The Other One: The Long, Strange Trip of Bob Weir

My 200th review here had to be about this fantastic band and this great musician who rocked the world during 30 years. Those who like the band enjoyed every little second of the movie. Those who still don't know Weir / GD have here a great chance to change this.

Watch the film and listen to the band!

PS: Once the film ended I researched more about Garcia and discovered today (1st August) would be his 76th brithday!!!

Truly Bob Weir has a colorful story, starting with The Merry Pranksters at age 16 and continuing through three decades of the Dead. Avid Deadheads will love this film. Unfortunately for this fan, Bob concentrates on his role as Jerry's buddy, the chick magnet of the band and the vegan spiritualist survivor. Other than Garcia's health problems, he glosses over conflict within The Dead, including efforts of other band members to dismiss him and Pigpen as musically weak. There's not much music in the film and the band's change in musical direction hardly gets mentioned. It's okay; The Dead was and will always be special, but this documentary doesn't fill the bill.

Not too much romanticizing the times, not too many hippy dippy claims of enlightenment or tying some meaning to a 'cosmic coincidence', meahn. But also not a lot of new information aside from very personal family stuff. I'd like to have heard more about writing songs and making some of the albums, but it's pretty good. 3.4 stars

The life and times of Bob Weir, Grateful Dead guitarist and vocalist.

Good, but a bit flat. Covers the history of Bob Weir well, especially the Grateful Dead years (as you would hope). Reasonably interesting interviews with Weir and other people. Quite emotional too at times.

However, doesn't ever elevate beyond interesting. There's no spark, or something revolutionary in the story-telling, to make this brilliant.

Band documentaries are tough, because you want to hear the music and see 30+ years of historical footage, but also hear the story telling and interviews. This documentary does a good job balancing, and doesn't tiptoe around the drugs and lifestyle.