The Devil and Daniel Johnston
Directed by Jeff Feuerzeig
Sony Pictures Classics
2006
Rating:


Daniel Johnston has earned a well-deserved cult following for his alternative folk music. For a long time only available on cassettes — many of which were unique, individual recordings because Johnston, making the tapes himself from a weight-lifting bench in his brother's basement, didn't understand how to dub — such Johnston albums as "Hi, How Are You?" and "Yip-Jump Music" are the sound of raw beauty. There's a fragility to these ultra-lo-fi productions that allow Johnston's wavering voice and incisive lyrics to pierce straight to the soul.

Such genius often comes at a price. It's telling that Johnston doesn't even get top billing in Jeff Feuerzeig's documentary, "The Devil and Daniel Johnston."

The film begins with the words, "I'm the ghost of Daniel Johnston," and during the credits Johnston dons a costume of Casper the Friendly Ghost. What falls in between is a sort of ghost story of a living man. A hagiography largely comprised of 8mm home movies, cassette recordings and other found footage, much like "Tarnation" and "Capturing the Friedmans," "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" recounts Johnston's ascendancy to outsider artist icon and his descent into a mental illness that prevented him from breaking through during the alternative-fueled music mainstream of the 1990s alongside such fans as Kurt Cobain, Sonic Youth and Pearl Jam.

Johnston was raised in a Christian fundamentalist household by parents who called him an "unprofitable servant to the Lord" for wasting his time on art and music. Convinced that he was more of an "unserviceable prophet" fated to become famous, Johnston pursued his music, even finding a muse in Laurie Allen, the woman who broke his heart to marry a funeral home director. Johnston made a name for himself through shameless self-promotion, making it big in the Austin music scene and appearing on MTV.

Then Johnston lost it all when his tenuous bond to reality snapped. Instead of becoming a pop star, Johnston became a pop martyr. Such "divine madness" is often glorified, but "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" portrays Johnston's manic behavior as truly terrifying. Like the title of one of Johnston's tapes, what's presented are "Songs of Pain."

Posted Friday, May 26, 2006

Link to this review:
http://filmzeus.pressbin.com/film/devil.and.daniel.johnston