Review of Crumb (1995) by Panta O — 17 Nov 2014

Interesting and orthodoxly made documentary about the noted underground cartoonist Robert Crumb and his family, which took nine years to be completed. The director Terry Zwigoff won widespread acclaim for this work of art about the controversial artist. Jeffery M. Anderson (later critic for the San Francisco Examiner) placed the film on his list of the ten greatest films of all time, labelling it "the greatest documentary ever made." I would not go even close that statement, because it is a typical talking documentary, with interviews about childhood, portrayal of his family and friends, his life philosophy and examples of his work. The guy is an odd one but he is amazing artist who makes this documentary interesting, his humour adds the entertainment, and his family adds reality and tragedy. Walking the fine edge between life and death, with the dark thought always present in the background, his saviour is his art, R-rated but, for him, liberating and invigorating.

The story of Crumb is real, and it is all about the experiences and characters of the Crumb family, particularly Robert Crumb's brothers, Maxon and Charles, his wife and children... sadly, his sisters declined to be interviewed, but I understand that if you take that all three brothers were growing as social misfits, and the oldest committed a suicide only a year after the documentary was shown, living secluded life in his room for many years before that. Of course, Zwigoff had the consent of the Crumb brothers, some questioned the ability of the more disturbed brothers to provide that consent, because even in the movie, Charles, the oldest brother (they are all amazing artists), in the beginning refused to be a part of it.

Robert Crumb initially did not want to make the film, but eventually agreed. There was a rumour that Terry Zwigoff made Crumb cooperate by threatening to shoot himself. During the nine years that it took to make the documentary Zwigoff said he was "averaging an income of about $200 a month and living with back pain so intense that I spent three years with a loaded gun on the pillow next to my bed, trying to get up the nerve to kill myself.".

If you are in a mood to watch a provocative and haunting documentary about one of the best cartoon artists of the 20th century (Time magazine art critic Robert Hughes calls him "the Brueghel of the last half of the 20th century") , do not miss this one, regardless the fact that Robert Crumb and wife Aline had drawn a "scornful" cartoon about the film in The New Yorker.