On the Saturday January 27, 2024 edition of the Richard Crouse Show we meet Nick Broomfield, director of the new documentary “The Stones And Brian Jones,” now playing in theatres. With candid interviews and never-before-seen footage he reveals how Brian Jones, the founder of the Rolling Stones, was left behind in the shadows of history.
Broomfield props the film up with first-hand accounts, particularly from former Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman, whose enthusiasm for the music, and Jones’s contributions to it, is infectious. The old stories are bolstered by the addition of new, fresh interviews but it is the focus on Jones as a brilliant musician and not simply another rock ‘n’ roll casualty, that elevates “The Stones and Brian Jones.” The story has its sordid moments, but Bloomfield emphasizes the very heart of Jones’s being, the music.
We’ll also meet Douglas Smith, author of “The Dream Rider Saga.” Douglas is following up the award winning first two books in the series, “The Hollow Boys” and “The Crystal Key,” with a third book to round out the successful trilogy. The new book, which is available wherever fine books are sold, is called “The Lost Expedition.” Described by Library Journal as “one of Canada’s most original writers of speculative fiction.” Smith calls the series “Indiana Jones meets Teen Titans.” All three books have been “Editor’s Picks” from BookLife, which described “The Lost Expedition” as “The explosive conclusion to this spectacular fantasy joyride.”
“The Lost Expedition” has a five out of five star rating on Good Reads and in this interview we’ll find out how Douglas came to writing as a second career, how he approached writing a trilogy, and much more.
Each week on the nationally syndicated Richard Crouse Show, Canada’s most recognized movie critic brings together some of the most interesting and opinionated people from the movies, television and music to put a fresh spin on news from the world of lifestyle and pop-culture. Tune into this show to hear in-depth interviews with actors and directors, to find out what’s going on behind the scenes of your favourite shows and movies and get a new take on current trends. Recent guests include Chris Pratt, Elvis Costello, Baz Luhrmann, Martin Freeman, David Cronenberg, Mayim Bialik, The Kids in the Hall and many more!
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The name Marianne Ihlen may not ring a bell on its own but mention Leonard Cohen in the same sentence and melancholic strains of one of the poet’s biggest hits floods the ears. She inspired two of his most famous songs, “So Long, Marianne” and “Bird on a Wire” and was the woman who “held on to me like I was a crucifix as we went kneeling through the dark.” A new documentary, “Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love,” paints a more complete picture of a person often thought of as Cohen’s muse.
Their story begins on Hydra in 1960, a place where artists could survive on little money. Ihlen, fresh off a divorce from mercurial writer Axel Jensen and raising a child on the Greek isle when she met Cohen, a down-on-his-heels poet looking for inspiration. They fell in love, did drugs and searched for inspiration. Cohen wrote feverishly, penning his novel “Beautiful Losers” there. Today the book is considered a classic but at the time it was met with derision– Robert Fulford it, “the most revolting book ever written in Canada”—and failed at bookstores.
To make money Cohen and Ihlen returned to North America to begin his career as a songwriter. Folk singer Judy Collins, who recorded his song “Suzanne” a full year before he released his own version and convinced him to sing on stage. Cohen’s sophistication and romantic balladry caught on and soon he was a star, much to Ihlen’s disdain. Feeling left behind she wrote a letter to Collins, rebuking the singer for covering Leonard’s songs and “ruining her life.”
When they parted. After seven years, Cohen was on his way to becoming a superstar, Ihlen returned to a more normal life, largely fading from public view. Using archival footage—home movies shot on Hydra, news footage and photography coupled with new interviews— director Nick Broomfield stresses the importance of Ihlen in Cohen’s life. Broomfeild himself is an Ihlen disciple. They met on Hydra and she helped him find his vocation as a documentary filmmaker. He returns the favour with a loving portrait of a woman who served as an almost mythical figure, a muse. Overshadowed by the artists she inspired she is nonetheless well served by the documentary which gives dimension to a person best known as a song lyric.
Ihlen passed away in Oslo in July, 2016. At the end of her life Cohen sent a message, read to her bedside and seen in the film. “Know that I am so close behind you that if you stretch out your hand, I think you can reach mine,” it reads in part. “Endless love, see you down the road.” Four months later he too was gone, joined in death as he had been in life with his muse. “Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love” is a sensitive and intimate portrayal of their time together, a love story that only spanned a handful of years but resonated for decades.
Your enjoyment of Biggie and Tupac is directly related to your enjoyment of director Nick Broomfield and his bumbling passive-aggressive approach to ambush journalism. He dominates the movie, integrating himself into the story in his search to uncover the culprits behind the slaying of the Notorious BIG and Tupac Shakur, two of hip hop’s brightest stars, gunned down within months of one another. Six years after the murders no arrests have been made, and while Broomfield offers some possible suspects, he stops short of any definitive conclusion. He suggests several motives for the killings, but the point of the film is to chronicle his investigation – to present the facts and open a new dialogue about the culture of violence that is prevalent in hip hop – rather than pointing the finger at one guilty party. I find Broomfield’s approach highly entertaining, and while he veers off course occasionally – there is a long pointless sequence with an ex-girlfriend of two LAPD officers allegedly tied to Tupac’s murder that hinges on the sex lives of the officers, not their criminal behaviour – you have to admire his bravado in chasing down interviews in backrooms, prison yards, anywhere the story takes him. In the film’s final third there is an interview with Suge Knight, head honcho at Death Row Records, a leading rap label. Knight was in prison at the time, and didn’t want to do the interview, but through sheer persistence Broomfield got him on camera. You can sense the tension in the sequence. The camera is noticeable jittery, as though the camera operator was have an anxiety attack while shooting, and Broomfield is unusually subdued. Knight begins benignly enough with a “message for the kids” which slowly disintegrates into a hate filled diatribe and death threat against rap artist Snoop Dogg. It is powerful footage, and worth the price of admission.
On the Saturday January 27, 2024 edition of the Richard Crouse Show we meet Nick Broomfield, director of the new documentary “The Stones And Brian Jones,” now playing in theatres. With candid interviews and never-before-seen footage he reveals how Brian Jones, the founder of the Rolling Stones, was left behind in the shadows of history.
