‘Don’t Knock the Rock’ is a music movie festival in Los Angeles founded by indie filmmaker Allison Anders and her musician daughter Tiffany Anders, and the festival always digs deep to find rock documentaries, musicals, and concert films. This year, the festival begins this week through August 25th
In an interview for the LATimes, Allison Anders said:‘The festival came about when Tiffany and I thought we'd like to bring music movies we loved together with live music we loved, we knew we wanted to cater to obsessive music and movie fans with very defined tastes. We knew they would want to see movies on bands and performers who created pop culture, who went out on the edge to do it. And within those parameters the world was open to everything from the roots of rock 'n' roll to wherever it has gone since.’
‘Tiffany and I are generally in perfect sync on the films we select. We know which films our audience will respond to because we are fans, just like they are. It can encompass a wide range of subjects; it can be a film about a single band or artist, or it can be a genre of music, or a scene, which was thriving, in a specific time and place. It can be a cult classic, or about a particular label, club or record store. I don't think we have ever had a year where we didn't have a mix of these sorts of films.’
‘Jay Duplass' film about Kevin Gant is beautiful’, added Tiffany, ‘and this is an artist whom I had never heard of before I saw the film. I was really happy to be introduced to his work and I am even more excited to see Gant play after the screening. I'm also really excited about the Light in the Attic night as well — they not only are an amazing record label but have made two exceptional films, ‘Wheedle's Groove' about the Seattle 1970s soul scene, and ‘The Jim Sullivan Story' — an amazing story about a lost — literally — folk troubadour.’
Beside ‘Kevin’, and ‘The Jim Sullivan Story’, a movie about the disappearance of an LA folk singer and UFO enthusiast, the other highlights of the festival include ‘Bob and the Monster’ about former Thelonius Monster singer Bob Forrest, ‘Rhino Resurrected: The Incredibly Strange Story of the World’s Most Famous Record Store’, a movie about the history of longtime Los Angeles Rhino Records, ‘Better Than Something: Jay Reatard’, the story of punk of Jay Reatard, who died last year at age 29, ‘The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye’, a documentary about Genesis P-Orridge (Psychic TV and Throbbing Gristle) a very influential figure in music, ‘Hit So Hard: The life and Near Death of Patty Schemel’, the drummer for Courtney Love’s band Hole,
‘The fact that a film about these people exists at all is cause to celebrate’, said Tiffany, ‘the fact that people are putting so much into these films about artists that are not pop charters is really admirable, especially in this day and age. The filmmakers are true lovers of their subjects and we get the films to the right audiences, the people who share their enthusiasm.’
Also scheduled is the 20th anniversary screening of the classic ‘1991: The year Punk Broke’, or the year when an almost unknown band called Nirvana was opening for Sonic Youth.
But there are many more to see:
http://www.cinefamily.org/films/dont-knock-the-rock-2011/