Gimme Danger

Gimme Danger: Gimme Iggy

Gimme Danger is about Iggy Pop and the Stooges, the unruly, undisciplined band of post-hippy rockers that, "killed the sixties" as Iggy says in one interview. There are several directorial and artistic choices made in the film that prevent "Gimme Danger" from being a spectacular film and places it in the middle of the list of good biopics, but not spectacular. In summary, I would rate the parts of the film thusly:

First half: A+ Third Quarter: B End: C-

The film doesn't address Iggy Pop's career from 1975 to 2003. What was happening during those years? What was happening is Iggy Pop was recording his successful solo album "Lust for Life" with the cult hit The Passenger on it.

Why exclude this? Did the record label refuse permission? Did Iggy or Jarmusch insist on only including Stooges music? What about Pop's other solo music and his dabbling into acting? What about his lifestyle transformation from drug addiction to clean living? No, the film buried the real story: Iggy Pop. It was a poor choice and I wonder why they did it? Why not more about Iggy? Was he trying to "Share the credits evenly?"

Why not interview some of the musicians Iggy and The Stooges influenced like Henry Rollins, Billy Joe Armstrong, among others? I would love hear what Neil Young thought of the Stooges, or Kim Gordon from Sonic Youth. Why not interview the family or others around the scene. Why not quote Bowie who produced some Iggy Pop music after the Stooges? Why take out the most interesting subject of the film? That was a bad choice, and even if Iggy Pop insisted, insist harder to include more about him. Perhaps that was a condition of filming, or otherwise, Pop would have refused? If it wasn't, Jarmusch did us a disservice.

That said, they did include his early career as a drummer, the development of the band, growing up in a progressive town, Ann Arbor, and how that influenced them, their drug addiction and issues staying clean, his travels to record music from Detroit to Chicago to New York to London and finally L.A.

Iggy is far more interesting, his transformation is more interesting, than the band. Imagine a Bourne movie spending half the film talking about Nicky Parsons. She's an important character, but you would be rightfully disappointed. That's how it is with Gimme Danger. Iggy is the attraction.

Rating: Matinée, accrued score. First half: Pay full price, see it twice. Second Half: Rent it.

The first half had me laughing and intrigued, the second half of the film was a big let down.

Peace, Tex Shelters

A friend of my recommended this documentary to me. Just randomly heard about it and was enough of a Jim Jarmusch fan to want to try it out, and he loved it, despite not being a fan of the Stooges, or having it change his mind about their music. As much as it was an in-depth look on Iggy Pop and the Stooges, it's just as much an in-depth look on Rock and Roll, and every Rock and Roll Documentary should be.

I gave it a shoot, as I am a fan of the Stooges and what they have done. After all, I'm sure a lot of the music I listen to they directly or indirectly are responsible for.

Going into the movie, I was expecting somewhat an adaption of the book Please Kill Me, which was an in-depth look at protopunk, which I herd the Stooges be described as before, plus they take up a big chuck of the book, but that's not what this doc is at all. It was so focus on the Stooges that it rarely expanded outside of the band members and those really close to them.

As the only original surviving member at the time of this release, Iggy does a lot of the talking, but not in an egotistical way. He seemed very genuine in his stories about The Stooges and their history. Not that the other Stooges did not get to chime as it looks like Jarmusch had been working on this for a while with the drummer of the Stooges also able to tell his stories before his death.

It is all about rock and roll and all about the music. I can see why Jarmusch selected and loves this band as they seem uncompromising to their love of the music. It's a great message on sticking with it. It also a great message about how it never dies within you, as the doc tells the story of the Stooges second guitarist James Williamson, who rolled with the band and Iggy until they dissolved got himself a pretty square life, but when Iggy calls to say come Jam with the band like 40 years later, he did just that.

Not Just for those people who love the Stooges, it's for those who love a really good rock and roll story. This is one!

"Gimme Danger" (2016 release; 108 min.) is a documentary about the Stooges. As the movie opens, we are in 1973, with the band in a free fall and ready to call it a day, as we get Iggy, Steve MacKay, and other to comment about how bad it was. Pop, then 24 years old, moved back in with his parents in their trailer, After the movie's opening credits, we then go back in time, and we see the humble Ann Arbor roots of these guys, and the even humbler beginnings of the Iguanas and later the Stooges.

Couple of comments: this is the latest movie directed by indie film maker Jim Jarmusch. Here he brings the story of the Stooges, as told to us by the band members themselves, although let's be clear: Iggy gets most of the screen time. Turns out Iggy is quite funny and self-depreciating, certainly as to the early years, when he switch from drums ("I got tired of looking at butts", ha!) to singer and front man. It is quite amazing how the Stooges' sound evolved from the early avant-garde sound (Iggy: "it was like an airplane taking off") to the punk sound of the latter days (the "Raw Power" album). The footage is okay but there is surprisingly not much high quality concert footage (one of the better clips is the classic from their 1970 set at the Cincinnati Pop Festival where Iggy smears peanut butter all over himself while he is crowd-surfing). The lack of high quality footage is more than compensated by the gazillion pictures, which frankly suit the legacy of the Stooges better than the archival footage. The documentary thankfully spends little to no time explaining the 3 decades between the 1973 demise and the 2003 "reunification" (as Iggy terms it, "it's NOT a reunion"), and even the years since 2003 are dealt with in 10-15 minutes. The documentary smartly focused on the key years in the late 60s and early 70s, and that is what makes it so enjoyable to watch. No major revelations, just a solid look at the Stooges. As of course Iggy has the documentary's last words: "I don't wanna be metal, I don't wanna be alternative, I don't want to be punk. I just wanna be".

"Gimme Danger" premiered at the Cannes film festival earlier this years, and finally opened at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati this weekend. I couldn't wait to see it. The Friday early evening screening where I saw this at was not attended well (2 other guys besides myself), but I know this: all three of us laughed a lot and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, Hopefully "Gimme Danger" can find a wider audience via Amazon Instant Video and eventually on DVD/Blu-ray. If you are a fan of music and music history, you don't want to miss this. "Gimme Danger" is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

GIMME DANGER is worthwhile and interesting look at those perennial underdogs of rock music, The Stooges. Long time fans of the band should be mostly satisfied with this documentary about their rise, fall and brief rebirth in the 21st century to a far more appreciative response.

The Stooges primal proto-punk was certainly before its time in 1969 and really wouldn't be embraced more fully until several decades later. The simplicity of their musical ideas may have evolved from their limitations rather than some grand design. The dark and confrontational sound they created together utilized into those basic elements that can make rock music so compelling. Jim Osterberg's transformation into the iconic Iggy Pop gave The Stooges an absolutely perfect front man. While the Stooges rhythm section hardly moved on stage, Iggy's spontaneous, lanky, almost awkward physicality gave their live performances a sense of danger and unpredictability that made their shows so captivating.

Overall, this is an enjoyable enough film, but it does possess some notable shortcomings. One of my main criticisms is that there isn't quite enough focus on the music. There is ample time spent on the songs for The Stooges 1969 debut album, but the songs on FUN HOUSE are discussed only briefly. Even less is said about their landmark RAW POWER album, although though there is some discussion and audio from the early sessions at Olympic Studio. Besides "Search And Destroy", any meaningful discussion about the album or its release are virtually absent here! Instead, the story quickly moves on to the demise of The Stooges and release of Iggy & James KILL CITY project. Although the movie time is approximately 1 hour and 46 minutes, another 15 minutes of musical discussion would have been well worth the time spent.

Early live performance footage of the band was either in short supply or the producers just didn't have the budget for the rights. For whatever reason, many clips are repeated throughout the movie, mainly the classic Cincinnati Pop Festival footage showing Iggy wandering off into the audience, smearing peanut butter on himself while being hold aloft by an adoring (or fearful) crowd. More vintage footage would have made this documentary a bit more compelling.

Given that this movie is focused on the The Stooges (or Iggy & The Stooges), Iggy Pop's solo career is mentioned pretty sparingly. I respect the reasons for this decision, but it would been interesting to spend a little time talking about Iggy & David in Berlin or even just some highlights. But given how little time in the spotlight the Asheton brothers, Dave Alexander and James Williamson have enjoyed, it is admirable that Iggy's celebrity isn't allowed to completely overshadow their contributions.

It was also a good decision to limit the interview sections to the band and a few insiders. Many rock documentaries are overfilled with a parade of contemporaries, critics and talking heads whom usually only add limited insight and too much hyperbole. Danny Fields slightly overstates the importance of The Stooges during his interview clips, but this is forgivable given that he was the person that basically discovered them. The newer interview sessions with Iggy back home in his parents trailer and James Williamson holding his Gibson Les Paul Custom Pro Black Beauty are each quite interesting and enjoyable.

All in all, i would rate GIMME DANGER 7.5 and would recommend to anyone who wants to learn about the band. I applaud the spirit and well meaning intent of Jarmusch, but wish he'd not moved so quickly through certain eras. It's a very nicely done film, but also a missed opportunity in some ways.

Having read (re-read actually) 'Please Kill Me", and having read a lot about Iggy Pop and the Stooges over the years, I didn't expect I'd maybe learn too much about them from this doc. Little did I know not only I would, but that I would be laughing much of the way (the story where Ron Asheton asks Moe Howard's permission to use the name 'Stoooges' kills, but not as much as Iggy's dead serious response when he is told he *willl* play Peter Pan on Broadway by David Bowie's seemingly scummy manager).

It's also at times dark, at times harrowing, and the most welcome thing to me is how Jarmusch starts with the Stooges at their (first) end in 1973, when they were broke, Iggy was missing gigs and often showing up so wasted on heroin he could "sometimes sing, sometimes not", and it changes up how we usually see these kind of rock documentaries. It often will start with the adulatory remarks. Here, Iggy Pop in the 1973 footage looks like he's about ready to puke all over himself... while stage diving... while probably slathering himself with some substance of unknown origin... maybe genitals out too, who knows(!)

This was an entirely fearless band, and they created art simply by virtue of only doing what *they* liked. F*** popular taste. Hell, if one follows Pop by his word (and how can you not?) there were many, many manufactured acts (Including CSNY? please not them) and that if nothing else the Stooges acted as a counterpoint to so much of what was going on in the late 60's and early 70's while being one of the hardest bands of the era. Jarmusch does an excellent job of showing us through Pop, the late Scott Asheton and other interviews, plus plenty of stock footage and, not unlike Julien Temple with Filth & the Fury, clips from old shows, movies and other rock acts (Soupy Sayles being one of them of course) that make joke of what we're seeing, or at least reference.

Even as someone who thought he knew the Stooges, or at least Iggy Pop (real name Jim Osterberg), this gives as full a picture as you can get while, at the very end, showing us just how massive an influence they had. Think about it: they couldn't play (at first anyway, they got better as they went), and yet they changed things simply by the force of what rock and roll could do and has done when it's at its most pure. The film reflects the aggression, the commitment to absurdity, and Pop's own madness in performance, which was an act depending on the night (or it was all of a piece).

FUN! And I never thought I'd see (or think about) the day when a Jim Jarmusch movie had animated sequences. Bonus!