Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...

You want to know if you should rent or buy this disc, right? I can give you one reason, and it comes less than a half-hour into the film, when Kanye West takes the stage. “Get ‘Em High” is absolutely fantastic. As good as West is, it’s a pretty remarkable performance by every single person onstage in equal measure. It’s a great group jam, everyone working together perfectly, laying down this one awesome groove... and then it just goes on... and on... under the next sequence, this one groove played low for a long time. The film cuts to a lot of great character stuff as the groove keeps repeating, revealing material shot three days before the concert footage that we’re watching. Nothing’s a throwaway in this film. Watching Dave trying to get people to come to his film is both touching and funny, and it’s the real meat of the movie. I think Chapelle did his best to be himself, to drop the act as much as possible, and in doing so, I think he manages to hit the same kind of honesty overdrive that marked the best work of Richard Pryor.

Yeah, that’s right. I’m dropping the “P” bomb. I think Richard Pryor is more than just the best black comic of all time. I think he’s the best stand-up comedian of any type, of any era. Hands down. No question. He’s the Ali of comedy. And don’t get me wrong. Dave Chapelle is definitely not Richard Pryor.

Not yet, anyway. I think CHAPELLE’S SHOW was very funny at times, but not really the work of genius that some people thought it was. I can see why the pressure of the sudden overwhelming financial responsibility might have scared the shit out of Chapelle. In backing off, in taking this side-step to do this film instead, I think he was scrambling to hold on to some sense of identity. Michel Gondry is hardly the first choice you would imagine shooting a Dave Chapelle concert film, but that stylistic push-pull of different influences makes it interesting. That’s what makes it work. Gondry’s a fucking good filmmaker, playful and compassionate and sweet-hearted through and through.

Compare this film to the recently-released Shyamalan book THE MAN WHO HEARD VOICES, and you’ll see the difference between mythmaking and confession. Chapelle seems absolutely compelled to be real while the camera’s rolling. He takes it as a challenge, and he’s more soulful than ever before. Have you ever heard Pryor’s material from after his life-changing trip to Africa?

Mos Def shows up right at the start, performing “Two Words” with West. Mos cracks me up. Mos is a badass rapper, but he’s also this larger than life character, with a presence that makes him the most interesting person on a movie set just as much as on a stage. You can’t take your eyes off him.

Cody Chesnutt shows up playing “King Of The Game.” A rehearsal session. Just Chesnutt by himself. Hip fucking choice. THE HEADPHONE MASTERPIECE is not inaccurately named. Chapelle plays “Round Midnight” on the piano. Really nice little version. Then he gets busted by his friend when he plays “Misty,” the only other song he knows. His friend talks about how Chapelle can really play the shit out of these two songs, but nothing else. He seems struck by how I’s oddly beautiful, how it trips him out to see someone give his whole life to one or two songs. Chapelle talks afterwards about Thelonius Monk and his gift for timing, then talks about the relationship between comedians and musicians, and how intermingled it is. Again... it’s naked. Anyone looking for answers about this guy need not theorize. Here he is, laying himself bare for his audience. It makes him really appealing. Mos and Dave jamming in rehearsal. Great. Funny as fuck, and a great exercise in playing to the band, literally.

When Kanye West comes back for “Jesus Walks”, he rips the roof off the place again. Seriously... removed of the hype of record sales or chart position or anything else... this is a phenomenal performance, using an entire marching band as a rhythm section. Electric is the best word for it. Dead Prez hardly has the same kind of media presence that Kanye West does, but they’re heard by the people who it speaks directly to. “You don’t hear them on the radio,” Chapelle says, “but you hear that in the barbershop all the time.” Their version of “Turn Off The Radio” feels like a genuine call to revolution, especially with Chapelle’s musings on the death of Biggie Smalls and his visit to the daycare center where Biggie grew up.

The way the film is built, things intentionally get bigger and bigger. The second song by Dead Prez is “It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop,” and if their first song is revolution, their second song is apocalypse, a world-class call-out to 99% of everyone working in music today. Scorching. Watch Chappelle’s face as he listens. He’s having as good a time as anyone in the audience. Not everything works. He calls a guy up onstage who looks like Mr. T, and the moment doesn’t really go where Chapelle wants it to.

But who cares? Erykah Badu shows up a few minutes later, and “Back In The Day” swings. I can see why the audience stood there, even while it was raining. These performers all feel energized by the collision of all of them in this one place at this particular moment. I don’t often use the word “magic,” but I think that’s a fair description for what you see happen in performance after performance, or in the backstage stuff with her. As Chappelle talks about seeing the reality of people, we see footage onstage of Badu’s wig getting ripped off onstage by the wind, and there’s something wonderful about the way she rips in the rest of the way, mid-song, turning it into a joyous thing. And when she duets later with Jill Scott... another moment of mutual admiriation flowering into something special for the audience.

I don’t want to just mention a few songs because of how much good stuff there is in the film, but the list of titles in the credits goes on for a good two minutes. Song after song after song, like “Boom” by the Roots or “Love OF My Life” by Badu and Common or “Definition” by Mos and Talib Kweli or Jill Scott’s “The Way”.

And, yes, the ending of the film, the big finish, is the reunion of The Fugees. And if that doesn’t excite you, then this isn’t the movie for you. If the notion of seeing everyone together again onstage together doesn’t get you going, then I would say you shouldn’t bother at all. I watched the film on my super-duper ultra-swanky Bose headphones, and it’s a genuine pleasure, beautifully mixed, rich and warm. I love how you hear Lauryn Hill before you see her, and when she takes the stage, she seems a little nervous actually, like she can barely believe she’s doing it. Once she settles in, though, and Pras takes the stage after her, and we see them relax with each other, it’s amazing. Pras talks about how much he loves watching Lauryn perform, and then we see her performance of “Killing Me Softly,” and she is indeed, as Pras calls her, “a beast,” just preposterously good. I have my issues with some of what Hill has said in the press, and I think she’s a sincere but misguided media figure, but as a singer... perfection. One of the great voices.

And thanks to Gondry, this appearance humanizes her away from the unfortunate quotes or the strident racial pronouncements. After her first big number, there’s some interview footage. She talks about growing up in the suburbs of New Jersey, and how she thought Pras and Wyclef were Jamaican when she first met them, and there’s obvious affection there, no matter what’s gone down between all of them as a band. In a flashback cutaway, Wyclef plays an impromptu version of “If I Was President” with the marching band backstage, playing for them, speaking to them. It’s a moment of quiet power, a strong choice. I like seeing them as people after seeing them perform, placing the emphasis there. Cody Chesnutt plays the movie out, another backstage moment, and Gondry ties it all together in these final moments, and it’s appealingly earnest. The last lines in the film are “Talking about love, talking about god-given love,” and that’s ultimately what the whole film is... one great big act of love. Chapelle may have bolted, but before he went, he offered up one great big love letter to the people who inspire him to continue, and one great big love letter to his audience.

The disc is really nice, but not overloaded with extras. Having not seen the film in the theater, I’m not sure what’s in the extra six minutes. Doesn’t matter in the end. You get a little more of a good thing... that should be enough. It’s a really nice transfer, visually and aurally, and in the end, this is a film I’m glad I own, one I’ll revisit many times, I’m sure. Especially when I get my sound system set up in my new house in the next few weeks.

I’ll be back a little later this morning with my review of Michael Mann’s MIAMI VICE, and I have to finish so I can get some sleep before a film later today that I’ve been waiting on for almost exactly four years now.