14 May 2014 UPDATE: Malik Bendjelloul – Swedish Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker Malik Bendjelloul, the film director behind the Oscar-awarded music documentary “Searching for Sugarman,” died Tuesday, May 13, 2014. He was 36. RIP.
Read more: Searching-Sugar-Man-director-dies-36
What do you wear when the invite says ‘Dress Code: Motown… Springbok … 90’s arena … Newport Fold Festival 1975… Vinyl Junkie… Jo-berg beachwear ‘ It was very confusing – Jo’burg doesn’t even have a beach, but it turned out very colourful and emotional. For the sea, the audience shed tears. The Secret Cinema screening in London at the Troxy brought over a thousand people who queued patiently around the block, with their beach balls and frisbees, for what was promised to be the ‘cinematic experience of the year.’ And it was. Review by Alan Greenhalgh.
Spoiler Alert – don’t read this if you are planning to see Searching for Sugar Man by Malik Bendjelloul
This is Secret Screenings a pan-European, monthly film night of incredible detail and style. With the smell of popcorn, a beer in hand and the humble sound of hot dogs being munched, the lights went down in the vast, flag-festooned auditorium. Tonight we are transported to the Bellville Velodrome, 12 miles from Cape Town, near the Tyger Valley Shopping mall and on the way to the airport. It’s the 6th March 1998, post apartheid-era South Africa. The fans had gathered to see if it really was true. Could it be that American-Mexican poet and torch-song folk hero Rodriguez, responsible for the soundtrack to their lives, be alive. And here in Cape Town, tonight? He’d stopped making music when his early 70s albums Cold Fact and Coming From Reality were a flop in America. He’d vanished without a trace. Rumours were rife that he’d shot himself or set himself alight on stage at his final gig to the lyrics of one his mournful, anti-establishment songs. Yet, here tonight was a limo and screaming fans waiting for him at DF Malan airport. Millions of bootleg vinyl records were sold there but he’d never received a cent. That he was so popular in South Africa was completely unknown to him. Two South Africans had tracked him down in Detroit and brought him over to see if he really was that man singing them through their adolescence and struggle against apartheid. Tonight we’d found out for sure.
The cinematic tale unfolds on the large screen with huge stadium-quality speakers either side an empty stage. The story of an unrecognised hero. A fan’s pilgrimage. The credits rolled, the screen retracted way up high and there on that stage, that night, in a single spotlight with the sound of a thunderous, repetitive chord was the hero himself. Rodriguez. Resurrected.
He sang to us and imparted some of his wisdom, telling us that his song Sugar Man is ‘descriptive not prescriptive.’ Not to be a silent partner in life. It’s only 30 concerts into the rest of his life and we are grateful Rodriguez is silent no more.
It’s difficult to describe how a hero is made. But we witnessed it in 85 minutes of film storytelling – the old grainy footage of a depressed Detroit, shadowy images of a singer in dive bars, 70’s families with record players in the shadow of Table Mountain, interviews with family, record producers, construction co-workers and folk-rock melodic snatches of the music. They’d gathered to tell the story of their hero. A simple, humble man. We believed them. We became fans and storytellers ourselves. Who will forget last night, in Cape Town in 1998? We won’t.
To sign up for further events www.secretscreenings.com
Read our review of the film here
Here’s a great piece about Rodriguez interviewed by Bob Simon on “60 Minutes” from our friends at celebzter.com
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