| Highlights
: |
The live
concert footage - ohyeah baby. Bob Geldof and the dueling cab ride story.
Waters gleefully saying 'I fucking hate Pink Floyd.' |
| Dubious
Highlight : |
The Floyd
finally speak about firing Rick Wright. None of them can hide the lingering
emotional scars: Mason looks sympathetic; Gilmour looks troubled; Wright
looks nervous; and Waters looks dismissive...at first. Watch his hands,
though. If he winds that ring around his finger any faster it'll go spinning
across the room. |
| Lowlights
: |
'Who are
these people and why won't they shut up?' Pooey on Mary Anne Hobbs and Robert
Sandall. I wanted to hear Andy Bown or Gary Yudman, not someone whose closest
brush with the band was probably touching the free Division Bell tickets
they gave away to their radio listeners. |
| Nightmare
Fodder : |
Waters' imitation
of the stage-crawling fan. If the music thing ever goes bust for him, our
Rog has a ready-made career playing the Creature from the Black Lagoon.
|
| Wrinkle
Factor : |
eeeEEEeeeeeEEEEeEEeEeEEEeEEEeeeEeeeeeeK.....!!!!!
The years between this show and the '94 doc have not been kind. |
| Band
Distinctions : |
| Roger
Waters - |
He's
in top form here; alternately the Floyd's bossy oldest child, then
a big goofy spaz. Most revealing comment: from behind The Wall, he
defies the audience to 'shout through this, you bastards! You can't
hurt us now.' Hm. I never knew getting paid to do what you love for
a living caused physical pain... *remembers creepy afr-w posts * Ah.
Um. Okay, point taken. |
| David
Gilmour - |
He's
unusually tense, hinting at The Wall's lasting emotional strife (I
get the same vibe from all the band, actually, in varying degrees).
Unfortunately the angst is reflected in the purgatorial interview
lighting. Yikes. Kudos to him for committing the doc's first f-word,
though. |
| Nick
Mason - |
In
every single Omnibus, Mason looks like Winnie-the-Pooh just up from
hibernation. He's even more lethargic in this one though, looking
bored to tears at telling the same old stories but politely trying
not to show it. Try a little harder next time, Nicky. |
| Rick
Wright - |
Wow.
Wright always looks nervous in interviews, but this one takes the
cake. He's so tense here you could bounce quarters off him. Still,
it must have taken some amount of guts to talk about this painful
personal stuff in front of millions of strangers, so he gets the gold
star for that. |
|
| Live
Wall Footage : |
Oh my my. Gorgeous isn't
the word. After the migraine-y Nassau and Earl's Court voios, these clips
are like a warm bath after a hard day. Some highlights:
'In the Flesh?'
- Even up close, those life masks were really good. Great synch between
Waters and Andy Bown on the vocals, too.
'The Happiest Days of Our Lives' - On the voios it's hard to get
a feeling of the full scale of the inflatable puppets, but here - well-lit
and shot from all angles - they're absolutely huge. The Teacher puppet
is actually freakin' scary.
'Young Lust' - Gilmour and Waters share a microphone, swapping
spit in perfect crystal-clarity. Waters gawps at the camera, then starts
a political debate with an ant crossing the stage floor while Gilmour
sings the verse.
'Hey You' - Another good glimpse of the show's massive scale. We
get a band's-eye view of the start of the second act - namely, a big fat
eyeful of Wall - and it is indeed one huge mammajamma.
'Comfortably Numb' - Much clearer than the bootlegs...I wish they'd
included a wide shot though. The only bonus: Waters' abrupt 'fuck this,
I'm going for a pint' departure from stage just as Gilmour sings 'you
are receding...'
'The Trial' - The Wall's collapse in the voios is pretty anticlimactic,
but here, it's filmed at stage-and-audience-level. Yikes. No wonder the
musicians were shitting themselves while the bricks thundered all around
their tender little heads.
'Outside the Wall' - Love that barbershop quartet. Go woo-woo boys!
|
| Lasting
Impression : |
Loved it.
I really wish Waters would release the rest of the live stuff, though. I'd
buy a 'Wall Concert' dvd in a nanosecond. Especially if there were goodies,
like a multi-angle function and a commentary...(are you listening, Mark
Fenwick?) So Roger, if you're out there, please let go of your end of the
bone and release the tapes. Please? We'll be your friend if you do. All
the cool kids are doing it. Pretty pretty please with sugar and jam. |
| Grade
: |
A |