Review of Scott Walker: 30 Century Man (2007) by Stephen M — 25 Mar 2008

Good as it was, after watching Scorsese's Dylan movie, "No Direction Home", I didn't feel like I knew its enigmatic subject any better than I did beforehand, but this superb documentary about Scott Walker is surprisingly revealing.

If he weren't American by birth, Walker could easily be the archetypal wilfully eccentric Englishman, ploughing his own lonely furrow. Though littered with insightful contributions from Walker's peers, whose diversity reflects the visionary trail blazed from his boy-band roots, what makes the film are the candid interviews with the man himself.

For all the genuine demystification, Scott Walker remains just as fascinating an artist at the close: an uncompromising perfectionist, riddled with insecurity. There are a couple of unintentionally funny glimpses of Walker at work in the studio though, which are reminiscent of Reeves and Mortimer's Mulligan and O'Hare at their most avant garde.

I caught this again on TV recently and I am sure it had been re-edited, with a couple of bits taken out.