Kurt Cobain - About a Son
by AJ Schnack
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DVD details
Actor: Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain, Michael AzerradDirector: AJ Schnack
Brand: UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP DISTRIBUTION
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Color, DVD-Video, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 135 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2008-02-19
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Shout Factory Theatr
DVD Reviews of Kurt Cobain - About a Son
DVD Review: Kurt Tells His Story
Summary: 5 Stars
If you want to know the real Kurt Cobain, purchase About a Son. The best part about this movie, is while Kurt tells his story, you see his hometown. I've read a review saying it could be any town. I've been there, it is where he grew up. As you see these images and hear the soundtrack of the music he listened to you get a better picture of what his life was like. It's the whole package, so to speak. I thank Michael Azerrad for making these great interviews available to his fans. It is touching and informative. I highly recommend it.DVD Review: good, but gets a little boring
Summary: 5 Stars
in this movie is just a video of seattle and aberdeen and olympia, which is where kurt lived and grew up, but even though there is an interview with him it does get boring just watching those areas for 2- 3 hours. but i would recommend it.DVD Review: A Little Disappointed
Summary: 2 Stars
I had very high hopes for this DVD, but it turned out to be a little boring. I lost interest very quickly. DVD Review: Kurt would have been ashamed...
Summary: 1 Stars
Let me first state that I am a huge fan of Kurt Cobain and have been since the late `80s when Bleach was first released. I was a huge fan of the music coming out of the Pacific Northwest at that time: Mudhoney, Mother Love Bone, the Melvins, Soundgarden, etc. I still love the music even as I'm approaching my 40s.
This documentary should have been released as an audio CD. If it had to be released as a film, at least it should have been subtitled against a black screen. That would have been more palatable than the highbrow visual pap, which the visuals are comprised of. The interviews were highly insightful, but the images were terribly disconnected and removed from the zeitgeist that was the alternative scene of the late `80s and early `90s. Grunge was against social conventions, somewhat nilhlistic, and rebelled against the prevailing conditions and fashions of the time. It brought about the demise of hair metal, fortunately. As such, the visual imagery of this film was anathema to that spirit. I felt like I was watching an overwrought, pretentious piece of "artsy fartsy" filming akin to a perfume commercial. I should have just closed my eyes and listened. It left a very bad taste in me, only redeemed by Kurt's spoken words, which were captivating . Kurt stated in the film numerous times how he identified with Punk Rock. A true punk rocker would be appalled at the blatant commercialism of the imagery. I was repulsed by it. The only saving grace is the interviews themselves, which I highly recommend listening to. If you buy this film, do yourself a favor and close your eyes while listening to it.
DVD Review: Fabulous
Summary: 5 Stars
I am ever so happy that Michael Azzerad created such a masterpiece. Having been a Nirvana fan since 1990 at the fresh age of 13, and really never hearing what Kurt had to say throughout the years, unless I wished to indulge in youtube nonsense or articles. It's nice to own this visual masterpiece that really and truly, without question, brings you into his world. At least a portion of it, and in his words, his voice. It was nice to lie back and just listen. Like rock -n- roll therapy. Looking up every so often to see sweeping views of pines and cartoon imagery, all flowing with Kurt's narrative. Beautiful, a MUST for any die hard Kurt lover.
Description of Kurt Cobain - About a Son
Kurt Cobain was deeply suspicious of journalists, but he trusted Rolling Stone's Michael Azerrad enough to give him unprecedented access during the writing of the book Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana. Consisting entirely of Cobain's never-before-heard musings and recollections recorded by Azerrad and laid on top of newly shot footage of the places that he lived, Kurt Cobain: About A Son offers an intimate portrait of the rocker's troubled formative years and meteoric rise to stardom. The result is the story of one of rock's greatest icons as it's never been told before. DVD Bonus Features:
Additional audio from the Kurt Cobain interviews
Behind-the-scenes featurette
Following in the deeply idiosyncratic footsteps of Last Days, About a Son plays more like autobiography than documentary. Gus Van Sant's feature extrapolates moments from the life of Kurt Cobain (with Michael Pitt as a musician named Blake), while A.J. Schnack's non-fiction film adheres closer to the facts, but advances a more radical Koyaanisqatsi-like approach. First off, Cobain supplies the narration, but the filmmaker avoids pictures of the alternative icon until the end. (He culled the voice-over from interviews conducted by author Michael Azerrad for Come as You Are: The Story of Nirvana.) Beyond-the-grave narration isn't a new concept--see Tupac: Resurrection--but Schnack (Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns) ups the ante by excluding talking heads, concert footage, and other staples of the genre. Instead, he uses still and time-lapse photography to explore Cobain's Northwest, i.e. Aberdeen, Olympia, and Seattle. The artist's unguarded reflections create a sense of intimacy as specific locations illustrate his words. Conversely, the lack of portraiture and self-penned music generates a feeling of absence. The soundtrack combines an ambient score from producer Steve Fisk and Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard with Cobain favorites, like David Bowie, Cheap Trick, and the Vaselines (available on a separate CD). For more specifics, interested parties can always turn to tomes by Azerrad, Gina Arnold, Charles R. Cross, and Everett True. About a Son doesn't presume to provide a definitive portrait, but Schnack's rigorous avoidance of convention results in an experience far more dream-like than depressing. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
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