What's the Consensus on Love & Mercy (2014) a Decade Later?

[Julia]

I used several permutations in the search function and didn't really see any threads pop up reviewing the movie so I thought I'd start one. Maybe Im missing something, feel free to shoot me a link but whatever. (It's probably too late to bother changing now, but Im kinda surprised movie reviews don't have a subforum like album and concert reviews here if you don't mind my saying so.)

How do people feel about this movie over ten years later, now that the hype has worn off and the two protagonists are no longer with us? Does it hold up? Here are my thoughts...

The Good (IE the Sixties)

The 60s scenes are almost all fantastic. Paul Dano is perfectly cast as Brian, as are the actors they got for Mike, VDP, Murrie, Hal and Carol Kaye. I think maybe Paul's only flaw (and this is probably more a writing/directing thing) is he's not given enough opportunity to show Brian's fun side. Because the movie is forced to spend so much time in the 80s, more on that later, they needed to get across his vulnerability and breakdown. I get it, and he's great at depicting that aspect of Brian, but we needed more of the cool, whimsical, charismatic side I feel. I can't imagine this version of Brian smoking hash in the tent and making everybody laugh, turning all these disparate, accomplished men in the industry into true believers of SMiLE through sheer force of personality and some fragmented acetates alone.

What inspired this post in the first place is I was watching the scene on YouTube where Brian demos GOK to Murry and is shot down. I love how after Brian leaves, the camera lingers on Murry for a second looking regretful and lonely, like he knows he's driving everyone away but doesn't know any other way to be. Murry's a complicated figure that it's so easy to get wrong, but there are layers. He was a hardened bitter man, frustrated in his ambitions, traumatized from losing an eye, probably beaten himself growing up. I do think he loved his kids in his own way and offered some good advice here and there (speeding up Caroline No was absolutely the right call in my book) but was conditioned to domineering violence and bullying. He was spiteful after getting fired and wanted to hurt Brian as much as that hurt him. Probably he didn't particularly want kids but it was pre-pill, where that was the cost of having sex, so him selling Sea of Tunes was justified in his own mind as "you're paying me back for all the food and clothes I bought ya!" Whatever his many faults, Murry's a tragic figure in my eyes who deserves a complex portrayal and I think this movie nailed it in the short time it had to work with.

Mike looks almost exactly life-like and I appreciate how the actor is able to make you feel his intimidating presence (well attested to by VDP, the Redwood guys, etc) without him directly threatening anyone. This is a dead-on portrayal of how he probably made others uncomfortable and brought imposing vibes into the room even if his concerns were valid and even when giving a compliment (the GV demo at the sandbox scene). I think this perfectly solves the problem of how to depict a Mike who was both entitled to (and even somewhat correct in) questioning Brian's actions, but still comes off as an unnecessarily negative figure everyone associates with bad feelings that killed the enthusiasm. If Brian is Jay Gatsby, the ostentatious eccentric nouve riche dreamer, then Mike embodies Tom Buchanan to a tee.

The Meh (IE the Eighties)

What ruins it for me are the discordant, noticeably inferior, less dramatically satisfying and time-wasting 80s scenes. I think the movie needed to pick a lane and stay with it, and any bozo would say "pick the 60s scenes, that's the dramatic arc of the band, that's the Brian people want to see!" but I strongly suspect their hands were tied. I don't have proof but Im willing to bet a condition of the Wilson estate (ie Melinda) was "include her or we don't sign off." And that's really a shame because, while Im sure she was a great lady in person and Im eternally grateful she helped save Brian and perhaps she deserves her own movie for all that...it just eats into precious screentime and isn't as interesting. When Marilyn barely gets any screen-presence and certainly no time to shine, making Melinda a co-protagonist was a bizarre choice unless there was some behind the scenes dictations going on. As AGD has reminded us too, there are NO SOURCES for these sequences except her word.

With regard to the 80s-antagonist, the problem is where Murry comes off as a loathsome yet pitiable figure as the sources attest to, Landy is a cartoon villain. Maybe he truly was that evil in day to day life, certainly his actions are inexcusably monstrous and I know Melinda said they had to tone it down or no one would believe it. But purely looking at this as a movie that must conform to (or purposefully subvert) the "rules" of drama, he isn't compelling as an antagonist. I think Paul Giamotti plays him well but he isn't given a three-dimensional character to work with.

Melinda is the opposite, she's a full-blown Mary Sue. Im not even getting into whatever qualities the real life woman may or may not have had, but it makes for a really boring story when the person we're following can do no wrong. A review I saw online once said "there's like a two-minute conversation where Melinda talks to Brian's cleaning lady--who wants this in a Beach Boys movie?" The scene that always breaks my suspension of disbelief is when Landy shows up and starts throwing a fit at the car dealership with the manager RIGHT THERE and he doesn't do anything. Doesn't tell them to beat it, doesn't call the cops or threaten to, just lets these goons scare away any potential customers and threaten one of his top employees until SHE scares them off. Then he meekly says "uh so what you wanna do?" and with a very propagandist flair she answers nonchalantly "I want to sell some cars." It's such a transparently manipulative scene "ooh isn't Melinda cool, everybody?!?" that Im very doubtful happened that way if at all. Anytime a writer has to telegraph THIS HARD that we're meant to think a character is badass, perfect and oh-so-likable it always backfires.

[ASIDE:] In hindsight this could even be seen as a harbinger of one of the most insufferable trends of the last ten-odd years in film, the forced "strong independent woman" archetype who, if you don't like them, it's only because you're a misogynist incel who needs to shut up and make way for the future (which is female, hashtag). The mainstream became conscious of this in 2016 with the all-female Ghostbusters, which to this day I think is a not-insignificant factor in getting Trump elected. Then there was Rey Palpatine, Brie Larson, all the "deconstructed" heroes of yesterday up through Indiana Jones getting upstaged in his own movie by a homely British chick that no one liked. Not to go off on too big a tangent but this has the same energy, it's a turnoff for me at least and I suspect many others, but we can't speak of it due to the political climate of the leftwing today. I hope we're all adults here, to where I don't need to profess that I admire a lot of female characters and real life women. It's just the ones that are transparently embodying an agenda and/or just badly written in their lack of flaws or setbacks, who bother me. Even from a perspective that's sympathetic to egalitarianism, this is just not an effective strategy, as evidenced by the backlash to such characters and the so-called "woke" (which is more accurately "4th wave intersectional feminist") agenda in media lately. [/ASIDE]

The Rest (Conclusion & Suggestions)

John Cusack, despite what I've heard people say, did great. Ive seen a ton of late-stage Brian interviews, especially lately, and he nailed those distinct mannerisms like no one else. The other BBs have absolutely nothing to do--Al doesn't even say anything in the entire runtime, the poor guy. (A dedicated '60s film could've had him introduce Brian to SJB at least, and maybe complain about having to make animal sounds.) There's no way people would recognize who's who among them unless they came in knowing the story (and it ought to work in such a way that non-fans can not only follow but are inspired to become fans).

Its really a shame because all the pieces were there to make a great movie if they'd just picked a story and fleshed it out. The 60s scenes are everybody's favorite, what everyone wants to see, but they're rushed and not as effective as they could've been either due to a poor scripting decision or (I suspect) to fuel Melinda's ego. Now we may never get another chance, and if we do they may never have as great a cast or set design and direction. Things like this just irritate me, where you had all the pieces in play but botched it with a flawed script. (Happens ALL THE TIME nowadays.) Even if we assume keeping the 80s scenes was a good idea, why does it end with them driving to a random cul-de-sac, getting out of the car they just got into, just to kiss? Why didn't they tie in BWPS to bring the stories together--all it would've taken was a "title card" explaining that Melinda helped Brian conquer his demons and then play some of that music or even show concert footage over the credits. One little change like that makes it so much better.

I can understand why the Vosse Posse members can't all be there, especially in the crunched timeframe, but there really should've been like an analog of Anderle-Vosse(& maybe Daro or Taylor) at least, as the hip friend whose validation Brian seeks and receives but the other guys don't trust. Someone whose departure clearly signals to the audience that SMiLE is dead-dead (after a period of desperately trying to carry on alone without Van Dyke). Plus maybe an analog of Williams-Siegel-Robbins as the outsider journalist who creates the myth. The SMiLE sessions can and probably should jumble chronology around for the sake of capturing the descent, where it starts mostly professional and music based, slowly intercut some of Brian eccentricities and people's inability to understand, then the ratio gradually flows in favor of total erratic goofy chaos and no releasable music is getting done anymore. A scene or two of Brian getting everybody to do the fish chants or veggie fight and they keep asking "Brian, what does this have to do with anything?"

This movie may still be liked or even loved by us uber-fans (not sure, why Im asking) but it seems to be forgotten in the general public. It has a 7.4 on IMDb which for a movie made at this time, when that site was still the #1 place for movies online, is "alright-to-good" level. (The site had a huge recency bias especially then, to where anything post-2000 that was "good" usually went to 8 stars and beyond, while great lesser-known films could get stuck with 5s and 6s.) I enjoy it for what it is, but it's not one of my favorite biopics (that's Lawrence of Arabia, then Goodfellas, Ed Wood, Oppenheimer, Raging Bull, Amadeus, Gandhi, the Aviator...) even though Brian is arguably my biggest hero. Similarly, I wouldn't recommend it to people *as a movie* unless they were already fans of him independently, and even then I'd have some caveats ("you might like this, but it's sorta two movies stuck together and one's way better than the other...").

Just my opinion. Curious to hear others...

[Zenobi]

Really excellent review, Julia. I happen to agree with you 200% on everything about this movie, but it's not the main reason I like it. It's the thoughtfulness, and the quality of the writing. ACE, 10/10 on your review. 

[Julia]

Really excellent review, Julia. I happen to agree with you 200% on everything about this movie, but it's not the main reason I like it. It's the thoughtfulness, and the quality of the writing. ACE, 10/10 on your review. 

I really appreciate the kind words! Thanks so much!

[BJL]

I haven't seen it in ten years... so I can only share my impressions from then. I planned to re-watch it this summer, actually, but my watchlist is so long and I didn't end up getting to it.

What I will say, is that at the time I thought it was a goshdarn miracle. I absolutely loved it, and considered it immediately amongst my favorite movies, although always with the caveat that as a rabid Beach Boys fan I am an inherently compromised judge, of course. But I consider it among the best narrative movies I've ever seen about music. And as an officially authorized biopic of a major baby boomer musician - I mean, compared to the Queen and Elton John and whatever other biopics of that ilk? Amazing. Just the fact that they decided to make an art film and not a Beach Boys blockbuster was a major win. I think in terms of how the movie is and will be seen by general audiences, it was pretty obviously aiming to be a cult kind of film - more for the Portrait of a Lady on Fire audience than the Marvel audience. In that context, I imagine it still does and always will have a level of interest, because people interested in Brian Wilson will seek it out, and because it has close to career-best performances from two pretty legendary leads.

I don't want to say too, too much about the film itself, because like I said, I haven't seen it since 2014. But at the time, I did not think the 60s scenes were better than the 80s scenes. I mean, on some level I enjoyed them more as a fan because of what they inherently are. But I felt that what made the film so powerful was the balance and contrast between Dano and Cusack's performances, and ultimately I think I definitely would have said then that giving the two stories equal weight was the right call. And my recollection is that I felt some of the best scenes were in the 80s section (that double date scene!)

Re: John Cusack, I remember reading reviews at the time and thinking exactly what you say, that Cusack absolutely nailed Brian's mannerisms, and that reviewers who saw his acting as affected were actually just struggling to wrap their minds around the *reality* of how Brian Wilson looked and acted at that moment. I definitely felt at the time that Elizabeth Banks and Melinda's character were the film's weak point, and that it was the writing's fault at bottom, so I would have agreed with you there. As far as Landy - he is the only person in the Beach Boys story that I believe really was evil. I mean, obviously he was an intelligent, complicated person with complex motivations, but what he did was truly just... evil. He was a psychiatrist who took advantage of a mentally ill patient in an absolutely terrible way in order to feed his own ego and make money, and he didn't do it in a gentle way, either. Everything about his behavior in that period was despicable.

I wouldn't recommend it as a movie to a casual movie fan (but again, I really don't think that was the intended audience. This was a ten million dollar movie that made 30 million dollars. It wasn't trying to be Rocketman, a 40 million dollar film that made 200 million). But I do and have recommend it to people who like art and independent cinema. And I absolutely believed at the time it would stand the test of time. Hopefully I will have a chance to watch it again this winter and see if I still feel that way!

[juggler]

L&M is quite consciously two different movies. The film's pitch-perfect reenactment of the recording sessions Pet Sounds/Good Vibrations/Smile era was like a dream come true for the hardcore fans.  The attention to detail in those scenes was over-the-top amazing, right down to Mike Love's driving gloves.

To me, the Landy era stuff made for a less interesting film and was a little too Melinda-as-savior saccharine for my taste.
 
However, it's difficult for us in the hardcore fan zone to watch a movie like this and judge it as a standalone work devoid of all the contexts of which we are aware and perhaps have preexisting opinions.

In another thread about this film a number of years ago, I mentioned that I first watched the movie with my father who was about a decade older than BW and was not a fan per se.  But my father who'd been a singer in a noted choral group in his youth found the '60s studio scenes quite fascinating from a semi-professional point of view.  He also seemed to enjoy the Landy era story purely as a human-interest story.  So, it was interesting to me that my dad, as a non-fan with no particular "dog in the fight," really liked the film (maybe even better than I did).  So from a filmmaking point of view, if it was aimed at a very general audience with no particular biases other than perhaps an interest in or appreciation of music), I'd say that it succeeded quite well

[rab2591]

When it first came out I saw it like 4 or 5 times in the theater. That probably sounds insane (and it really may be) but I just remember thinking, “I finally have a way to show my friends and family why The Beach Boys are so important to me” - so I went with various friends and family during the few weeks it was in the theaters. Sadly, I haven’t really felt a pull to rewatch it much since it was in the theaters. I did buy the blu-ray immediately when it came out and watched it a couple times, but it’s been almost a decade (wow!) since I’ve seen it fully.

First I want to say that this movie was a blessed gift to us fans. Honestly the pieces coming together for this film is a miracle…And especially after stint of made-for-tv Beach Boys biopics that are terrible, and the Aaron Eckhart Dennis Wilson movie that was never realized (perhaps thankfully), I think us fans were kinda not expecting much (if anything at all) and what we got was a masterpiece (relative to other music biopics). While there is room for criticism in everything, I think this project absolutely could’ve been a bonafide disaster, and instead we got a coherent and beautiful film that didn’t stick to the usual music-biopic trope (at least, in terms of artistic vision and chronological narrative)…and thus this movie receives mostly praise and thanks from me.

Second, the crew that worked on this film is a dream-team. Bill Pohlad, being one of the producers for Malick’s ‘The Tree of Life’, was a bold choice (as he had no real standout directorial work before ‘Love & Mercy’ to my knowledge) - but being close to Malick’s work made me hopeful about this choice (and it seemed to pay off well). The editor is most famously known for his work on ‘Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’ (incidentally another movie that weaves back and forth through a timeline) did a phenomenal job. Atticus Ross doing the score was a perfect choice. I mean, we could’ve gotten a movie with some ‘London Symphony Orchestra covers The Beach Boys’ but instead, we got an incredibly well thought-out and deep score that wasn’t stereotypical and yet it still had a powerful impact on the film.

Why have I not seen this film in a decade? Honestly, I think it’s that the last ten years of the fandom have wore me out. Partly, I have had incredible changes in my life and I have less time for this music. But also, the cliques, drama, over-the-top opinions have just grated on me for years and I’ve slowly realized that the world of the Beach Boys music doesn’t bring me the joy it once did. I think this movie just reminds me of a darker time in my fandom life when there was a lot of petty drama going on, and those memories are just attached to this movie for me, and thus I kind of avoid it.

Also regarding the 7.4 IMDB score (from 45,000 people), I don’t know how that is calculated, whether solely user reviews or what, but Rotten Tomatoes (which shows both critic review averages and user averages) gives it a critic average of 89% from over 250 critics, and an 85% from over 10,000 users (which is pretty incredible). Not that that has any bearing on the IMDB score, but just wanted to throw out some other review scores so we didn’t just see the lower one. I remember after Brian Wilson died the movie rocketed up to or near #1 on Apple's top-selling movie chart - so obviously regular people do watch this movie as well...I think it's just like any music biopic, you can't really expect it to be on the public scope for a long period of time.

There is a video from Elliot Roberts, here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j68ZIE2YRW4) that has over half-a-million views that makes the case for why ‘Love and Mercy’ is the best music biopic ever made. I did watch this video some 4 years ago when it came out, but I kinda forget what his points are - though I remember agreeing with them at the time - but if anyone wants to check it out, I do recommend it.

[BJL]

When it first came out I saw it like 4 or 5 times in the theater. That probably sounds insane (and it really may be) but I just remember thinking, “I finally have a way to show my friends and family why The Beach Boys are so important to me” - so I went with various friends and family during the few weeks it was in the theaters. Sadly, I haven’t really felt a pull to rewatch it much since it was in the theaters. I did buy the blu-ray immediately when it came out and watched it a couple times, but it’s been almost a decade (wow!) since I’ve seen it fully.

First I want to say that this movie was a blessed gift to us fans. Honestly the pieces coming together for this film is a miracle…And especially after stint of made-for-tv Beach Boys biopics that are terrible, and the Aaron Eckhart Dennis Wilson movie that was never realized (perhaps thankfully), I think us fans were kinda not expecting much (if anything at all) and what we got was a masterpiece (relative to other music biopics). While there is room for criticism in everything, I think this project absolutely could’ve been a bonafide disaster, and instead we got a coherent and beautiful film that didn’t stick to the usual music-biopic trope (at least, in terms of artistic vision and chronological narrative)…and thus this movie receives mostly praise and thanks from me.

Second, the crew that worked on this film is a dream-team. Bill Pohlad, being one of the producers for Malick’s ‘The Tree of Life’, was a bold choice (as he had no real standout directorial work before ‘Love & Mercy’ to my knowledge) - but being close to Malick’s work made me hopeful about this choice (and it seemed to pay off well). The editor is most famously known for his work on ‘Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’ (incidentally another movie that weaves back and forth through a timeline) did a phenomenal job. Atticus Ross doing the score was a perfect choice. I mean, we could’ve gotten a movie with some ‘London Symphony Orchestra covers The Beach Boys’ but instead, we got an incredibly well thought-out and deep score that wasn’t stereotypical and yet it still had a powerful impact on the film.

Why have I not seen this film in a decade? Honestly, I think it’s that the last ten years of the fandom have wore me out. Partly, I have had incredible changes in my life and I have less time for this music. But also, the cliques, drama, over-the-top opinions have just grated on me for years and I’ve slowly realized that the world of the Beach Boys music doesn’t bring me the joy it once did. I think this movie just reminds me of a darker time in my fandom life when there was a lot of petty drama going on, and those memories are just attached to this movie for me, and thus I kind of avoid it.

Also regarding the 7.4 IMDB score (from 45,000 people), I don’t know how that is calculated, whether solely user reviews or what, but Rotten Tomatoes (which shows both critic review averages and user averages) gives it a critic average of 89% from over 250 critics, and an 85% from over 10,000 users (which is pretty incredible). Not that that has any bearing on the IMDB score, but just wanted to throw out some other review scores so we didn’t just see the lower one. I remember after Brian Wilson died the movie rocketed up to or near #1 on Apple's top-selling movie chart - so obviously regular people do watch this movie as well...I think it's just like any music biopic, you can't really expect it to be on the public scope for a long period of time.

There is a video from Elliot Roberts, here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j68ZIE2YRW4) that has over half-a-million views that makes the case for why ‘Love and Mercy’ is the best music biopic ever made. I did watch this video some 4 years ago when it came out, but I kinda forget what his points are - though I remember agreeing with them at the time - but if anyone wants to check it out, I do recommend it.

I could basically have written this post! I didn't see it quite so many times in theaters, and I wasn't worn down by the fandom so much as just slipped out of it naturally. But other than that... I remember watching that Elliot Roberts video when it came out! Also completely agree that Atticus Ross's score is perfect and adds so much to the experience of the movie.

[Julia]

I didn't see it in theaters myself, for whatever reason. (I was a broke college kid at the time, and while I remember a friend sending me info when the movie was in production, knowing I was a fan, the thing came and went from theaters without my knowing.)

Im probably guilty of being the strongly opinionated type. Hope that doesn't turn people off too much, it's just how I express myself--very wordy and passionately for better or worse.  

I wonder if other fandoms, especially for bands, have the same drama as the beach boys haha. If not, I wonder if it's because of that semi-unique Brian/Mike split of personalities, attitudes towards suitable material and politics. (If Brian is a conservative and/or right-winger he has the good sense to shut up about it. Not because right=bad but because it's usually pretty dumb to be political as an entertainment figure. As Michael Jordan once said "Republicans buy sneakers too." However, Mike and his camp openly flaunt their support of Reagan and Trump, which adds a political texture to their fandom and invites bickering about it among the wider community.) Otherwise I wonder if SMiLE and the exhausting never ending discussions it invites might sometimes be a detriment, as every time a newbie comes in with the same "Baby's first SMiLE theory" it can get a little annoying to those who've poured over the thing for decades I suppose. I'd like to think if a youngin came in with the usual "Mike killed SMiLE, my fanmix solves everything" mentality I wouldn't be as big of a jerk to them as others were to me, but I'd be lying if I wouldn't think on some small level "oh you sweet summerchild..."

I agree the movie could've been a disaster and it's a lot better than any contemporary movie about or inspired by the Beatles so we have that going for us, which is nice. Around the same time the Beatles had "Across the Universe" which I thought was a pile of sh*t. (Now watch, it's somebody's favorite movie. Sorry in advance   )

[JK]

I didn't see it in theaters myself, for whatever reason. (I was a broke college kid at the time, and while I remember a friend sending me info when the movie was in production, knowing I was a fan, the thing came and went from theaters without my knowing.)

Im probably guilty of being the strongly opinionated type. Hope that doesn't turn people off too much, it's just how I express myself--very wordy and passionately for better or worse.  

I wonder if other fandoms, especially for bands, have the same drama as the beach boys haha. If not, I wonder if it's because of that semi-unique Brian/Mike split of personalities, attitudes towards suitable material and politics. (If Brian is a conservative and/or right-winger he has the good sense to shut up about it. Not because right=bad but because it's usually pretty dumb to be political as an entertainment figure. As Michael Jordan once said "Republicans buy sneakers too." However, Mike and his camp openly flaunt their support of Reagan and Trump, which adds a political texture to their fandom and invites bickering about it among the wider community.) Otherwise I wonder if SMiLE and the exhausting never ending discussions it invites might sometimes be a detriment, as every time a newbie comes in with the same "Baby's first SMiLE theory" it can get a little annoying to those who've poured over the thing for decades I suppose. I'd like to think if a youngin came in with the usual "Mike killed SMiLE, my fanmix solves everything" mentality I wouldn't be as big of a jerk to them as others were to me, but I'd be lying if I wouldn't think on some small level "oh you sweet summerchild..."

I agree the movie could've been a disaster and it's a lot better than any contemporary movie about or inspired by the Beatles so we have that going for us, which is nice. Around the same time the Beatles had "Across the Universe" which I thought was a pile of sh*t. (Now watch, it's somebody's favorite movie. Sorry in advance   )

This post sums it all up wonderfully well (including your good self). I've been following the recent spate of mainly SMiLE-related posts from the sidelines and it's a wonderful read believe me.

[Julia]

Thanks John, I appreciate it. But you know, the more I try to understand SMiLE the more I realize we don't know (like the AGD quote). It's like Jesus and the Gospels--we can only speculate based on the meager accounts we have, and since two of them heavily borrow from Mark (and likely a separate "Q" source since there's a lot shared in Matthew/Luke independent of Mark) it's even less. We can write thousands of essays and books over two thousand years and it's certainly interesting and may reveal some new insight, but nothing can fill in the blank spaces. We'll never know what he did between boyhood and his baptism, what exactly was his relationship with Mary Magdalene, what his brothers were up to, etc. So, while Im as big a SMiLE fanatic as anyone and love the discussion I'll also admit in the spirit of empathy, I can understand perhaps some of the "ugh another one" sentiment of the older posters on the board when I came on the scene. Not saying they couldn't have been nicer about or just not participated but yeah. I really do wonder if the Beatles fandom has similar tiffs about George versus McCartney or "what would Get Back have been?" I've never participated in a Beatles forum.

Someone mentioned other band biopics, particularly the ones about Queen and Elton John. I never saw the former but heard bad things--I think the problem is it was authorized. I saw the latter on the recommendation of my dad and it has sentimental value as it was one of my first dates with my now-husband but I could go the rest of my life never seeing it again. It was good not great. I realize re-reading this post I may've come off as too down on L&M. I'd still give it a solid ~7 out of 10 for a fan, maybe slightly lower like 6 for someone with no knowledge of Brian going in. It's a solid, good movie with moments of greatness. My misgivings are I think it could've been a 10/10 all-time masterpiece if it focused on what worked best and cut the semi-confusing (at least mildly disrupting) dual-story structure.

[mike s]

I don't think Smile is as mysterious as people think.  When you look at the tracklist and session logs and contemorary press and hear what was recorded I think there's a pretty clear picture.

Details are missing but the body of it is there I think.

[BJL]

Someone mentioned other band biopics, particularly the ones about Queen and Elton John. I never saw the former but heard bad things--I think the problem is it was authorized. I saw the latter on the recommendation of my dad and it has sentimental value as it was one of my first dates with my now-husband but I could go the rest of my life never seeing it again. It was good not great. I realize re-reading this post I may've come off as too down on L&M. I'd still give it a solid ~7 out of 10 for a fan, maybe slightly lower like 6 for someone with no knowledge of Brian going in. It's a solid, good movie with moments of greatness. My misgivings are I think it could've been a 10/10 all-time masterpiece if it focused on what worked best and cut the semi-confusing (at least mildly disrupting) dual-story structure.

For what it's worth, I took your initial review as fair, respectful, and considered. I think the reason you got such a strong response from a few posters isn't because your review was negative, but because of the question in your title. You asked for the fan consensus, and so I for one wanted to be a part of that consensus by expressing how deeply I loved the film at the time.

Anyway, I thought your take on the movie was not exactly negative. After all, you basically said, it's good, but it's no Lawrence of Arabia / Goodfellas / Ed Wood etc. The fact that you felt you could make such a comparison speaks volumes. Can you imagine saying, of the Elton John movie (which I also very much enjoyed as a date at the theater), it was good, but it was no Lawrence of Arabia? Of course you couldn't, no one would ever say that. Just saying a movie *doesn't* belong on that list is a high compliment!

[Julia]

I don't think Smile is as mysterious as people think.  When you look at the tracklist and session logs and contemorary press and hear what was recorded I think there's a pretty clear picture.

Details are missing but the body of it is there I think.

Yes and no. The music's all there minus the ~5 (I think) missing reels and handful of unfinished parts like CIFOTM' vocals and SU' second half backing track. I think the mystery is we only have such bare bones accounts of the primaries but there's such intense interest in the topic so things the earliest accounts didn't feel the need to clarify never got entered into the historical record. Stuff like "how often did Brian and Van brainstorm" / "what exact date did Van leave, come back and leave again" / "what did the other BB besides Mike really think/say" / "who talked to Taylor" / "when & why did the Smiley aesthetic develop and what were those sessions like" / "did the band really almost break up over SU and if so who was on what side" / "were the spoken word pieces on Psychedelic Sounds and 'that ones for you, punk' intended to go on the LP?" things like that, maybe not that important in terms of "whats the corpus of SMiLE music" but potentially very important for the history of the band.

And trying to find any kind of clue to any of these (and far more) minutia ends up revealing just how bare and/or how contradictory the record really is. There's multiple different versions of stories like who told Brian there's copyrighted music in Look, how SU got its name, which SMiLE songs were written when and when Van and Brian started writing, when it changed from Dumb Angel to SMiLE... I don't mean to be pretentious in my comparison to the Gospels but as a fan of academic biblical scholarship it's really interesting how similar they are. (Any historical study where you're working from several primary sources is like this to some extent I presume!) Like there's clearly analogous stories but significant details are changed which gives the stories entirely different meaning, changes the character of the actors and it can lead to widely different conclusions depending on which version you give precedent to. I think the fact that Brian never kept anyone completely in the loop and is such a bad interviewee exacerbates this issue, combined with VDP never being put on the record until something like a decades later plus he's run hot and cold on Brian over the years. If not for Vosse, Anderle and Siegel (like Mark, John and Q for Jesus) we'd know so very little of what went down.

And thanks BJL, I appreciate it 

[mike s]

Oh I meant more about the tunes not the lore.  I just think the content of the tracks isn't as mysterious as once thought.  IIGS was once a complete mystery but not now for instance.
 

I don't think Smile is as mysterious as people think.  When you look at the tracklist and session logs and contemorary press and hear what was recorded I think there's a pretty clear picture.

Details are missing but the body of it is there I think.

Yes and no. The music's all there minus the ~5 (I think) missing reels and handful of unfinished parts like CIFOTM' vocals and SU' second half backing track. I think the mystery is we only have such bare bones accounts of the primaries but there's such intense interest in the topic so things the earliest accounts didn't feel the need to clarify never got entered into the historical record. Stuff like "how often did Brian and Van brainstorm" / "what exact date did Van leave, come back and leave again" / "what did the other BB besides Mike really think/say" / "who talked to Taylor" / "when & why did the Smiley aesthetic develop and what were those sessions like" / "did the band really almost break up over SU and if so who was on what side" / "were the spoken word pieces on Psychedelic Sounds and 'that ones for you, punk' intended to go on the LP?" things like that, maybe not that important in terms of "whats the corpus of SMiLE music" but potentially very important for the history of the band.

And trying to find any kind of clue to any of these (and far more) minutia ends up revealing just how bare and/or how contradictory the record really is. There's multiple different versions of stories like who told Brian there's copyrighted music in Look, how SU got its name, which SMiLE songs were written when and when Van and Brian started writing, when it changed from Dumb Angel to SMiLE... I don't mean to be pretentious in my comparison to the Gospels but as a fan of academic biblical scholarship it's really interesting how similar they are. (Any historical study where you're working from several primary sources is like this to some extent I presume!) Like there's clearly analogous stories but significant details are changed which gives the stories entirely different meaning, changes the character of the actors and it can lead to widely different conclusions depending on which version you give precedent to. I think the fact that Brian never kept anyone completely in the loop and is such a bad interviewee exacerbates this issue, combined with VDP never being put on the record until something like a decades later plus he's run hot and cold on Brian over the years. If not for Vosse, Anderle and Siegel (like Mark, John and Q for Jesus) we'd know so very little of what went down.

And thanks BJL, I appreciate it 

[Julia]

Oh I meant more about the tunes not the lore.  I just think the content of the tracks isn't as mysterious as once thought.  IIGS was once a complete mystery but not now for instance.

Ah I gotcha. Yeah beyond the missing reels and unfinished parts...it seems we have what we have.

[BJL]

Oh I meant more about the tunes not the lore.  I just think the content of the tracks isn't as mysterious as once thought.  IIGS was once a complete mystery but not now for instance.
 

I don't think Smile is as mysterious as people think.  When you look at the tracklist and session logs and contemorary press and hear what was recorded I think there's a pretty clear picture.

Details are missing but the body of it is there I think.

Yes and no. The music's all there minus the ~5 (I think) missing reels and handful of unfinished parts like CIFOTM' vocals and SU' second half backing track.

I mean, I agree on one level. But there's another part of me that thinks we've just tricked ourselves into thinking we understand this music and what it might or could have been. Tricked ourselves into thinking what we have is close to what would have been.

But look at the difference between the Good Vibrations early takes and session outtakes and the actual final record. Like, all the pieces are there, and its incredible in all its versions. But the final record, it has a focus, a concentrated power, as if it's truly determined to fit a symphony's worth of musical ideas into three minutes, that's almost unique to Brian Wilson's music from this era. Or look at the difference between Cabinessence and Do You Like Worms. One is finished, one is not. That's it. That's the only difference. They're both amazing, and yet, on some hard to define level, they're light years apart.

We just can't handle the uncertainty of the most likely version of reality, which is that... I'll put it this way, there are songs on Pet Sounds that stand obviously, for lack of a better word, above the rest. But there's no song that doesn't fit, that doesn't sound finished, polished, like it 100% belongs on the record and it would be foolish to change a note. (Kind of like the difference Julia was describing in this thread between a movie that's perfect and movie that you can see how it could have been perfect). There wouldn't have been on Smile, either. We know a hell of a lot more about Great Shape than we did 30 years ago, but we still have absolutely no idea how Brian gets from the pieces we have to a song that belongs next to Cabinessence, Good Vibrations, or the cantina mix of heroes. But I absolutely believe he would have, in a world where he finished Smile in 1967.

Last week Julia went on something of a brilliant fools errand trying to reconstruct Part 2 of Surf's Up from Brian's experiments. Which is like trying to write a history of the first Lee administration after the South wins the Civil War. There are no answers, because there were never answers, because it didn't happen. BUT Julia's work was the opposite of a waste of time. At least for me, personally. For my actual life. Because in light of Julia's enthusiasm and research and ideas, I listened to a mix of Surf's Up with the moaning horns overdubbed (which Julia later told me actually wasn't timed nearly as well as it could have been!). And for a moment, I was totally persuaded. I heard a song I've probably listened to 1000 times with fresh ears. And I imagined an alternate reality. Call it Smile alternate reality No. 7,563.

In this alternate reality, Carl asked Brian if they could put Surf's Up on their next album in 1971, and Brian said no, I don't think so. And Carl said, okay Brian, obviously I'm not going to try and finish Surf's Up without you because that would be literally insane and sooooo disrespectful (see Julia's influence again there?). And so Brian didn't remember / didn't have the new idea (because actually we have *no* evidence I know of that it was a 1966 idea) to put the Child vocals on Surf's Up, and the song remained unfinished. Fast forward to the 90s, fan mixers and bootleggers divide themselves into two camps. One camp uses the piano demo on their mixes. It's what we have, they say, it's all we know. It's perfect how it is. The other camp says, look, we have this whole other Surf's Up session! We can't just pretend it doesn't exist! Look how well these moaning horns fit! Obviously this was what Brian planned for Part 2! And it's strange and wild and a little Sonic Youth or whatever, and so all these bootlegs from the 90s have moaning horns overdubbed onto Surf's Up. And so obviously in 2004, when Darian plays Surf's Up for Brian, that is what he plays. And Brian, who does vaguely remember recording something like that, says oh yea, that was it!! It was gonna have all those moaning horns, yea, and moaning strings too, and then the version of Surf's Up on BWPS is filled with insane chromatic horns and like, Day in the Life style strings, and everyone is like, whoa, damn, so that's what it was.

And that alternate reality is just as likely as the one where Brian finishes Surf's Up in 1966. Just as likely.

Which is also why no, I don't think any other fandom is like this one. Because the Beatles, you know, they were a band releasing albums. A great band releasing great albums, but it's all there, what they did, what they accomplished. Anyone can listen to it. Whatever the hell the Beach Boys were or mean, they were so much more than a band that released albums. They were something else, they mean something else.

[mike s]

'We know a hell of a lot more about Great Shape than we did 30 years ago, but we still have absolutely no idea how Brian gets from the pieces we have to a song that belongs next to Cabinessence, Good Vibrations, or the cantina mix of heroes'

I think IIGS would have been a whimsical collage - the barynyard suite mentioned in '66 - so would never have had the horsepower of those songs.  I think it was supposed to be humorous.  I honestly don't think it would have been that great - more like an 'interval' amongst the heavy stuff.

Same with Elements a bit - a collage although that seemingly would have had some very impressive sections - MOC is obviously brilliant.

[BJL]

'We know a hell of a lot more about Great Shape than we did 30 years ago, but we still have absolutely no idea how Brian gets from the pieces we have to a song that belongs next to Cabinessence, Good Vibrations, or the cantina mix of heroes'

I think IIGS would have been a whimsical collage - the barynyard suite mentioned in '66 - so would never have had the horsepower of those songs.  I think it was supposed to be humorous.  I honestly don't think it would have been that great - more like an 'interval' amongst the heavy stuff.

Same with Elements a bit - a collage although that seemingly would have had some very impressive sections - MOC is obviously brilliant.

Well, yea, but that's exactly my point. Of course that's what looks most likely. I'm not trying to say you're wrong, by any means. It's what we hear. It's what exists. It's what makes sense. And so yea, I can't fault you for saying IIGS would have been four whimsical, vaguely connected fragments of funny farmyard music cut together, a little underwhelming humor interlude.

Or maybe Brian would have cut one or two sections completely, written a new section we can't even imagine, added a mind-bending a cappella break and created something spectacular. Given Brian's perfectionism, his high ambitions for the album, the speed with which he was working, the fact that he clearly considered himself and Van Dyke Parks not to have finished the writing process, and where he took Heroes and Villains and Vegetables in 1967, I've slowly come to believe that fans have been too willing to accept what we hear on the tapes as what Smile would have been. The temptation is just too overwhelming to resist. How can my theory that's based on music that was never recorded possibly compete with your theory based on what Brian put on tape that we've all heard?

But there isn't a moment on Pet Sounds that isn't perfect. I believe Smile would have had a strong humor element, but I don't think it would have had a medley of half-developed fragments run back to back without a clear musical through-line, just because Brian had them laying around and wanted to use them. That's the logic of a bootlegger or a fan mixer - use what you have - it's not the logic of a creative genius working at the height of their power.

[mike s]

'I believe Smile would have had a strong humor element, but I don't think it would have had a medley of half-developed fragments run back to back without a clear musical through-line, just because Brian had them laying around and wanted to use them. '

Well for IIGS a medley of fairly disparate fragments seems in order - he did say barnyard 'suite'.  I mean H&V was in that state upto and including Cantina early '67 - there's nothing we've heard thats a 'proper' song until the single and even that is extremely episodic.

The only half developed bit would be the IIGS fragment itself and remember there's a much fuller take on the Durrie acetates.

'Barnyard suite' is a massive clue.

[Zenobi]

While I mostly agree with BJL, I have a reservation. Namely, IS Pet Sounds perfect because it's complete or do we rather CONSIDER it perfect because it's complete?

Same for Good Vibrations? And Cabinessence?

I'm about to go into full heresy mode here... I'll tackle maybe the biggest totem, Good Vibes. As unbelievably awesome as it is, there was always  something slightly unsatisfactory for me. It is too perfect-sounding, too clean-cut, too carefully calibrated to the millimiter... to the point it ends sounding a bit dry to my ears. It lacks just a bit of breathing space.
I actually prefer the more "dishevelled" GV we hear in BWPS: the additional chant and the wonderfully airy ending add just that breathing space.

When I first listened to Heroes in 1967, liked it a lot, but sensed that something was really amiss. It sounded exactly like what it really was: an abridged version of a longer song. Againg, a bit too dry, but drier. When I discovered the Cantina version, was like: "Now THAT is more like it!"
And, if you leave off for a minute the "idolatry" for the officially released product, you could even admit this: GV and H&V share a feature, i.e. being longer songs forcefully compressed into 3-minutes format, albeit with different results.

A detour about Barnyard: Dae Lims, in its A.I. SMiLE, creates a Barnyard suite which shows HOW it could have turned as awesome as Cabinessence in 1967. Full use of the Boys' voices (especially Mike), dynamic flow, vocalizations seamlessly leading into the sublime "Barnshine" tag (plucked strings version). Even though it's A.I., it's fantastic.

Anyway, perfectionism, even by geniuses, does not always yield perfect results. Sometimes it leads to overcooking things.

If you ask me what's the perfect song, the one where I would not change a single note, it's Wind Chimes. Smiley Smile version.

[mike s]

'GV and H&V share a feature, i.e. being longer songs forcefully compressed into 3-minutes format, albeit with different results'

Couldn't disagree more - both tracks ARE longer songs.  Both work perfectly format wise.  H&V is poorly produced.

As SONGS both are perfectlly sequenced bar the la la las in H&V.