August 28, 2002
		September 4, 2002

Toronto 2002
Standing in the Shadows of Motown
(Artisan) Rated PG
Release Date - November 15, 2002

My day of movies closed with an easy win, Artisan’s Standing in the Shadows of Motown, directed by Paul Justman, the man who gave us T&A Academy 2.  Of course, he also directed three rock-n-roll films as well.  And he does a nice job with this film as well.

Here’s the deal – this is a movie about the band that played on virtually every Detroit-era Motown hit.  As asked in the movie, “Did you ever think about who was playing the music on (name you Motown hit with a big name singing)?”  I have.  But not long enough to find out the answer. 

This is the story of The Funk Brothers… 13 musicians who worked together day in and day out, building the aural ark that greats like Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye and Diana Ross and Martha Reeves, etc, etc., floated on for all those years.   They tell their stories of glory and failure, ecstasy and agony.  Some had women trouble, some had drinking problems and two were even white. 

Justman is very clever in how he builds his movie, giving us a new performance of a classic hit every ten minutes or so throughout the film.  (Ironically, the one that seems to be missing is “Standing in the Shadows of Love”.)  The songs are performed by The Funk Brothers and guest singers Joan Osborne, Gerald Levert, Meshell Ndegeocello, Bootsy Collins, Ben Harper, Chaka Khan, Montell Jordan and Tom Scott.  And in between the songs, the tales of their lives. 

If you love the music, and I do, its hard to imagine having more fun watching a documentary… all the more so because it reminds you of how the standards that have been playing on your radio for years came to life by way of the efforts of real, flesh and blood people with real strengths and weaknesses.  And in the singing of Osborne, Levert, Ndegeocello and Jordan, there is the realization that the music is the music and the performance is only one of the colors, no matter how wonderful the new renditions of these songs may be. 

Of course, the movie got me before the credits even began.  As soon as I heard Andre Braugher doing the narration, I was there.  I even applauded quietly.