‘Pavements’ (2024)
Of all the bands in the rock canon, few would seem less suited to the big-screen biography treatment than Pavement; with its rolled-out-of-bed fashion sense and singer Stephen Malkmus’ smirking delivery, the ’90s lo-fi pioneers often seemed to be making fun of the very idea of rock stardom. Fortunately, the band found a like-minded collaborator in Alex Ross Perry, director of the not-really-Courtney-Love biopic “Her Smell” (2019). In the aptly titled “Pavements,” Perry surrounds footage of the band rehearsing for its 2022 reunion tour with fragments imagining more “traditional” tributes. There’s a snooty downtown art exhibit (“Pavements 33-22”) collecting artifacts real and fake from the band’s past; an off-Broadway jukebox musical (“Slanted! Enchanted!”) with theater kids giving the old razzle-dazzle to their slacker anthems; and even a glossy Hollywood biopic (“Range Life: A Pavement Story”) starring “Stranger Things” breakout Joe Keery as a hilariously angsty Malkmus. Perry splices these narratives together, along with archival tour and TV footage of the band at its Gen-X peak, to create a sort of cubist take on the “Behind the Music” formula.
Like Pavement itself, “Pavements” is both ragged and often very funny; Keery is a hoot playing himself as a pompous, Austin Butler-esque method actor (at one point demanding a photo of Malkmus’ tongue to better mimic his Californian drawl), as is an uplifting, “Rent”-style rendition of “Spit on a Stranger.” Also like Pavement’s music, though, there’s a deceptive layer of soul underneath all the tape hiss and reflexive irony. Through Perry’s hall of mirrors, a portrait comes into focus of a band deeply uncomfortable on the world stage (and frequently with each other) that is nonetheless compelled to make strangely beautiful music. At more than two hours, “Pavements” is as stuffed as a double-disc reissue, and those not familiar with Pavement’s catalog and lore may find themselves bewildered. For reformed ’90s kids who haven’t hung up their flannel, though, its winking charms will be as comfortable as a used copy of “Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain.” Now go and cut your hair.
At The Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle St., Harvard Square, Cambridge.
‘It’s All Gonna Break’ (2024)
Though not as influential as Pavement, Toronto’s Broken Social Scene was perhaps the quintessential indie rock band of the 2000s; its expressive, shambolic eclecticism made it a lodestar for Millennial college radio DJs, and the dreamy 2002 album cut “Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl” found new generations of fans via the soundtracks to “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” (2010) and “I Saw the TV Glow” (2024). The new documentary “It’s All Gonna Break,” which screens Friday and Saturday at the Somerville, provides a suitably homemade view of the band’s DIY rise and Pitchfork-era peak. Director Stephen Chung, longtime friend and unofficial videographer of the band, was present for many of its early rehearsals and recording sessions, capturing members’ bond and creative process with an uncommon level of intimacy.
As a film, “It’s All Gonna Break” is probably better suited to established fans than to neophytes. True to its name, Broken Social Scene was as much self-contained scene as band, and its revolving cast of dozens of musicians (including future solo pop star Leslie Feist and Metric frontwoman Emily Haines) requires a scorecard to keep track of. What’s more, the framing device of Chung’s relationship with the band and previous attempts to bring them to the screen (the band rejected an early cut of the film all the way back in 2007) veers toward the cutesy and self-indulgent. Luckily, the film leans heavily on the band’s still-invigorating music, and vintage footage of the Toronto scene at its peak will provide a rush of nostalgia for anyone who was young and in love with independent music at the turn of the millennium. One can easily imagine this movie inspiring a contemporary 20-something to find a bunch of friends and start their own weird, sprawling art-rock band – a perfect legacy for an outfit as singular as Broken Social Scene.
At the Somerville Theatre, 55 Davis Square.
Cambridge writer Tom Meek’s reviews, essays, short stories and articles have appeared in WBUR’s The ARTery, The Boston Phoenix, The Boston Globe, The Rumpus, The Charleston City Paper and SLAB literary journal. Tom is also a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics and rides his bike everywhere.
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