Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man [2006]

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Editorial reviews

Synopsis
Leonard Cohen manages to garner fans from the unlikeliest of places despite his distinctly un-rock-&-roll appearance and a set of songs that veer closer to poetry than to their uneasy bedfellows in the pantheon of popular music. But viewers looking for an in-depth analysis of the man behind some of the most deeply introspective music ever recorded should look elsewhere: LEONARD COHEN - I'M YOUR MAN contains precious little insight from Cohen himself. Instead, director Lian Lunson has pieced together a warm tribute to the Canadian singer, drawing on the words of his many celebrity fans while also sharing generous amounts of footage from a Cohen tribute concert staged in 2005. The concert was filmed in Australia, with the bulk of the celebrity testimonials coming from performers at the show. The eclectic array of artists taking part include Nick Cave, Pulp's Jarvis Cocker, Martha and Rufus Wainwright, and folk legend Linda Thompson, all of whom perform unique interpretations of Cohen-penned classics such as ‘I'm Your Man’ (Cave) and ‘Chelsea Hotel #2’ (Rufus Wainwright). Lunson intersperses the concert footage with interviews from the stars, the most vocal and effusive praise coming from U2’s The Edge and Bono, who are seen backing Cohen on a rendition of ‘Tower of Song’ as the movie closes. Cohen himself is also given some screen time in which he muses on a number of interesting topics, but Lunson's piece is mostly designed as a straight tribute to a man who has never sat easily in the contemporary music world, much to the delight of his fans.

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Customer reviews

review by: date: 2008-01-09 rating:
It converted me to Leonard Cohen, anyway...
I bought this as a Christmas present for my wife, a longterm Cohen fan, and I watched it with her, expecting to kind of enjoy it, but to my surprise I had a great time. I had distantly respected his stuff for a long time, but something about this movie made me love it.

The meat of this movie is not, unfortunately, to be found in the performances by the many guest artists covering Mr. Cohen's songs. There are, frankly, very few gold stars to be handed out. Nick Cave does a bang-up job as perhaps the only person herein who's had a weirder life than Leonard Cohen, even if Mr. Cave is starting to look and sound eerily like Neil Diamond. Teddy Thompson understands the idiom better than some people, although I couldn't help wishing that his dad were in this movie instead of him. Martha Wainwright does a lovely, slightly unhinged rendition of 'The Traitor'. The finest, most spine-chilling performance of all is, IMHO, Julie Christensen and Perla Batalla's fragile and dignified version of Cohen's hypocrisy-kicking anthem, 'Anthem'. It brought a tear to my eye, anyway. (And a nice move by the filmmakers: when Batalla sings the line about 'the killers in high places say their prayers out loud', they bring up on the soundtrack a rousing cheer from the audience.)

The really good stuff is Cohen reminiscing about his long life as a poet and musician, accompanied by some priceless vintage Canadian home movie footage. He comes across as both pontifical and dry, which is a neat trick that perhaps only the old can pull off. I especially liked his reading of his baffled and excessively self-deprecating foreword to the recent Chinese translation of his notoriously extravagant second novel 'Beautiful Losers'. It's the spectacle of a wise old man finding his younger self both irresistibly funny and also, sort of, heartbreaking.

Unfortunately the film also has troughs. Not the lowest is Rufus Wainwright's camp-as-all-get-out vaudeville turn on 'Everybody Knows', which if I never hear it again it's still one time too many. (I don't like Rufus Wainwright's voice, but must admit that elsewhere in the film he does a nice job of 'Chelsea Hotel', actually bothering to sing most of the consonants.) The guy in the Handsome Family suffers from the delusion that he can sing like Leonard Cohen, which of course nobody can, and which maybe isn't even something worth aspiring to do. And, as other reviewers have noted, there's a particularly annoying strain of U2-related drivel, with Bono and his guitar player spouting boilerplate about what an amazing guy Leonard is, as if we hadn't gathered that by now. Worst of all, the final performance is the man himself singing the marvellously droll 'Tower of Song', backed by - aaaak! - U2 in their entirety, replete with pointlessly simple-minded guitar solo and the usual groaning from the Bonomeister. To do him credit, Mr. Cohen rides the performance out with an expression of serene disdain on his face. Or maybe I was projecting. At any rate, file under 'Not as good as the original version'.

So now I am a fully-fledged Leonard Cohen fan, and this film has something to do with it. But I wish nobody had thought to involve U2.

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review by: date: 2007-12-21 rating:
Shedding some light on the mysterious Mr Cohen
This film is part concert tribute, part documentary tribute to Leonard Cohen. What is undeinable about it is director Lian Lunson's enthusiasm for her subject: the word and music of Leonard Cohen, and the man himself. The words and music are given admirable voice by various performers: Teddy Thompson, the Wainwrights, Perla Batalla, Beth Orton to name but a few. Each performer brings gives their own take on the song in question (you'll either like it or not, but the same could be said about any Leonard Cohen cover version). What Lunson does very well is give a flavour of Leonard Cohen the man. Here, the documentary does not seek to be comprehensive or didactic: it merely reflects the various facets of Leonard Cohen. Indeed, this is the film's strength: Lunson seems to have take her cue from Leonard Cohen himself, and has not tried to 'pigeon hole' him into this or that category.

The result is a more fluid film, which captures the mecurial nature of the Leonard Cohen. If it seems like at the end, there are still loose ends to tie up, that's because there are, because - thankfully - Leonard Cohen is still giving us great poetry and songs. SOme other reviewers have taken issue with the contributions of U2 and others. I think their contributions are fine, and what is undeniable about them, particularly Bono, is their enhtusiasm for Leonard Cohen and his songs. It's refreshing to see Bono be humbled (as he himself admits he is) by Leonard Cohen. It's great to hear the likes of Edge admit that U2 owes a debt of gratitude to Cohen, without whom, it seems, there would have been no U2. And that's where this film succeeds in pointing out that a lot of the bands beloved of younf people today were initially inspired by this poet from Montreal.

As for the DVD, there is a good director's commentary (from a quirkily cute Lian Lunson), a trailer, and Teddy Thompson rehearsing "Tonight will be fine" in black and white. For those new to Leonard Cohen, this is a great initiation. For those who know his work, this will be a refreshing look at that work, and will give an abiding flavour of one of the most important voices (musically and poetically) of the 20th Century.

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review by: doodlebug date: 2007-07-30 rating:
surprisingly uplifting ....
Whether a Leonard Cohen fan or not, you'll love this beautiful DVD.
Mr Cohen is so obviously accomplished in his use of language and yet his conversation on this DVD shows him to be an humble poet. The artists' comments are not sycophantic, and their interpretive renditions are warmly appreciated by the Poet and audience. Real quality sound, too.

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review by: nicnib date: 2007-05-22 rating:
could've been better
The overall result is very good,it gives a good insight Leonard Cohen.I bought this on the strength that the CD was so good,and i am a huge fan of the Thompson / Wainwright clans.It could have shown more of the performances of the artists,but the really big disapointment was the lack of Teddy Thompson-The Future,the best track on the CD without a doubt but missing from the DVD. WHY?


review by: ladyjudith date: 2007-05-08 rating:
Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man
This is sheer pleasure, with marvellous performances from superb singers - Nick Cave, Jarvis Cocker, Rufus and Martha Wainwirght, everybody. I went to the film, came dancing out at the end, bought the CD, bought more for my friends, and found myself purchasing a multiregion DVD player in order to enjoy the film all over again. Darlings, buy ten of each because you'll want to give it to EVERYBODY!

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