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"Troubadours" Premiere - 2011 Sundance Film Festival Photos
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NEWS/PRESS
-Hollywood Reporter, FEBRUARY 6, 2011
'Face to Face,' 'Troubadours' Among Santa Barbara Int'l Film Fest Award Winners
By Gregg Kilday
Michael Rymer's Face to Face, an Australian film about an angry young man, was awarded the Panavision Spirit Award for Independent Cinema at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, which concluded Sunday.
The prize for best international film went to Nathan Collett's Togetherness Supreme, a movie from Kenya, while the Swedish film Pure, by Alicia Vikander, earned a special jury mention.
The Nueva Vision Award for best Spanish/American film was presented to Patricio Guzman's Nostalgia for the Light (Nostalgia De La Luc), from Chile.
The Best East Meets West Cinema Award went to Yoshihiro Fukagawa's Patisserie (Colin de Rue), from Japan. And the Best Eastern Bloc Award went to the Romanian film If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle (Eu Cand Vreau Sa Fluier, Fluier), directed by Florin Serban.
Nostaliga was one of two films that were recognized with the Fund for Santa Barbara Social Justice Award. The other was Matt Hames' When I Rise.
Phil Grabsky's The Boy Mir: Ten Years in Afghanistan won the prize for best documentary film. The doc follows the coming of age of a boy in Afghanistan as he ages from 8 to 18.
Short film prizes were handed to Brent Bonacorso's West of the Moon and Andrew Ruhemann and Shaun Tan's The Lost Thing.
The SB Independent Audience Choice Award was given to Morgan Neville's Troubadours, which looks at the Los Angeles music scene from the late '60s to the early '70s.
-KPCC Film Week rave, FEBRUARY 4, 2011
Sanctum, The Other Woman, Waiting for Forever, Troubadours & more
-Los Angeles Times, FEBRUARY 4, 2011
Movie review: 'Troubadours'
By Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times Film Critic
Watching the warmly nostalgic "Troubadours" is like going to a reunion of old friends. You're so happy to see them again that you are willing to forgive whatever lapses and flaws there are in the experience.
The old friends in "Troubadours" are the singer-songwriters who flourished roughly between 1968 and 1975, people like Joni Mitchell, Kris Kristofferson and Bonnie Raitt. It was a time when, says Carole King, "there was a hunger for the intimacy, the personal thing we all did," a moment when, says James Taylor, "the authenticity of telling your own story" mattered a great deal.
-New York Times, FEBRUARY 1, 2011
Recalling the Reign of Taylor and King
By STEPHEN HOLDEN
Once upon a time in Lotus Land, the Troubadour, a 300-seat nightclub in West Hollywood, Calif., became the center of the singer-songwriter movement that dominated American pop during much of the 1970s. Created by Doug Weston, a wild-haired eccentric whose favorite attire was a green corduroy suit that earned him the nickname Jolly Green Giant, the club is fondly remembered in Morgan Neville’s documentary “Troubadours” as the place that kick-started a musical genre. Mr. Weston died in 1999, but the Troubadour still flourishes.
-The Salt Lake Tribune, JANUARY 28, 2011
Next stop for "Troubadours" filmmaker: Pearl Jam doc with Cameron Crowe
By David Burger
Morgan Neville's next film project is producing a Cameron Crowe-directed documentary about the rock band Pearl Jam and its 20-year anniversary.
"They were part of a rock scene," Neville said. "Their concern was for songwriting, and that music matters. That it is a religion."
The same sentiments apply to the musicians profiled in Neville's documentary "Troubadours," which will receive its final Sundance screening today in the U.S. Documentary Competition.
-The Envelope, JANUARY 28, 2011
Laurel Canyon's 'Troubadours'
By Amy Kaufman, Los Angeles Times
Carole King and James Taylor are the focus of a new documentary that looks at their role in the singer-songwriter movement and the Troubadour club, where they got their start in the 1970s.
-Variety, JANUARY 26, 2011
'Troubadours'
By Dennis Harvey
A Concord Music Group presentation of a Tremolo production. Produced by Eddie Schmidt. Executive producers, Sam Feldman, Michael Gorfaine, Lorna Guess, Robert Smith. Directed by Morgan Neville.
With: Carole King, James Taylor, Lou Adler, Peter Asher, Jackson Browne, Cheech & Chong, Robert Christgau, David Crosby, Robert Hilburn, Elton John, Danny Kortchmar, Kris Kristofferson, Russ Kunkel, Steve Martin, Roger McGuinn, Bonnie Raitt, JD Souther , Cynthia Weil.
An infectiously fond look at a mellow moment in rock history, "Troubadours" celebrates the 1970s singer-songwriter craze via portraits of leading lights James Taylor and Carole King, as well as the Los Angeles venue that became this genre's star launching pad. Morgan Neville's feature casts its thoughtful net beyond merely hooking boomer nostalgists during PBS pledge weeks -- though indeed the pic is skedded to debut on the pubcaster's "American Masters" (in a slightly shortened version) simultaneous with its U.S. DVD release. Limited theatrical runs in a handful of major cities commence Feb. 2.
Five Hot Sundance Music Documentaries
By Kevin O'Donnell
Film buffs and industry veterans flock to the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, each year to get a glimpse of the next Quentin Tarantino or Steven Soderbergh. But this year's festival, which runs from January 20-30, also features a group of buzzy music documentaries. Below, check out SPIN's picks for the hottest new rock docs, from Adam Yauch's balls-out Hollywood party to director Morgan Neville's history of the '70s songwriter scene in L.A.
Sundance review: 'Troubadours' takes James Taylor and Carole King back in time
Fest programming includes buzzworthy music films
By Drew McWeeny
My entire life, I've grown up positively soaked in the pop culture of the 1960s. After all, when I was born, the decade was just coming to a close, and the pop culture was still fresh. By the time I was in high school, the music was showing up on oldies stations, but because so many of the people making films and television shows were children of the '60s, it was still omnipresent. I'm so familiar with the music of the era that even the stuff I've never actually sought out is still wedged firmly in my consciousness simply because it was ubiquitous.
This year, we're officially a half-century out from 1960, and yet we continue to mine this decade, and it's fair to start asking if there's anything left to say. The new documentary "Troubadours," one of this year's Sundance premieres, looks at the music scene that evolved around the Troubadour in Los Angeles, and in particular, at the work of Carole King and James Taylor, who re-united in 2007 at the club for a series of shows. These two are front and center in the film, and the interviews with them form the spine that the rest of the movie hangs on, but by focusing on the Troubadour, it allows filmmaker Morgan Neville room to look at the folk movement, the rise of the singer/songwriter, Steve Martin, "hoot nights," Troubadour founder Doug Weston, and many more subjects, and the film manages to feel energetic and fresh no matter how well some of this ground has been covered before.
For example, I had no idea freight trains used to run down the middle of Santa Monica Blvd. and Beverly Hills, and that one little digression is an example of how rich and diverse the story is, even if it does keep coming back to the music. Elton John, Jackson Browne, Joni Mitchell, David Crosby, Kris Kristofferson, and others show up for interviews, as well as many faces that are less famous but just as significant to the way the "California Music" scene developed. Anyone looking for any dirt on these people or that period will likely be disappointed, as "Troubadours" is obviously a film born of great affection.
What's really great about the film is visiting the recording spaces and the performance spaces where these indelible music memories were created, and seeing the way the community grew and evolved and expanded. So much of this music has become a permanent part of the fabric of modern life that it's interesting to see where and how it began. Watching many of the people who were session players on some of the most remarkable records of the era prepare for a Troubadour Reunion Tour that took place this year is one of the highlights of the film, just listening to the awesome sound of the LA Studio Mafia, as they were informally known. They're gorgeous players, and even if they're not superstars, they are every bit as gifted as the bigger names featured in the film.
I didn't realize that Elton John was essentially unknown in the US before he played the Troubadour in Los Angeles, and they tell a great story about his engagement there and how it changed his world, and I love hearing Steve Martin talk about the experience just because it seems such an unlikely collision of talent. It's also an amazing example of how things worked in an age where media wasn't as all-encompassing as it is now, and when things could still sneak in and explode thanks to one performance at the right time in the right place. Reviews mattered. Word of mouth mattered. These pop culture explosions were organic, unpredictable, and undeniable, and even if Linda Ronstadt isn't a giant star right now, she was at that moment, and being reminded of how much she helped break other performers by performing their songs is significant. There's also a section that talks about how the critics may have been significant at the time, like the infamous Lester Bangs piece about killing James Taylor with a broken bottle, but how that significance faded while the music didn't. It's a solid point, and a reminder that over time, the work is really all that matters. If it matters to people, it will endure, and if it doesn't, it won't, and no criticism in the world will ever change that.
Cheech and Chong talk about the scene, about the way the bar would be packed every night with stars that range from John Lennon to Betty White, and how bands would be formed there at the bar as musicians would meet and hang out. I also dig the section where they talk about the birth of Eagles (Steve Martin tells a great story about being corrected when he referred to them as "The Eagles"), and I'm surprised how funny a lot of the film is. They get into the idea that Eagles were considered by many to be the death of a scene that they supposedly embodied. They're just great stories, and well-told here. Neville is a guy who has been making documentaries about music and musicians for many years, and he displays some real sensitivity here in terms of the interviews and his choices as an editor. I never realized that the Roxy was opened specifically to destroy the Troubadour, and when you look at the club scene in LA today for music, I'd argue no one really won that fight in the long run.
I doubt "Troubadours" will change anyone's mind about the value of this music and the era, but for fans and for people who are curious about the way this scene evolved, it's a really satisfying, enjoyable sit, and there are worse ways to spend 91 minutes listening to James Taylor and Carole King perform. If you're at Sundance this week, this is worth your time, and I'm sure those of you not at Sundance will have a chance to see it in the very near future.
-MFW, JANUARY 17, 2011
Podcast #18: Troubadours
By Andy Markowitz
Morgan Neville has covered a lot of ground in his music doc career, from Nat King Cole to Hank Williams to the Brill Building to Memphis soul. But never has he – or many other nonfiction filmmakers, for that matter – made such a neck-snapping swerve in subject matter between projects as with his latest work. After documenting the making of Iggy and the Stooges' snarling 1973 album Raw Power, one of the holy relics of punk, in Search and Destroy (about which we podcasted last spring), Neville turns to the introspective, strummy Southern California sound of early '70s with Troubadours, which recounts the singer-songwriter scene around LA's famed Troubadour club, launching pad for James Taylor, Carole King, Jackson Browne, the Eagles, Joni Mitchell, and many more.
Shortly before taking Troubadours to the Sundance Film Festival, where it's entered in the US Documentary Competition, Morgan Neville joined See It Loud to talk about the film and the scene it chronicles – a cultural "interregnum," as he terms it, between the tumultuous '60s and the fractious late '70s that left a rich but much-maligned musical legacy.
-VARIETY, JANUARY 6, 2011
DOCS, GIGS PUMP UP SUNDANCE
Fest programming includes buzzworthy music films
By Steffie Nelson
Maybe it's the boundary-pushing programming. Maybe it's the red carpet-defying dress code. Whatever the reason, the Sundance Film Festival seems to rock a little harder than most, consistently introducing audiences to the year's most buzzworthy music films -- whose afterparties often become full-blown concerts.
Last year's festival saw the premieres of Floria Sigismondi's all-girl rock band biopic, "The Runaways," with a performance by Joan Jett, plus Sam Taylor Woods' John Lennon pic, "Nowhere Boy," while Sundance 2009 featured two high-profile rock docs: Tom DiCillo's Doors pic, "When You're Strange," and Davis Guggenheim's guitar hero riff-fest, "It Might Get Loud."
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Sundance 2011 is shaping up to be just as eclectic and electric, with a generous selection of documentaries and narrative features in which music plays a central role, plus a few appearances by well-known indie rockers moonlighting as composers and a handful of projects that don't fall into any traditional category at all.
Documentary filmmaker Morgan Neville's "Troubadours" takes us back to the legendary '60s and '70s singer/songwriter scene in Los Angeles, focusing on Doug Weston's Troubadour nightclub and the friendship between James Taylor and Carole King, who toured together in 2010. The film offers first-person accounts from, and music by, many who were there, including David Crosby, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Kris Kristofferson and the famously private King, who told her story at A&M Studios, seated at the very piano where "Tapestry" was recorded. King is confirmed to play in Park City.
For Neville, the selection of this film for documentary competition is especially gratifying, as Sundance doc selections tend toward the "edgy." "It's nice to know that there's space for something warm and soulful, too," he says.
Actor Michael Rapaport, who makes his directorial debut with "Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest," finds this year's festival bringing his career full circle. "The first time I ever saw myself in a movie was at Sundance in 1992 at the premiere screening of 'Zebrahead,'?" he recalls. "To be coming back 19 years later directing a documentary that I'm so passionate about is overwhelmingly exciting."
What Rapaport expected would be a celebratory film about the group's history and its sold-out 2008 reunion tour turned into something more probing as the members struggled with interpersonal hurts and disappointments, often while the camera was running. "Those were some of the most exhilarating moments as a filmmaker," he says.
At the same time, "Beats, Rhymes & Life" boasts a stellar cast of characters, from Adam Horovitz to Kanye West to Pharrell Williams, all paying homage to these pioneers. "If you grew up as a first generation hip-hop fan," says Rapaport, "A Tribe Called Quest is our Beatles, our Rolling Stones."
Classic rock plays a key role in the Salt Lake City Gala Film premiere selection "The Music Never Stopped," which takes its title from a Grateful Dead song. Director Jim Kohlberg tells the story of a man who uses '60s music to communicate with his brain-damaged son, and in fact, the Lou Taylor Pucci starrer is so reliant on the canon that Kohlberg figured it would simply never happen. He remembers contacting music supervisor Sue Jacobs and saying, "We have to get Dylan and the Dead first and we'll never do it but it's worth a shot in the dark." But, he adds, "To my surprise and delight Dylan and the Dead came on very quickly."
Kohlberg believes the artists responded to the film's portrayal of music as socially and psychologically beneficial. "Even if you're not a musician you respond to it emotionally because of the characters."
Although "The Music Never Stopped" re-creates a Grateful Dead show from the '80s with a math teacher from Brooklyn standing in quite convincingly for Jerry Garcia, Park City Dead Heads should be on the lookout for the real Bob Weir, who is slated to do an acoustic set.
Indie-leaning audiences will want to keep an ear out for Richard Ayoade's "Submarine," which features new songs by Arctic Monkeys frontman Alex Turner, and "Sound of My Voice," the feature debut from Zal Batmanglij, whose last name will no doubt be familiar to fans of Vampire Weekend. The director's brother Rostam plays keyboards and guitar for that band, and in between tours he laid down tracks for the film, which is about a cult in the San Fernando Valley.
Although the seed of Batmanglij's inspiration came from his visits to the culty L.A. yoga studio Golden Bridge, the score is more "Terminator" than tamboura. "I love those '80s synths and that sense of impending doom, that sense of lonely Los Angeles," he says.
Miranda July, who knows a thing or two about lonely Los Angeles, recruited composer Jon Brion ("Magnolia," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind") to write the music for her latest, "The Future." Premiering out of competition, the film follows a 30-something couple thrown into crisis, who encounter a talking cat and a living T-shirt on their strange trip.
The shorts category has several sonic standouts as well, including the rock musical horror movie "The Legend of Beaver Dam," by Montreal musical theater duo Jerome Sable and Eli Batalion, with songs inspired by Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. As for Beastie Boy Adam Yauch's longform musicvideo "Fight for Your Right Revisited," it's hard to know what's more of a calling card: the fact that the film is in advance of a new album; a cast that includes Jack Black, John C. Reilly, Seth Rogen and Elijah Wood; or the rumors of a private Beastie Boys show.
Contact the variety newsroom at news@variety.com
Documentary filmmaker Morgan Neville's "Troubadours" takes us back to the legendary '60s and '70s singer/songwriter scene in Los Angeles, focusing on Doug Weston's Troubadour nightclub and the friendship between James Taylor and Carole King, who toured together in 2010. The film offers first-person accounts from, and music by, many who were there, including David Crosby, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Kris Kristofferson and the famously private King, who told her story at A&M Studios, seated at the very piano where "Tapestry" was recorded. King is confirmed to play in Park City.
For Neville, the selection of this film for documentary competition is especially gratifying, as Sundance doc selections tend toward the "edgy." "It's nice to know that there's space for something warm and soulful, too," he says.
Actor Michael Rapaport, who makes his directorial debut with "Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest," finds this year's festival bringing his career full circle. "The first time I ever saw myself in a movie was at Sundance in 1992 at the premiere screening of 'Zebrahead,'?" he recalls. "To be coming back 19 years later directing a documentary that I'm so passionate about is overwhelmingly exciting."
What Rapaport expected would be a celebratory film about the group's history and its sold-out 2008 reunion tour turned into something more probing as the members struggled with interpersonal hurts and disappointments, often while the camera was running. "Those were some of the most exhilarating moments as a filmmaker," he says.
At the same time, "Beats, Rhymes & Life" boasts a stellar cast of characters, from Adam Horovitz to Kanye West to Pharrell Williams, all paying homage to these pioneers. "If you grew up as a first generation hip-hop fan," says Rapaport, "A Tribe Called Quest is our Beatles, our Rolling Stones."
Classic rock plays a key role in the Salt Lake City Gala Film premiere selection "The Music Never Stopped," which takes its title from a Grateful Dead song. Director Jim Kohlberg tells the story of a man who uses '60s music to communicate with his brain-damaged son, and in fact, the Lou Taylor Pucci starrer is so reliant on the canon that Kohlberg figured it would simply never happen. He remembers contacting music supervisor Sue Jacobs and saying, "We have to get Dylan and the Dead first and we'll never do it but it's worth a shot in the dark." But, he adds, "To my surprise and delight Dylan and the Dead came on very quickly."
Kohlberg believes the artists responded to the film's portrayal of music as socially and psychologically beneficial. "Even if you're not a musician you respond to it emotionally because of the characters."
Although "The Music Never Stopped" re-creates a Grateful Dead show from the '80s with a math teacher from Brooklyn standing in quite convincingly for Jerry Garcia, Park City Dead Heads should be on the lookout for the real Bob Weir, who is slated to do an acoustic set.
Indie-leaning audiences will want to keep an ear out for Richard Ayoade's "Submarine," which features new songs by Arctic Monkeys frontman Alex Turner, and "Sound of My Voice," the feature debut from Zal Batmanglij, whose last name will no doubt be familiar to fans of Vampire Weekend. The director's brother Rostam plays keyboards and guitar for that band, and in between tours he laid down tracks for the film, which is about a cult in the San Fernando Valley.
Although the seed of Batmanglij's inspiration came from his visits to the culty L.A. yoga studio Golden Bridge, the score is more "Terminator" than tamboura. "I love those '80s synths and that sense of impending doom, that sense of lonely Los Angeles," he says.
Miranda July, who knows a thing or two about lonely Los Angeles, recruited composer Jon Brion ("Magnolia," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind") to write the music for her latest, "The Future." Premiering out of competition, the film follows a 30-something couple thrown into crisis, who encounter a talking cat and a living T-shirt on their strange trip.
The shorts category has several sonic standouts as well, including the rock musical horror movie "The Legend of Beaver Dam," by Montreal musical theater duo Jerome Sable and Eli Batalion, with songs inspired by Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. As for Beastie Boy Adam Yauch's longform musicvideo "Fight for Your Right Revisited," it's hard to know what's more of a calling card: the fact that the film is in advance of a new album; a cast that includes Jack Black, John C. Reilly, Seth Rogen and Elijah Wood; or the rumors of a private Beastie Boys show.
Contact the variety newsroom at news@variety.com
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