4/10
Rather boring anti-documentary
2 May 2006
OK, to answer a few questions that others seem to have had:

1. Yes, this film *is* available, after a fashion. It's out there in collector's circles. I recently found a copy recently on a pirated DVD-R for under $20.00. It is the complete version, not the edited version. The transfer quality was excellent, whereas the quality of the original film reel was only good to very good.

2. The film soundtrack was released several years ago on CD. You can occasionally locate copies of it on E-Bay. That's where I got mine.

3. This is a very disjointed and boring film. If you are a Tiny Tim fan, or a Peter Yarrow fan, you will probably not be disappointed, but otherwise, unless you were part of the San Francisco Scene in the Summer of Love, you'll probably be as bored to tears as I was: this film was, according to the Album's liner notes an "anti-documentary" "about a particular moment in time." If you were there, you'll probably spot some familiar faces in the "Family Dog" sequence and in the "Be-In" footage. If you weren't, you'll see "just these spotty, dirty, kids" as George Harrison once described them-- it's clear this was not the Clearasil generation...

4. There is no logic, rhyme or reason to this film. No continuity. No order. Unrelated footage cuts in and out of scenes for no discernible reason.

5. The Tiny Tim sequences were filmed in the basement of Bob Dylan's "Big Pink" house with "The Band" (in their last appearance as "The Hawks" )as his back-up band in Woodstock, N.Y. Why Yarrow included them on this film, that otherwise limits itself to San Francisco is beyond reasoning. The raw tapes of this session are available on the bootleg "Bob Dylan, Tiny Tim and The Band: "Down In The Basement". What Mr. Tim (a New Yorker) has to do with the rest of the film, set as it is in San Francisco, and why they interspersed one of his performances with audience shots of the Beatles fans at Candlestick Park from two years earlier, is beyond explanation. (The only Beatles/Tiny Tim connections I know of are that the Beatles attended Mr. Tim's debut at the Royal Albert Hall in '68, and Mr. Tim later sang "Nowhere Man" on the Beatles 1969 Beatles Fan Club Christmas Record-- both of which are antecedent to this film's release.) Tiny's duet is with the lovely Elanor Baruchian, a young lady of his accquaintance (not his girlfriend as reported on The Band's website)who used to appear on the same bill with him at The Scene Club in New York City in 1966. Ms. Baruchian changed her name to Chelsea Lee and was a founding member of the Psychedelic Folk Rock trio "The Cake" and later was a vocalist in Ginger Baker's Air Force, and one of Dr. John's Nighttrippers. It was Tiny Tim's appearance in this film that opened the door for him to his invitation to appear on Laugh-In, The Tonight Show, and all of the subsequent fame to follow.

6. Frank Zappa, near as I can tell, does not appear in this film. His music certainly does not. Another reviewer claims that he is sitting on a chair on the side of the stage during the psychedelic light show of the topless go-go girl dancing... frankly, I nearly went blind trying to determine that the girls were, in fact, topless, and didn't notice Mr. Zappa anywhere on this film. The band playing during the Psychdelic Lightshow & Topless Go-go dancing was The Electric Flag, not The Mothers of Invention, who were an *L.A* Band, not a Frisco Band.

7. David Crosby *does* make a five second cameo in this film. He has no lines.
8 out of 9 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Recently Viewed