The Boston Herald
June 17, 2000
"Sense" And Sensible
Low-Key Concert Film From Director Jonathan Demme Doesn't Compete With His Talking Heads Film
Storefront Hitchcock
Rated PG-13
**½ (Out Of Four)
by Paul Sherman
Jonathan Demme, the director of Melvin And Howard, Something Wild, and The Silence Of The Lambs, returned to the concert film more than a decade after his Stop Making Sense helped bring the Talking Heads into Rock's mainstream. But pop-culture lightning did not strike twice with Storefront Hitchcock.
Demme's film of a December 1996 New York performance by English singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock never got a proper release -- most likely because of the precarious finances of its original distributor (Orion Pictures) and because Hitchcock, despite a loyal core audience, is not that well-known. It had some festival showings in 1998, quietly came out on DVD in February, and is now getting its only local screening tonight -- just before its July 5 video release.
The movie bears some of the trademark qualities of Demme and Hitchcock, although the simple fact that it records a solo performance makes it less cinematic than the usual concert film.
In both Stop Making Sense and his music video work, Demme has shown a keen eye for demystifying performance. His video for New Order's "Perfect Kiss" is the video that most effectively and democratically depicts the contributions of every bandmember toward the song's success; his Talking Heads concert film basked in the band's eagerness to expose the "strings" behind the technical aspects of their show.
In the unassuming Hitchcock, a sometime painter and novelist, Demme again has an artist free of rock-star airs. First coming to prominence in the 1970s with the Neo-Psychedelic band The Soft Boys. Hitchcock then took his droll, often dark songs to Robyn Hitchcock And The Egyptians before becoming even more of a solo artist (in the movie, he gets assistance from violinist Deni Bonet or guitarist Tim Keegan in only a handful of songs).
Storefront Hitchcock -- so named because he performs to a small audience in the site of a former clothing store on Manhattan's 14th Street -- features Hitchcock and his guitar, his voice (which sometimes recalls John Lennon's nasal rasp), and, occasionally, his harmonica. In its location and its views, such as those of sidewalk passersby behind Hitchcock during many songs and moments, the film debunks the notion of the "Rock concert" and the person on stage as larger-than-life spectacle.
Among the movie's standout songs are "Glass Hotel", in which candlelight flickers across Hitchcock's face; "The Yip Song"; and the haunting "No, I Don't Remember Guildford". Almost as integral as the songs is Hitchcock's sardonic, glib, between-song patter, such as his introduction to "The Yip Song": "[It's] the most upbeat song I've ever written. It's about death from cancer."
Like most concert films, Storefront Hitchcock will please those who already have an appreciation for its performer more than it will the uninitiated. Ticket buyers for the Coolidge screening will get to compare the real thing to the movie, as Hitchcock, in one of only two East Coast stops in his current United States tour, will play a 15-minute set and introduce the film.
COPYRIGHT NOTICE