Clarence Clemons: Who Do I Think I Am?

Too much slow motion, too many repetitive video clips, too much spacey music, too many white people (and hardly any from the E Street Band), and very little info or insight. Did Clemons not know any black people? One gets the feeling that he didn't, that he inhabited an all white world, but no, you think, that couldn't have been the case, even if he was mostly in rock bands. I am confused as this film states that it was produced by Clemons, yet he died 8yrs before it was released. And??? Nothing about his death, not even the date. Likewise other milestones in his life. This isn't a bio as much as it is an arty vanity project by the director, or seems that way. Even if Clemons planned this film before his death, and recorded some narration, he was not around for its editing, finish, or release, so how much input did he have (or was the reference to Clemons actually his son, the III?). The worst thing anyone can do, it becomes more and more clear to me, is make a bio that is more arty than informational. After all, we want *information* about the person we have given time to find out about, not slow mo echo art stuff. You want an acclaimed documentary director. What is said about Clemons here could be condensed into about 15min. I am reminded of the comedy film which was being edited in the movie All That Jazz, in which a comedian does a riff on the "Help me welcome a huge star... bla bla bla...and a GREAT humanitarian." intro we've all heard a million times. That is pretty much all you have here, which is kind of pathetic, since Clemons wrote and released an autobiography, so we know there is info out there, not to mention, all the people he knew and touched. But many of the people interviewed here just say the exact same things over and over, as if, even though some of them are great songwriters, they are experiencing a massive lack of words (Bruce?). Others, like Joe Walsh, only hung out with him for a year or so, so why is he even in this except as clickbait? Walsh is hardly anyone's idea of a memory bank, esp of the last century. Even Springsteen gets (or gave) little time here and absolutely NO insight into Clemons, the man. For someone who spent hundreds of nights intimately onstage with, and even kissing Clemons, you'd think he'd have something interesting to say.

I'm not a big enough Springsteen fan to know if having a black guy in his band did anything toward improving racism in music, but I well remember when Springsteen hit and it was never my impression that having a prominent black guy did anything that hadn't been done before. Rock and blues bands had had black members before (or even fronted by), so it was all over but the shouting, in 1975. Probably better to ask Clemons his experiences being a black guy in a white world or touring the South then, whether his presence was historic. Asbury Park is a long was from Virginia Beach, where Clemons was born. I am also tired of films that portray a black person as "spiritual", "different with dreads" (describing him in China; heck, I'D be different there), "psychic", and all the other boxes white people seem to be so comfortable putting people of color in. Kind of hypocritical when you think of the central thesis of Bruce and Clemons as game changers for blacks. So this film will be very palatable for white people everywhere, as Clemons is portrayed as what we are most comfortable with. Either delve into what it was really like for Clemons, in a white world, or just give us a portrait of him as a MAN, whether white, black, or purple, and quit stumbling all over yourselves with the racial thing.

After writing this, I have to lower my rating even more. Just no excuse for this kind of drivel for an amazing artist, who helped forge Bruce Springsteen's signature sound, perhaps more than anyone (the question of why Springsteen jettisoned Clemons and The E Street is never answered) and who was a singer/songwriter and in-demand session player, and apparently a great humanitarian with a vibrant inner life, who wanted, as many do, to become more than he was born (spiritually). To distill Clemons down to a repeated slow motion clip of him walking in a white suit or his voice over a lonely highway is like showing BB King sitting, as he did in later years, in his chair on the stage, in a white suit, playing in slow motion and letting it stand in for his music and most of his entire life. There is more to anyone than a few clips and quotes, but this director (and producers) took the supreme lazy way out and some might say, bottom line way, cashing in on a half finished film from the 2010s and a famous name. I will not believe that Clemons left these kinds of instructions for this film, if he indeed left any, as his illness and death was very, very sudden and fast.

This documentary shows the spiritual / religious steps Clarence takes during a religieus retreat in China. If you expect interesting discussions about songs, dialogue with the Boss or great stories about the E Street band... this is not your movie.

A moving, affecting look at a side of Clarence Clemons of which his many fans and admirers likely were unaware, much of it in his own words, centered on a spiritual quest to China long after he'd become a star. I'm not sure we get a really complete view into what made Clarence to tick - don't expect a traditional documentary- but this is a nice portrait of C's worldview as a seeker and friend.