Yikes, this was awful.
As someone who's only listened to a few albums in The Rolling Stones' discography (most without Jones' involvement), I was ready to be convinced that Jones was the true mastermind behind the band, and a musical genius... but the first hour largely fails to present a compelling argument to what made him so great (he played the cool sitar part on Paint it Black is all I can remember - and there are disappointingly no Rolling Stones tracks used, so you just have to hum said sitar part to yourself. Any music examples would have helped the "underrated music genius" argument, but the song rights clearly weren't within the film's budget).
Then it just turns into a tedious and not particularly well made true crime documentary in the last half hour, and even if some interviewees disputed the conspiracies, the ones that did try to push them didn't make many great arguments.
Honestly, Brian Jones seems like a bit of a tag-along, and given that so much great music was made by the band after his departure, I'm thoroughly unconvinced that he was the secret mastermind behind the band. The documentary describes him as being constantly drunk and/or high around (and then after) the time the band started to find popularity, too.
I also remain highly skeptical of any possibility that he was murdered. This documentary tried very hard to put forth that he was misunderstood musical genius + hE wAs MuRdErEd as it's two main arguments, but fails almost completely.
Some really dodgy interviewees, too, who barely even seem to make sense some of the time. ("Brian could resist everything but temptation" one of them sincerely says at one point. That's literally as dumb as the "pain don't hurt" line from Roadhouse).
As someone who's only listened to a few albums in The Rolling Stones' discography (most without Jones' involvement), I was ready to be convinced that Jones was the true mastermind behind the band, and a musical genius... but the first hour largely fails to present a compelling argument to what made him so great (he played the cool sitar part on Paint it Black is all I can remember - and there are disappointingly no Rolling Stones tracks used, so you just have to hum said sitar part to yourself. Any music examples would have helped the "underrated music genius" argument, but the song rights clearly weren't within the film's budget).
Then it just turns into a tedious and not particularly well made true crime documentary in the last half hour, and even if some interviewees disputed the conspiracies, the ones that did try to push them didn't make many great arguments.
Honestly, Brian Jones seems like a bit of a tag-along, and given that so much great music was made by the band after his departure, I'm thoroughly unconvinced that he was the secret mastermind behind the band. The documentary describes him as being constantly drunk and/or high around (and then after) the time the band started to find popularity, too.
I also remain highly skeptical of any possibility that he was murdered. This documentary tried very hard to put forth that he was misunderstood musical genius + hE wAs MuRdErEd as it's two main arguments, but fails almost completely.
Some really dodgy interviewees, too, who barely even seem to make sense some of the time. ("Brian could resist everything but temptation" one of them sincerely says at one point. That's literally as dumb as the "pain don't hurt" line from Roadhouse).