“The Velvet Underground”: To see or not to see Todd Haynes’ documentary about the legendary band of the 60 ″

Although he did not have such popular and forceful beginnings as that of other directors of his generation – call them Quentin Tarantino, Paul T. Anderson, or David Fincher -, Todd Haynes was a pioneer in bringing the universe queer towards new, very sophisticated lands, as he demonstrated with “Far from Heaven” (2002), a formidable postmodern revision — including the theme gay– from the classic melodrama of the fifties.

On the other hand, Haynes’s interest in 20th century popular culture icons, and specifically stars of the rock counterculture, was evident from his re-reading of the movement. glam with “Velvet Goldmine” (1998) —whose protagonist was inspired by David Bowie— and with “I’m not there” (2007), a strange portrait of a Bob Dylan played by six performers, including a woman (Cate Blanchett).

Therefore, it is not uncommon for Haynes to take an interest in one of the rock bands that is not only one of the most mythical and influential in history, but also one that was cradled by Andy Warhol and his troupe of New York artists of the sixties. As his 110-minute Apple TV-produced documentary Warhol and his cinema will demonstrate avant garde they will be essential allies for the experiment commanded by Lou Reed and John Cale.

The best of the documentary is in the first half. Haynes uses archive images that allow us to see, in parallel, the childhood of Reed (New York, 1942) and John Cale (Wales, 1942). But it does not do it in the conventional way. Makes the screen a mosaic, a collage ecstatic, with much of the imprint of poetic cinema experienced by independent filmmakers in New York in the 1960s.

Images of a still candid postwar American TV, with its shows familiar and popular icons, are combined, in split screens and proliferating squares, with the voices in off of Reed or John Cale, or of their friends and family, who comment on their childhoods. A social critique also takes shape that accounts for the loss of innocence in the sixties, thanks to the Kennedy assassination, Vietnam, civil protests.

A no less achievement of the documentary is to have paralleled the birth of a new sound and literary discourse by the hand of Reed’s band, together with the new cinematic discourse promoted by Warhol’s “Factory”. If Reed and Cale were influenced by the repetitive, minimalist music of La Monte Young, Warhol’s radically contemplative films were screened in the background of their concerts.

Haynes dares to confront us with long, slowed-down close-ups of Reed’s face, then Cale’s —taken from Warhol films—, which are combined with archival images as testimonial, as dreamy and delusional. In some ways, the documentary emulates many art styles from the sixties, including the poetic contrast of small everyday shots, a la Jonas Mekas, another New York film guru of the time.

Unfortunately, this aesthetic, sums up many of the filmic imprint of the genius of Pop Art —sponsor of the Reed and Cale band—, it was fading towards the second half. On the other hand, the sharp musings about the entry of the poetry of Rimbaud and Delmore Schwartz into rock, thanks to Reed’s transgressive and ambiguous pen, cease to permeate a film that opts for a more informative, more conventional narrative. Even so, it is a documentary that triumphs in many risks, and that dares to discover the revolutionary nature of a band that went far beyond drugs and sex.

Datasheet:

Original title: The Velvet Underground

Gender: Documentary film

Country and year: USA, 2021

Director: Todd Haynes

Interventions: Lou Reed, John Cale, Andy Warhol, Nico.

Qualification: Three stars (3)