Awesome: I Fuckin’ Shot That | Review

Beastie Boys’ bootleg supreme is a must – for fans only.

Take a legendary, platinum-record selling hip-hop act with a grass roots connection, take the Mecca center all of venues in Madison Square Garden and add a sellout crowd displaying all of their affection and appreciation for the sounds, the lyrics and the rhythms of a trio called the Beastie Boys and we have on paper what sounds like the most genial experiment in concert-to-film documentation in history. That might be the case for the play of THINKFilm’s logo, the beginning scroll credits, the gorgeous skyscraper shot of NYC and then perhaps the first couple of songs in the line-up, but the novelty behind Awesome I Fuckin Shot That! quickly dwindles into kitsch making the re-experience of watching a concert seem like a fun time to be had for those who were present or at least would have liked to been present.

When the Wachowski Brothers introduced a 3 dozen or so still camera set-up with results that gave them different perspective of one angle and being able to freeze that one moment in time. Here 3 whack maestros draped in the national colors of Brazil hit the stage with 50 fans pointing various recording formats at them. Edited by Neal Usatin and directed by (pick one name) MCA (Adam Yauch) Nathanial Hornblower, this collage from Hi-8- and DV-to-HD is either an editor’s worst nightmare (tons of footage to choose from) or a documentary dream (tons of footage to choose from).

With the impeccable sound transfer moviegoers will bob their heads to the groups’ best of hits with the fun rests not in various unattractive camera angles but in some of the documentary’s rare impromptu usage of a camera – a pee break, a beer break and a behind the scenes moment in an elevator. It’s a forgettable five minutes worth of footage which only breaks the film’s monotony.

Even with the best technology, best camera angles and an amazing performance one can’t emulate the concert going experience – the vibe and the electric charge aren’t items that transfer well in a filmic sense, especially in the case where awful filmmaking skills makes up the core of the shot footage.

If there is something to appreciate here is that this is a celebration of an age where bootlegs are no longer a rarity and where technology allows everyone to record their own video diary. Certainly like the recently released Jay-Z concert film, the appeal of such a video experiment will be limited to the 15,000 plus people on hand or the legions of Beastie Boy fans from Tibet to Tim Buck, Too.

Jan.20 Sundance 2006.

Rating 1.5 stars