. Tom is Matt's younger brother, and the movie is mostly centered around his own experience joining the band on tour. He is immature, emotionally unstable, jealous of his brother's success, and kind of annoying, but somehow likable. One of the things that I liked most about the movie is the portrait of the different members of the Berninger family. They all seem like very nice people, and the love and respect that they have for each other (especially Matt and Tom) is evident throughout the film. Seems like both brothers have found a way to channel their own frustration through their art, and the results are very enjoyable in both cases. The movie shows that Tom really has filming talent, and I hope to see more of him in the future (but not exactly the B-class horror / barbarian flicks that he seems to enjoy making). My only complain is that I would have liked to see more of the Dessner and Devendorf brothers, and of course, more National music!

Pretty awesome documentary overall. I really didn't expect it to be any good and was pleasantly surprised. As well, I had never heard of this band before, not necessarily my type of music but I liked what I heard. Tom is a guy we all know, maybe a guy we are all at times. A likable fellow that can to no awareness of his own, ruffle feathers and mess things up even though his heart is in the right place. The dynamic of this film captured how we can all feel insignificant despite our efforts. Tom you are talented and you showed it with this documentary for sure.

Def worth a watch.

Mistaken for Strangers is a film that I saw back in early 2014 at the IFC Center in New York. But it's also one of those films I almost forgot I saw- not because I meant to, it just got shuffled briefly out of my memory so far as the title - but I but was extremely glad just now I found the title as the subject matter. You may not know who the Berninger brothers are before going in (or you'll probably know one of them more likely than not), but by the end they leave their mark due to their personalities and how they relate to each other and the world around them.

This is about a filmmaker brother (not a great one, but trying) who follows around his up-n-coming brother musician, who leads the band The National (you may/may not have heard them, big hit singles) while he's promoting a new album and playing concerts. Oh, and there are some incidents that make things awkward, weird and at times it's just a matter of this guy Tom Berninger messing up while kind of 'attached' with this band. Does he know what kind of movie he's making? Does he tell the band? What happens if this all falls apart and he goes back to making schlocky horror movies? Now there's stakes here - at one point the National is even involved at an event with the POTUS (that's an intense, kind of hysterical scene as I recall).

So really, it's about this band The National, but only in the secondary sense. It's much more of a self-portrait, what it means if you keep mucking up your own work and getting in the way of doing what you know you can do creatively (this happens more than once, sometimes just due to the Party-of-One mentality Tom has). But in the light of this guy and his brother - a man who Tom looks up to, but also isn't sure he can really live up to in the sense of creative engagement. Can he make this a great movie? We're along for the ride either way, and it's a funny, affecting, and honest on all sides kind of experience. Charming, even.