Man at Work

 

Somehow, Living the RomCom got nearly to the end of this year without once mentioning Michael Jackson - no small feat, given the blitzkrieg of overkill information we've been subjected to since his demise this past June (I know, you're thinking: Wait, wait - Michael Jackson died?!  Why didn't anyone say so?).  The jaded Industry Insider demon that lurks within me, hearing that a documentary of his concert rehearsal footage was being rushed into production, heaved a cynical sigh.

Fie on said demon.  I have seen This is It, and I'm here to merely tell you that I'm glad I did.

Once you get past the tearful testimonials from the show's music and dance crew and some slapdash "putting our icon in historical context" footage, you're suddenly thrust into the rehearsal for the show's first number, and here's the thing: When you watch Michael Jackson singing and moving his way through Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' in the privacy of an audience-free rehearsal hall, all the rest of it - the celebrity lunacy, the sordid child abuse trial, the self-induced disfigurement, the everything baggage that usually comes with this superstar's name - falls away.

All you're seeing is an astoundingly talented artist at home (for clearly, the stage was his second, if not his first native residence), doing what only he could do.  And watching this breathes new life into the word awesome.

Honestly, I would rather see Michael Jackson like this - smudged in focus, rough around the edges, half in and out of actual performance mode - than to have seen the finished live show.  Even the circumstantial stylistic choice, born of utility - Jackson is almost always shot in full, with closeups rare, and a lot of hand-held angles - gives you the sense of "the real thing," as opposed to the unreal polished perfection, inevitably crowned with over-the-top pyrotechnics, that a stage show would deliver.

Credit director Kenny Ortega for pulling it together, and for letting This is It, with its few but telling glimpses of MJ-the-human-being, provide us with some sense of intimacy - at least, as close to intimacy as one could get with such a heavily-guarded phenomenon.  His razor-sharp band-leader's acumen (a brief discussion of feel and tempo in The Way You Make Me Feel is priceless), his high-as-the-sky standards (e.g. the awkward apologies about having to conserve his voice), and above all, his joy at being able to dance so well (there are dancers half his age who'll never come close) - all of this leaves you with a credible portrait of an incredibly gifted man at work.

All the glitz that was meant to go with this - the elaborate videos, the sets, the fireworks - is the least interesting and appealing aspect of the experience.  The documentary's low point is a hokey-shlocky "save the world" themed song, all of its bells and whistles being applied to one of Jackson's least effective efforts.  The only moment to savor here comes at the literal end of the performance, when he makes a technical decision about how the last bit should be blocked and handled, and you think - Right! - because the man's showman instincts are so invariably spot on.

There's also a few moments of fun and generosity - watch, for example, as he urges guitarist Orianthi to hit and sustain her highest possible note on Beat It, saying, "This is your moment to shine!" - and of course, there's always a poignant sadness in the subtext.  Why did it all have to go the way it went, given how incandescently alive this man was?

Questions like this have been much on my mind lately in the wake of my father's passing, and they're not really meant to be answered.  As the singer sang, Why? Why?  Tell them that it's human nature. 

Let the critics and historians try to make their sense of Mr. Jackson.  For anybody else asking, What was the deal with this guy?, this sketchy, incomplete, "Michael Unplugged" of an almost-concert film will be one good place to start.

Comments

[ECHenrikson@aol.com]

Billy, I respecet your opinion, but wonder if your own sensitities with you being a musician yourself taint your review of a fellow musical performer.
To me, "This is It" reeks of being a cost recouper. Practice is meant for just that, practice. This movie should have never had a theatrical release. That said, releasing it over the Halloween weenend with no other big releases to complete against was BRILLANT.

I too like the "Human Nature" song, and several others Michael Jackson sings. Glad to hear his song was able to help you in what you are going too now.
Over the years I found Michael Jackson's dancing skills fun to watch, but Michael Jackson was way too far out there for me to gravitate towards as a celebrity personality. Too bad he was so wierd and tragically flawed, we lost a GREAT entertainer. A man who with a little different direction may still be among us, and more popular with the masses. I don't think Michael Jackson's talent was maximised; he could have done better than he did.

- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA

[binnie]

Robbie and I happened to see the movie this afternoon and had the same reaction you did. Exactly right, Billy.

[thegirlinthecafe]

I saw it too and enjoyed it, he has made some fantastic songs. I was wondering the same things. He seemed in good shape and not at all the wreck the media wanted us to believe.

[mernitman]

EC: It's "agree to disagree" time. But I gotta say, the idea that MJ could've been "more popular with the masses" makes me giggle.

Binnie: Thank you! Isn't it fun to be right?

The Girl: Yeah... His death seemed mostly about having the wrong (i.e. celeb-exalted) access to the wrong sleep-aids, period.

[binnie]

Billy - As Robbie will tell you, I'm ALWAYS right!

[Bill]

I've not seen the film so I can't really comment on it except to say I'm not surprised those elements you speak of are in it. For me, Michael Jackson was always too popular and I was too cool. At the time, I couldn't really admit to liking him as an entertainer - I had to like obscure bands. I'm sure you're familiar with people going through that phase of "music as social status."

The truth however was that I always liked his music and the few performances that I saw (video etc.). What is also true is that Michael Jackson's career has run through my entire life from the Jackson 5 to Thriller to the weirdness. I think the final phase, the weirdness, tends to overshadow the rest.

An aspect of that final phase that isn't often spoken of is how we were complicit in it. Was he weird to begin with or did our need for ever bigger stars and greater spectacle of the Anna-Nicole variety bring it about? A bit of both probably.

I think his talent, and the levels he achieved with it, were inevitable because his life from the beginning was entertainment, almost exclusively. A person can't help but get ever better at something when it is done for that long and with that intensity. It came at the cost, however, of not developing other skills, like people and relationships. So in the end he was an astonishingly talented man and an equally astonishingly lonely, isolated man. And so the weirdness follows.

If you're familiar with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's book "Flow," I think when we see Jackson perform that is what we see: flow, a man totally in the moment doing what he absolutely loves and doing it almost without thought, he is so in tune with what he's doing and it comes so naturally. I can watch that over and over, regardless of all the weird business. That stuff is noise; those flow moments are music.