Review of Louie Bluie (1985) by Adam S — 08 Sep 2010

Terry Zwigoff's odyssey in producing this low budget doc is almost as memorable as the movie itself, and on Criterion's unexpected, welcomed DVD, he gets a showcase commentary track to tell the story.

A longtime aficionado of old time blues and country music, Zwigoff set out to write an article on long forgotten Chicago mandolin master Howard "Louie Bluie" Armstrong, but when he finally tracked down the musician, living in a rundown Detroit housing complex, he was so fascinated by the man that he put his life savings into a film project, and through additional grants, and ingenious self-made situations (like pairing Armstrong with his old recording friend Ted Bogan, and fellow blues masters Ikey Robinson and Yank Rachell for a series of impromptu sessions), a 60 minute film was crafted, serving not only as Armstrong's own charming oral narrative, but of black country blues music dating back almost to the slave quarters.

Armstrong, 75 when Zwigoff filmed him, comes off as a man of many talents; besides being a virtuoso mandolin and fiddle player, he's an exceptional painter and narrator, spinning yarns five decades old like they just happened, and cultivating a chronology of his life's experiences (and a bizarre opus about the eroticism of pornography; something in common with Zwigoff's next subject, Robert Crumb) in beautiful watercolor, and surreal whimsy.

This is a strange, loving portrait of a man, a sound, a culture, practically lost to the history books and dusty collections of obsessive record collectors; it was worth the director's life savings at the time, and it's priceless now.