Passing Strange (2009, USA)

Coming into Passing Strange, it's important to know that it's not a narrative film - it's the Spike Lee's filmed version of a Broadway musical, a movie that breaks the narrative flow to the point that it occasionally crosses the line into documentary. The musical itself is musician Stew's semi-autobiographical picaresque, the accounting of a young black man's journey from 1970s Los Angeles through Europe and back again. It's a powerful piece, partly in subject matter - grappling with blackness, family and love, and the creation of art - but largely through an amazing cast and band. Stew himself narrates, observing as a version of his younger self (played by the amazing Daniel Breaker) stumbles through self-discovery. A bit too self-serious at times, as all musicals of this sort tend to be, Passing Strange is buoyed by a snarky sense of humor ("my porno films feature fully clothed men making business deals") and the sheer energy of a cast that knows its run is nearly at its end (Lee filmed Passing Strange during the last three shows of its Broadway run). I'm not an expert on concert films, but the closest comparison I can draw to Spike Lee's Passing Strange is Jonathan Demme's Stop Making Sense, and that's not faint praise.