Review of It Might Get Loud (2008) by Shawn E — 17 Jan 2011

The opening scene features guitar master Jack White hammering together a few pieces of wood, attaching some strings to it, and pulling them over a glass bottle before plugging it in to an amplifier and going at it. "Who says you need to buy a guitar?" He comments. It's an inspired moment that really showcases White's love and understanding of the instrument he wields with such efficiency and one wishes the rest of the film felt as spontaneous and inspired.

Instead, we get a highly entertaining, if not particularly enlightening, documentary based around the brilliant idea of putting Jack White of the White Stripes, The Edge of U2, and guitar playing prodigy Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin in the same room and letting them chat it out while the film intercuts footage of their pasts and rises to stardom.

The history of these three is interesting, but is already so well known that the extensive scenes involving their childhoods and forming of their respective bands seem unnecessarily bloated. The film works best when it focuses on the three of them sharing stories with each other and jamming out. If the film had focused more on this fateful meeting, it may have risen to the status it so clearly wants for itself. As it stands, it's just an entertaining documentary that doesn't completely live up to its promise.