When You’re Strange (A Film About the Doors), Blu-ray (2010)
Director: Tom Dicillo
Narrator: Johnny Depp
Studio: Rhino/Eagle Vision [6/29/10]
Video: 1.85:1 for 16:9 1080p HD
Audio: English DTS-HD MA, DD 2.0
Extras: Interview with Jim’s father, Admiral George Morrison, Theatrical trailer
Length: 96 minutes
Rating: ***½
If you missed this interesting documentary on PBS, the disc offers an opportunity to see a lot of previously-unseen footage about Morrison, even though you have probably experienced much of his and the group’s story previously. Johnny Depp’s narration is excellent, though the words put in his mouth by director Dicillo may sometimes seem breathlessly over the top. Some of the unscreened footage includes shots from an experimental film project Morrison did after the band was a success. He is bearded, stoned and/or drunk (as usual) and roaring around the desert somewhere in a blue Mustang. (In its plot he has killed the original driver who picked him up.) I had thought it was just a lookalike actor playing Morrison but it really is the rockstar/poet. And the footage looks great in Blu-ray – like shot yesterday.
The story of the band’s beginnings and rise to fame is familiar, but there is a strong emphasis on Morrison’s continual problems with alcohol and drugs and how the band for a long time just tried to ignore them. However, it’s not all sad – there are some shots of Morrison having fun, interacting with fans, etc. I was struck by the similarity with Morrison running off to Paris after losing a questionable court case for indecency, and the flight of Roman Polanski. The band was only around for 4 ½ years; like other rock stars of the period, Morrison burned brightly and then suddenly went out. (The match metaphor is repeatedly shown in closeup by Dicillo to be absolutely certain the viewer gets the point.)
The documentary was made with the full cooperation of the three remaining band members, and they come off as rather innocent bystanders to Morrison’s excesses. I wonder if that was really true. There are lots of visual references to the turmoil of the 60s and how The Doors fit (or didn’t fit) into it. There were no comments from people who worked with the Doors or their still-living friends and associates, but in the extras there is one with his sister and a so-called exclusive interview with his father, in which he publically discusses the life of his famous son for the first time. (Morrison had put down on his bio sheet for the group’s publicity: “Parents: Dead.”)
– John Sunier
