The Who: The Kids Are Alright

This 2-disc DVD is an absolute essential for any Who fan and perhaps the only documentary film ever made that captures the essence of rock'n'roll's importance to youth culture. Its brilliance largely belongs to the irresistibly appealing personalities and unparalleled live performances of the Who, but can also be partially attributed to director Jeff Stein, who was a nineteen year-old fledgling photographer and Who freak in 1978 when he persuaded the group to front him the cash to make a movie. What results is a warts 'n' all portrait of the most honest, inspired, and inspiring of rock's superheroes.

The film begins with the now-infamous performance of 'My Generation' on the Smothers Brothers show and never slows down. Included are hilarious outtakes of staged antics originally intended for a Monkees-style TV show that never aired, a wonderfully irreverent segment featuring John Entwistle using gold records for target practice on the lawn of his estate, priceless video and still photography of Keith Moon at his hotel room-smashing best, and vintage interview material with Townshend, charting his development from insolent young mod (at one point, when asked to comment on the relative quality of the Beatles' music by a smug British TV host, he refers to the Fab Four as "flippin' lousy") to a soul-searching artist trying to find meaningful space for himself in a form he fears he has outgrown. There are liberal doses from 'Tommy' and 'Who's Next,' but equal attention is paid to the group's early mod years and their more radio-friendly late-seventies era releases. Included in its entirety is the group's performance of 'A Quick One' from "The Rolling Stones' Rock 'n' Roll Circus," a TV show produced by the Stones which was never aired due to the Stones' opinion that they had been badly upstaged by the Who (only a fragment of the same clip was featured in the theatrical release of the film due to copyright restrictions). Surprisingly absent is any material from 'Quadrophenia,' an unexplained omission but one that doesn't really glare given that the footage is not arranged chronologically.

None of the Who's studio releases ever equaled their brilliance onstage, and Stein loads the film with impossibly hot concert footage, including mind-blowing performances (some borrowed from the Woodstock film) of live staples 'Young Man Blues,' 'Pinball Wizard,' 'See Me Feel Me/Listening to You,' and 'Sparks.'

Indirectly, 'The Kids are Alright' is also a cautionary tale: we see Moon transformed in a mere ten years from a lean young prankster into a bloated caricature of himself (Moon died shortly before the film was released; his last performance with the group was the concert at Shepperton Studios staged for the film at Jeff Stein's request). We see Townshend joking about his hearing loss and struggling with his fear of growing old and irrelevant. Entwistle dryly remarks, 'I'm too old to enjoy my money;' Roger Daltrey dismisses the cultural importance of rock music, stating flatly that 'it doesn't stand up.' Townshend confesses his frustration at the pressure he feels to satisfy the expectations of the group's army of frenzied fans. By the end, the group seems weary of itself and its overblown reputation.

Nevertheless, the film ends on a note of triumph, with a manic encore at Shepperton of "Won't Get Fooled Again," climaxing with a slo-mo shot of Townshend leaping and then sliding across the stage on his knees, followed by an end-credit coda of "Rock is Dead (Long Live Rock)". The DVD set includes director commentary, a recent interview with Daltrey, Who trivia quizzes, and isolated tracks of John Entwistle's extraordinary bass work on several classic tunes.

Definitive evidence of the Who's stature as one of the most influential and inimitable of the titans of rock. Anyone who loves the power and energy of a live rock performance will come away from this film slack-jawed and looking around for a guitar to smash.

Only recently did I acquire an appreciation for The Who. After seeing this film, they've moved from the bottom of my list to nearly the top. It gives an amazing look into the group almost solely through the use of concert footage. There are a few cuts of interviews and humorous stuff with Ringo Starr, but they don't compare with the concerts.

It also gave me a new perspective beyond The Who and into the world of the modern music world and INDUSTRY. Most people have seen Trent Reznor and Kurt Cobain destroying their equipment at Woodstock and on Mtv, but have they seen The Who do it on the Smother's Brothers Show? THAT is insane!!! That was 35+ years ago...

Where is modern pop-music going? That's what I ask after this film. What is being done today that hasn't been done before? The answer is pretty close to nothing. Except a lot more money is being made...big deal.

10 out of 10... Easily as good as "Don't Look Back" and the Bob Marley docs I've seen. Just as inspiring.

The object of any great concert film is to convince you, at least for the span of the movie, that the subject is The Greatest Rock Band in the World. If The Kids Are Alright doesn't succeed in that goal as completely as Jonathan Demme's sensational Stop Making Sense, that's hardly the fault of The Who-- few performers have labored harder in the name of fan service.

Though engaging and highly watchable, The Kids Are Alright stays a minor affair, documentary-wise. Here and there it flirts with insight. We catch a bit of Keith Moon palling around with fellow alcoholic Ringo Starr ("We're just taking our medicine, children!") in a bit that foreshadows tragedy without actually catching the weight of it. We get a laugh from Pete Townshend's startled "Eh?" at being confronted with his own lyrics ("...hope I die before I get old..."). But the between-music bits of the film offer little substance; they're just filler.

But there's an early clip of the band performing in a club, in which we cut to Moon, drumming his heart out, already in hyperdrive-- and then, impossibly, he starts going faster. His face is upturned in spiritual abandon, his hands simply disappear. And, in a phenomenal rendering of Baba O'Reilly, you see Townshend dancing in genuine and infectious ecstasy over John Entwhistle's thunderous bass line. And in an epic performance of Won't Get Fooled Again, we finally understand the sheer force of The Who-- the lights go out around six minutes in for the synth solo. Then the drums kick in, gathering our heartbeats with it. The lights come on: Roger Daltrey is screaming, and Townshend is in midair, and we are with him, transported, levitating.

These were men who enjoyed their work. And for these five-to-ten minute stretches, we are watching The Greatest Rock Band in the World. Worth the price of admission.

Well, I've been sat here for the last five minutes thinking what I could write about the Greatest Rock 'n Roll band in the World, or more to the point, one of the best Rock Documentaries to come out of the 1970's.

Seeing The Who live only four time's since 13th July 1985 to November 10th 2000. The original line up would have been great, but time and history say different.

This is where Jeff Stein has a wonderful idea (the film was being made when Keith was still very much alive, but as reference to today's generation) if you can no longer go to the mountain, then he has brought it to you, enter stage right, The Kids are Alright, 109 minutes of pure Rock 'n Roll documented history.

The film start's of with some fantastic black and white footage (the early gigs must have been out of this world) of one of the hardest working bands to come out of the Sixties and to continue to World domination, a cliché I know, but it works.

Interviewing them must have been a night where you earned your money, poor Russell Harty, (in case of Keith Moon break the glass).

The 1970's tracks see them develop into a real tight outfit, if not a "little older" , performing most of their classics without fault. Jeff Stein has done a great job of bringing together this visually collective musical collage to a wider audience. I say lets turn the record over and begin side "B"...

Thanks Jeff.

In some ways this is best the movie ever. Errrm... make that one way. Let me put it this way. If you're as big a fan of The Who as I am, The Kids Are Alright is as alright as movies get. Director Jeff Stein was probably an even bigger Who-fan than yours truly, and you get that vibe from every aspect of the movie: the chosen footage, the editing and the chosen narrative (or lack thereof) chosen. TKAA is a documentary, but unlike documentary-makers fashionable today Stein didn't set out to make his points in a Michael Moore-ish style, with himself as the narrating voice-over and on-screen interviewer. Stein lets the footage speak for itself, only slightly suggesting conclusions that can be made through editing, and only once serving as an off-screen interviewer.

If there is one point Stein tries to make, it is that the Who were the most interesting/wild/intelligent/contradictory/refined/loony/crude Rock 'n' Roll band in the world. And therefore the most fascinating. He didn't have to turn to the viewer and say that in person: the Who themselves are their own best spokespeople. The Kids Are Alright isn't ABOUT the Who, it IS the Who. The a-chronological editing, live as well as mimed performances and contradictory quotes spanning two decades make a rich collage of fifteen years of Rock 'n' Roll mayhem.

Editing was Stein's weapon of choice to make TKAA a double-edged sword. People can try to find a deeper meaning in the director's decisions and/or draw their own conclusions. Or you can just kick back and relax and let it be the ultimate party-DVD. Watching this movie, you really get the sensation of hanging with the Who, addiction, hearing problems, impromptu strip sessions and all. And with Roger Daltrey, John Entwistle, Keith Moon and Pete Townshend around, there's never a dull moment.