Nonureva Really Surprised!

Merolliv I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Adeel Hail Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

classicsoncall It occurs to me that if you followed a particular band from it's very beginning, a film documentary concerning their career will generally reveal very little you didn't already know. That was the case here, at least for this viewer, who's been a Rolling Stones fan right from the get-go. Released in 2012, I was surprised actually that this look at The Stones basically took you from the beginning of their career to just about the middle to late Seventies, so it's not the thorough piece I was expecting.There were however a few tidbits I hadn't been aware of. How is it that in a little over fifty years since the Stones began playing, this is the very first mention I ever heard that the crazed young teenage girls who first came out to see the band play actually wet themselves in their hysteria? It must be true, Mick said it himself. Actually, Jagger had another comment along those lines. He stated that it was primarily in England that girls reacted hysterically to the band, while in the rest of the world it was boys. I thought that was an interesting observation on his part.Among the topics covered in the film - manager Andrew Oldham's shaping of the band as the anti-Beatles with a significantly darker image, the early drug busts that threatened to break up the band, Brian Jones's death, the Altamont disaster, and Keith getting arrested and deciding that the band and the music were more important than his personal relationship with heroin.In all, one will catch snippets of about two dozen songs in the Stones repertoire, with some time spent on Mick and Keith's collaborative writing and how some of their songs came together. But again, most of the footage that goes with those songs emanate from the late Sixties and early Seventies, so it's somewhat shocking to make the forty year time jump when a clip of the band singing 'All Down the Line' is used to close out the picture. It's from the 2008 Scorsese film "Shine a Light", documenting the Stones two day performance at the Beacon Theater in 2006. You wonder how the lot of them are still standing much less performing.And yet they still perform. I've never seen them live myself, and the chances of ever doing so grows slimmer with each passing day since most of their concerts are sold out within minutes. But one can always hope.

Mike B This is the best Stones' documentary that I have seen. There is a lot of early footage when the group started out – of screamin' teenage girls, of stage riots... The commentary by the group members (in the present tense) was also informative, for example they are all quite candid about the death of Brian Jones. It is also quite obvious that the government went after them for their use of drugs as a way to silence these rebellious bad boys.Many of their best songs (along with some I didn't know) are featured and their performances as well. At least half of the documentary is on the 1960's – which was the "golden age" of the Stones – with their best music. Then there is some on the 70's and very little footage beyond. There is also commentary by Mick Taylor and Ron Wood. The best line in the documentary is when the Stones asked Ron Wood to join the group; his reply was "in a New York minute"!

Tony Bush Brett Morgan, director of THE KID STAYS IN THE PICTURE, delivers this almost superb chronicle of the rise of The Rolling Stones. Interview sound-bites from unseen Jagger, Richards, Watts, Wood, Taylor and Wyman pass comment over a backdrop of newsreel, home movie and concert footage which continuously and unbrokenly spools across the decades.If you lived through most of it, it's a moderately emotional and involving experience, full of nostalgia and wistful insights. There is little bite or revelation going on, but the entertainment value is high – especially for fans. Casual onlookers might not be converted easily, but the scope of this at times faintly nightmarish modern "fairytale" of fame and success is likely to have at least some impact.Richard's autobiography LIFE and Stephen Davis's masterful band bio OLD GODS ALMOST DEAD have a certain meat protein on their bones and an incisive analysis in their bloodstream that CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fails to come close to replicating on screen. It nearly nails it with depictions of the bands early yob behaviour and riot incitement plus a truly chilling depiction of the Altamont concert which manages to successfully generate a tangible sense of the fear and danger permeating that particular event. The ramshackle death and disintegration of the peace and love movement of the sixties is directly and probably quite correctly connected to the Altamont disaster.There is much to see of the sixties and seventies, but not really enough added depth of inquiry to resonate passionately with the imagery and sound. The story is told, but told deadpan and without much genuine emotional punch or guts. The grit and gore, the down and dirty stuff never materialises. It's all rather civilised. Then it gets to the early eighties, jump-cuts to the Beacon Theatre concerts in 2006 (Scorsese's SHINE A LIGHT) then abruptly ends. What?I love the Stones and always will. Anyone with an interest in popular music who can't appreciate their immeasurable contribution and cultural influence in creative terms alone might as well be living in a sterile vacuum on some other planet. Where rock and roll is concerned, these are the real deal, they ARE the old gods, and almost dead or not, they still shine bright. If hearing Satisfaction, Jumping Jack Flash, Sympathy For The Devil, Gimme Shelter, Miss You, Sweet Virginia, don't move you in some way, then you just ain't got a taste for the stuff that don't taste of anything but sucrose, Tupperware and Styrofoam. They might have become a corporate cash cow touring machine, but when it came to delivering, they delivered.CROSSFIRE HURRICANE delivers also, but to a limited extent. It provides some truly great visuals and some truly great sounds. But the definitive Stones movie is out there somewhere still waiting to be made. This ain't it, but it will do to pass the time with until the glorious day arrives.

Bunwad gregwetherall (above) has done an excellent and spot-on job so I'll keep this brief -as a 15-year rock musician (so I actually get "the wobble bit" - though I'm not quite sure I buy all of it) who grew up with the Rolling Stones, while this isn't anywhere near perfect (likely impossible)"Crossfire Hurricane" is still very entertaining and a must for any Stones fan. Some of the remixed live tracks are astoundingly preserved and sound great, though imo some of the interview comments need to be tweaked up a bit (though my hearing is shot, so maybe that's me) Some quick cuts from "Cocksucker Blues" interspersed just at the right moments of some of the live tracks; Keith as usual brutally honest in his comments about drugs, Brian, songwriting, etc - and there's some stuff in Crossfire Hurricane I've never seen before. (no spoilers here) - even Charlie speaks up now & then. The best and worst of Brian is brutally portrayed as well.All in all, a job well done and definitely worth seeing. I've DVR'd it, seen it twice so far, and likely will watch it again. Play it loud through your sound system.