I join “CTV News Toronto at Five” with guest anchor Zuraidah Alman to talk about new movies in theatres including he thriller “Relay,” the neo-noir “Honey Don’t” and the rock doc “DEVO” on Netflix.
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 15:59)
Deb Hutton is off, so I sit in with host Jim Richards on NewsTalk 1010 to go over some of the week’s biggest entertainment stories and let you know what’s happening in theatres. We talk about Kewrmit the Frog making his Broadway debut, why Willem DaFoe doesn’t talk politics and I review the Netflix rock doc “DEVO.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I joined CTV NewsChannel anchor Roger Peterson to have a look at new movies coming to theatres, including the thriller “Relay,” the neo-noir “Honey Don’t” and the rock doc “DEVO” on Netflix.
Watch the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: There’s a lot more to DEVO than the herky-jerky funk of their biggest hit “Whip It.” A new documentary, now streaming on Netflix, offers a complete, and completely entertaining, look of a band who, as keyboardist Mark Mothersbaugh says, “did some absurd things.”
CAST: Gerald Casale, Mark Mothersbaugh, Bob Mothersbaugh, Bob Casale, Josh Freese. Directed by Chris Smith.
REVIEW: My teenage brain wouldn’t have allowed the thought that DEVO, the art rock band from Akron, Ohio who occupied my teen ears for years, would still be a going concern in 2025. Their music was so of-the-moment it felt destined to become dated as pop culture trends shifted and even their name, a shortening of de-evolution, suggested they would disappear over time.
And yet, half a century after they first chanted, “Are we not men? We are Devo!” on stage, they are having a bit of a renaissance, complete with the “Cosmic De-Evolution Tour” and “DEVO,” a new documentary, now streaming on Netflix, that details their unlikely rise to fame.
Like most music docs “DEVO” utilizes new and archival talking head interviews with the band and their contemporaries to shape the story, but the real magic comes with director Chris Smith’s vivid wallpapering of the film with a collage of educational films, ads, old black & white movies, cartoons and television shows to create a sense of time and place.
From the eerie “Island of Lost Souls”—which provided their famous “Are we not men?” refrain—and the religious pamphlet “Jocko Homo Heavenbound” to David Bowie concert footage and industrial films, the surreal images contextualize the influences that created the band’s ethos.
Born as an art rock experiment, the early satirical work of DEVO’s founding members, Gerald Casale and Bob Lewis, quickly became serious following the Kent State massacre of May 4, 1970. Their embrace of “de-evolution” as a metaphor for societal decline became central to their subversive cultural commentary and aesthetics. Their lyrics, like 1979’s “Smart Patrol/Mr. DNA”—”He’s just a clone / Of a chromosome / He’s our Mr. DNA / He’s a mutant on the loose / He’s the living proof / We’re not what we used to be”—spoke to what they saw as social regression.
Add to that their matching jumpsuits, strange “energy dome” hats and sunglasses and the comment on corporate conformity and societal homogenization was complete.
Using the hallucinogenic visuals and new firsthand interviews with band member Mark Mothersbaugh, Bob Mothersbaugh, and Gerald Casale, Smith creates a portrait of a committed, uncompromising band who rode a wave of success in the kind of corporate medium they were satirizing.
Sure, “DEVO” has a good beat, and you can dance to some of it, but, as the film reveals, underneath the band’s crazy costumes and off-kilter music, are keenly observed positions on consumerism, alienation, conformity and regression.
The songs may be nostalgic for those of us who grew up hearing them on the radio, but their philosophies haven’t aged a day. “This is not how we wanted to be right at all,” says Gerald Casale. “We sure wish we had been wrong.”
“DEVO” is a fascinating look into the machinations of a misunderstood band who maintained their Dadaesque integrity for half a century, treating every phase of their career as an art project.
