DIFF begins down the final stretch, and it just gets better every day.

“I’m not qualified to do anything else.”

Greg Olliver and Wes Orshoski’s documentary on Motorhead front man Ian “Lemmy” Kilmister is not so much a fully-realized personal history or detailed portrait as much as an intense love fest.  Lemmy takes a tour of the heavy metal driving force’s more mundane routines – shopping, doing interviews, playing his favorite games at local bars and casinos – before diving into a brief look at former bands he played with and current concert footage.  But most of its runtime is filled with musicians, singers, actors, roadies and fans telling us how great he is and what an influence he’s been.  At 63, Lemmy has outlived most of his friends and continues to provide a raw honesty that blows away nearly everyone else in the business.

Continue reading “Dallas IFF: Wednesday (4/14) – ‘Lemmy’”

Director Tamra Davis’ early works may have included music videos and films like Billy Madison and Half-Baked, but it turns out her passion project was always nearby, tucked away in a drawer:  a feature-length interview with her friend, artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.  Just months before his death, Davis filmed the painter in a casual setting, talking with him about his life, influences and his perceptions of the art world.  After his passing, she put the film away and forgot about it.  20 years later, we have Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child, a documentary that incorporates that earlier footage of the soft-spoken iconoclast with new and archival interviews with the people that surrounded Basquiat from as far back as his beginnings as a homeless graffiti artist.

Continue reading “Dallas IFF: Tuesday (4/13) – ‘Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child’”