There's about an hour of this movie that's really solid. I liken watching this to a sandwich with a really good filling, but between one slice of bread that's stale, and another slice of bread that's mouldy.
The stale slice of bread is the first 10-15 minutes. It establishes things in a messy, somewhat confusing way, and I thought I was going to be in for something lousy. Things do shift somewhat into focus eventually, though, and lead into...
...the surprisingly good filling of the sandwich/movie, which is the hour in approximately the middle that focuses exclusively on The Triffids. The music selections are great, a lot of the footage used is inspired and aesthetically pleasing, and the not quite rise and not quite fall story of a band no one knew what to do with (at the time) is told very well. Isolate this chunk and you've got yourself a very satisfying 1-hour documentary on the band itself.
Things fall apart once the film focuses on McComb's post Triffids life, and eventual tragic demise. It's a difficult subject and many interviewees appear confused or uncomfortable when talking about it, and then that leads to a film that ends up being wildly unsatisfying and unsure of what it wants to say. You can feel the documentary fall apart in a way that perhaps McComb's life did? But it's hard to say for sure when the filmmakers and the interviewees either can't or don't want to give a clear account about that last eight or nine years of the life of the man to whom this documentary is about.
It left a sour taste in my mouth, and made for an overall frustrating package. Mathematically, most of this film is good, as about one hour of its 100-minute runtime is solid. But some of its problems could have been overcome quite easily, with a little polish and through either editing the interviews down a little, or asking more hard hitting questions. And other things like the inconsistent quality of its visuals and audio are similarly hard to forgive.
It's sometimes sloppy, sometimes frustrating, but at other times very compelling. Without a doubt, my feelings on it are beyond mixed.
