Customer Reviews

A Bookshelf on Top of the Sky

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Claudia Heuermann's "A Bookshelf on Top of the Sky: Twelve Stories About John Zorn" is not quite what it seems. Expectations ran high, a documentary about John Zorn, the man who rarely grants interviews and when he does, seems to say everything and not say anything at all, whose music jumps genre to genre in a matter of seconds, captivates some, horrifies others, and has a strange sway over its fan.

What Heuermann did though was quite a bit different-- she told the story about her trying to make the movie, about her relationship with Zorn, from the moment she first discovered him (a friend playing her Naked City's "Torture Garden") to her meeting him for the first time, travelling to New York and deciding to make a movie about Zorn. It's really a piece abuot self-discovery, about learning to be one's "own parent".

Along the way, we get snippets of interviews with Zorn, brilliant statements, footage of rehearsals, recording sessions, remastering of "The Big Gundown" and live performances from Naked City, Painkiller, Masada, Bar Kokhba, Emergency, and "Rituals". We also get a brief explanation of game pieces and a picture of a frustrated artist who can't stop looking, who views music as problem solving, and who does it not for listeners, but for himself and the musicians.

This is the second time I've watched this-- the first time was when it first came out, and I was still in the process of discovering Zorn's work through a chance encounter at an independent movie theater (Naked City was the house music before the show, and somehow I knew who it was). Three months and a dozen or so Zorn CDs later and this came out to guide my way, to help put the pieces together.

A year after that and my Zorn collection is bordering on obscene and the piece still holds weight. It still is entertaining, and yeah, its not a lot of revelatory stuff, but it's a worthwhile viewing. Truth to be told, in many ways, the piece gave validity to my own view on my choice of career and my great passions. And I keep thinking that maybe when my coworkers ask why I'm making the four hour trip to New York City yet again to see some obscure musician who they've never heard of (and who if they did hear, they'd probably dislike), maybe in those situations I should let them borrow this and certainly Heuermann's experience isn't really that much different from mine. Isn't that powerful enough to merit a recommendation to someone else?

If you're just learning about Zorn, get this, it's critical. If you're already initiated, you probably already have it. It's got its flaw, but invariably, it's a deeply personal expression, how could it not? Either way, it's a fun film to watch. Recommended.

...I gotta say, I came into this one with high hopes. Zorn, one of the most relentlessly documented musicians of our time, really deserves a great documentary film: something to explore his methods, collaborations, and underlying philosophies. This ain't it. The film-maker insists on inserting herself and her own ho-hum Euro-art-student self-discovery tale into the mix, which adds nothing. What emerges is exceedingly frustrating: there's tons of great footage, and much insight from Mr. Zorn, yet these great moments are dangled like the proverbial carrot. Just when you think you're getting an extended performance or interview, it cuts to the film-maker deciding how best she should edit, or rattling off another numbingly bland tale of her "friendship" with Zorn. It's a tremendous shame, as she actually has years worth of interesting footage...ever wonder why the great documentarians prefer to manifest themselves in the editting and narrative of a documentary, rather than as a physical presence??? This tipid tome is the answer. I gave it two more stars than it deserves because Zorn is brilliant, and you catch fleeting glimpses of that genius behind the film-maker's amateurish construction...so, to all you folks who think you can make a good Zorn documentary, GO FOR IT. It definitely hasn't been done yet.

If you like John Zorn and, like me, are also really into several of his usual cohorts (John Medeski, Marc Ribot, Chris Speed, Arto Lindsay, etc.), this "John Zorn documentary" is interesting enough just to see the momentary clips of rehearsal and performance footage, and Zorn's outlook on music composition, performance, recording, sound, etc. But the documentary is almost as much about the filmmaker as it is Zorn... which is where it falls way short. While the affect Zorn has had on filmmaker's life and work is mildly interesting, it's more than a little distracting that she felt it necessary to include herself in so much of it, especially when the film is ostensibly supposed to be about Zorn. My opinion is she could have done herself a much better turn and had a much better product if she would have concentrated more on Zorn rehearsal/performance footage, and kept herself more in the background. The way it is, the film seems much more amateurish than it could have been. I would really love to see a Zorn (or Ribot... or Medeski) DVD with musician interviews, rehearsal, studio and performance footage only. This "Zorn documentary" just wets the appetite. 3 1/2 stars (would/could have been 5).

I hesitate to call this film a documentary, for it seems to serve the mystique of John Zorn rather than circumvent it (or move through it) to examine the work of a man who has broke open a whole new way of composing music. Even more than serving the mystique (done through endless misses between the film maker and her subject matter and only brief glimpses of music being made), the film ultimately seems to serve the film maker to muse upon the process of creating films...but hardly in any way that provides insight.

There are interesting, brief glimpses into Zorn putting together a game piece performance, for example, but I came out of this feeling that I had been given some opportunity to glimpse some of the people behind the music, but no further understanding of the music or the artist behind the music than what I have devised through my own listening and through articles I've read talking about noise as well. Obviously, this film wants to examine the music more than the man, but I think it did it very poorly, with only brief peeks at Zorn's various styles and some interesting blurbs from Zorn himself, but more I felt that I just watched someone trying to make a documentary about Zorn and generally failed, so she decided to put herself in the movie to fill it out some.

A lost opportunity.

I have to agree with the reviewer from texas. How many more of these gimmicky "lets watch the director make the movie at the same time we watch it" movies do we really need? I will never understand why artists continue to think this makes their projects automatically fresh and interesting, 70+ years after modernism. it's more like a conceptual crutch. If the director were Chris Marker or Tarkovsky, maybe I'd be more interested in following her every rumination, but I'm sad to say the result here is just boring. I'd really rather just see a bunch of Zorn clips.

This film contains numerous snippets of very interesting footage of the musician/composer John Zorn performing live, rehearsing, recording, and discussing his ideas about art and politics. However, these clips are brief and scattered amongst even more abundant footage of the director (Claudia Heuermann) assembling the film and pretentiously musing about her past, the concept of time, the time in her life when she discovered Zorn's art, the nature of art itself, and suchlike... but not to any intellectually rewarding ends. At some point during the making of this film, Zorn stopped returning her calls. Perhaps this is part of the explanation as to why the film seems so patchy and incomplete. However, there are so many clips included from different sessions and performances that one would think there was enough raw material to fill out the film by lingering on the live shows and the unraveling of the creative process (Zorn's, not the director's) that was hinted at in brief studio and rehearsal segments. Unfortunately, this is not the route Heuermann chose to pursue.

I knew only a little about Zorn and his music when I came into this film; and while the brief flashes of his artistic process included in this film served to pique my interest even more, it didn't actually educate me about its subject at all. I couldn't tell you during what decade he was born, played his first show, recorded his first album, or what his background was before he discovered hardcore and whether that was the genesis of his musicianship or a later development that succeeded his interest in film music, Jewish music, jazz, and classical (although it does seem he had an early preoccupation with cartoon scores).

I knew even less about director Claudia Heuermann, but I was quite put off by her meaningless pseudo-intellectual ramblings. I hate to read between the lines too much, but it isn't hard to guess why Zorn would quit returning her calls.

I can't completely put this film down because it contains some very interesting, but very brief, footage of its intriguing subject. However I constantly felt my mind wandering and the last 30 minutes of the film was quite a chore to sit through. If you're still interested after reading what I just described, you will probably get SOMETHING from viewing this "documentary." Otherwise, Bookshelf On Top Of the Sky is not recommended.

This project is every mega-fan's wet dream: the chance to make a feature-length film about the subject of one's passion, only to override that subject with one's own ego. Claudia Heuermann is essentially the star of her little film. She relegates Zorn, his music, and the Downtown New York milieu to the sidelines so she can muse droningly about the art of filmmaking and how important she is to the process that's supposed to be happening here. Each time this film shows some potential to give us some depth -- through the music if not its evasive subject's own words -- it fails, drifting off to another of Heuermann's musings about film and, less often, Zorn. There are dozens of prime concert clips, interview fragments, and other teasers in this film, but they are simply left as that: teasers, reminding us briefly that the subject is supposed to be Zorn and not the director. Now someone needs to come along and *really* make a film about this misunderstood genius, Zorn.

The negative reviews of this documentary and its creator Claudia Heuermann are unfair. It's pretty obvious that John Zorn's decision to absent himself from the film-making process ("I hadn't spoken to Zorn for over a year," Heuermann says at one point) is at the heart of the documentary's problems. Without its subject's active participation, Heuermann seems to have had to fall back to a different, problematic approach to her film and its subject (that she was evidently passionate about and committed to) which ultimately leads to the issues that the other reviewers here so eloquently kvetch about.

Heuermann's 'Sabbath In Paradise' (1997) is an interesting and accomplished investigation into the beginnings of the NYC Radical Jewish Culture scene. With informed, thoughtful input from Anthony Coleman (the movement's intellectual powerhouse for my money), Andy Statman and Marc Ribot, among others, it proves that Heuermann is a talented director with the vision to work in an area of contemporary music that requires documenting in an intelligent way, such is it's highly-conceptual basis.

This is still interesting though. Good footage of Zorn's various projects, game piece rehearsal footage, Naked City stuff, Masada stuff, some classical stuff and a bit of Zorn sounding off about Germany. Perhaps Heuermann could have gone to Zorn's peers for the insight that Zorn was not able/willing to give her (sadly, as his contributions to the extra documentary on the 'Sabbath In Paradise' DVD are entertaining and interesting enough) but she didn't.

So, flawed and a missed opportunity, yes - but I really don't believe the vehement criticism here is justified or even directed in the right direction. It's OK, and it's all that's out there. And Zorn is such a unique character that surely any attempt to 'capture' or explain him is doomed to failure.

I can't say I loved every second of this movie. I found the filmmaker and her narratives so irritating I wanted to shoot her by the end of the film. However, what she did manage to capture of John Zorn and his process is so fascinating I can't help but recommend it to ANYONE who is interested in making music, whether they can wrap their heads around his music or not. Sure, you have to put up with her drivel and her whining, but it's worth it in my opinion just to watch Zorn instructing an improvisational ensemble on the use of flash cards, directing an orchestra that includes a guy slurping and spitting water and another sawing the legs off chairs, and of course his strangely insightful if cryptic theories on music. As an artist and musician, I found it massively inspiring and I recommend it to all my like-minded friends, with the caveate that she's intolerable and they probably won't dig all the music right away...

Considering the tiny amount of live footage and interviews that are available of Zorn, this is defiantly worth getting if you're a fan

As far as documentary filmmaking goes this is sub par at best, and is defiantly not worthy of tzadiks reputation
Everyone you expect is here -Patton, Masada, naked city, marc ribot-
But not one interview with anyone! which is pretty disappointing
Instead the filmmaker spends an exuberant amount of time talking about herself, the editing prosess and how Zorn's music has changed her life blah blah blah...