The Chills: The Triumph and Tragedy of Martin Phillipps

This documentary is about a beloved cult band from New Zealand. While The Chills are called a band, they are pretty much just Martin Phillipps, who is the lead singer/songwriter and the sole constant member in something like 23 iterations of the band. The Chills were on the cusp of international success during the 1980s, but when they failed to break through, Phillipps descended into alcoholism and drug addiction. So far, pretty much a standard rock and roll story. But the movie follows Phillips as he cleans himself up and releases a couple albums that are a return to form. It's an uplifting story with some great archival footage of the band in its prime. However, the movie seems a little long as there is way too much footage of Phillips puttering around his house and talking to the camera. Still, fans will eat it up, while others probably will not enjoy it nearly as much.

I guess in the modern dark world of content you've got to have the negative so you can pull out your positive. Unfortunately this documentary falls for the trap of dwelling too much on the misfortunes however much they may appeal to modern audiences tastes for the darkness of the world, and not nearly enough time exploring the wonderful things Martin Phillipps achieved in his life time.

We get the boring alcoholism and drugs thing which we've seen in a million shows on musicians and actors. We hardly need to see it again, and importantly they waste time on it when we could be looking into Phillipps as a charming and interesting thinker. How, coming from the tyranny of distance he managed to achieve so much and kept at it again and again when around him fellow travelers fell off?

Martin and the Chills is a story of success and overcoming difficulty to keep doing the thing he seemed destined to, and doing it well in a local climate that predominately thinks of success in arts as irrelevant, even to the level of government. If it's not sport or farming it doesn't matter. That's the location where The Chills had to hone their craft in.

For me Phillipps life won't be defined by this film or all the cliche multi band member fluff. It will be defined by the body of work he left and by the unique person he was and the way he carried himself. I hope we get to see something that shows us that.