The Daddy of Rock 'n' Roll

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03/07/2021 "Ars est celare artem" — Perhaps one way to understand Ovid's aesthetic saw, beyond its conventional interpretation as meaning art should appear natural and realistic rather than contrived and ostentatious, is in the polar opposite direction: Sometimes, art does not seem like art at all, at least not in the way we are taught to expect art to appear. This is one of the great lessons underlying so-called outsider art, that by its very nature, art should resist and rub against its commodification and standardization at the hands of the art industry. In our aesthetic epoch of the expressive, individualist author, we are taught to expect creativity to be deliberate, purposeful—the elementary critical question: what is the author's intent, what control (and hence copyright) does an auteur maintain over their work—with the aim of artistry being to give the audience insight into another person's mind. From such a vantage, the neuroatypical and impoverished, who frequently (if not inherently) lack the mental or financial means to maintain such deliberation and control, are constitutively excluded from the so-called normal realms of artistry—hence someone like Wesley Willis is an outsider. And yet, as this brief but touching fly-on-the-wall documentary illustrates powerfully, Willis' work is so much more than a novelty, unambiguously communicating the gamut of human experience: Pain, joy, isolation, humor, horror, innocence, ugliness, beauty, commercialization, eccentricity—hellrides and joyrides alike. It may not sound like what we think artistic music should sound like, he may not look like what we think an artist should look like, and in that refusal, willful or otherwise, is it not art? See more 06/09/2012 Wesley Willis is a god. This is his bible. See more sean l 09/02/2011 Not a documentary so much as a day in the life, the lack of traditional narration seen here is both liberating and rough around the edges. The director's hands-off approach, which consists of simply following Wesley around to his various haunts in and around the city of Chicago, gives us a revealing, enlightening look at the chance encounters and everyday stimulus that led to his subject's work. It also gives us a rare opportunity to see Willis precisely as he was, unguarded and genuine. Clearly, the man has struggled with more than his share of problems. Obese, loud and medicated, he attracts wary glances and uneasy smiles at every stop, but appears to have long since left behind any apprehensions and fully embraced his own notoriety. And while the completely open direction of the film does give us a rare chance to know Wesley as the warm, brash, adventurous spirit he really was, it also leaves a lot of questions about his ways disappointingly unanswered. Though the music that ultimately led to his stardom may seem shallow and childish at first glance, a deeper look at its contents and inspirations shed light on what it truly was: a perfect exp?ression of his carefree, prolific character and a fleeting chance to escape the personal demons that chased him throughout his life. Willis makes for a great subject, but I remain undecided on the film itself. See more 10/29/2009 Follow Wesley Willis as he greets strangers, talks with friends, and fights his demons off with songs about bestiality. See more 05/11/2009 There's really no narrative structure to this, and I think it suffers for it. Wesley was a guy that inspired curiosity through his music & his circumstances, and while it's interesting to see a snapshot of his day-to-day life, without any context framing it, it just doesn't seem to go anywhere. See more 04/09/2009 The film never bothers to make an argument, any argument. All it does is show a very personable man who dealt with his schizophrenia by recording massive amounts of 2:50-long songs. Which, I suppose, is exactly what Wesley was. See more Read all reviews

The Daddy of Rock 'n' Roll

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