Review of The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2006) by Devon B — 21 Jan 2009

One man's happy is another man's crazy. The Devil and Daniel Johnston documents the life of a musician/artist who's life (thanks mainly to acid) goes from eccentric to sad. The movie follows Johnston from childhood to the present day, showing us the constant deterioration of his mind, and how the people close to him react to his worsening state.

Johnston's life is thoroughly documented, from his early years as a teenager through to adulthood he was almost obsessively filming himself and taping his thoughts onto cassette. As one of his colleagues notes, throughout history we've often treated our mad geniuses as if they were mental deficients, often locking them away in mental institutions, and while Johnston's story doesn't end too happily, he at least is never "put away" or forgotten.

This is mainly due to his extremely christian parents, who, while they may have contributed greatly to his condition, have never abandoned their son. His father in particular, has sacrificied greatly.

There's a particularily harrowing tale he tells of a time he was flying Daniel in his private airplane and Daniel decided he was Casper the Ghost. He wrenched control away from his father and put the plane into a suicidal nose dive.

His dark story begins as a kid, making silly home movies and recording low tech albums in his garage. He moves to Austin and begins passing out these tapes, and soon manages to weasel his way onto an MTV tv program covering the local music scene.

He is embraced by the local noise rock and avante gard scene, even garnering the attention of such national acts as Sonic Youth. This seemingly is his goal, and yet at the same time, he seems oblivious to it.

Someone introduces him to LSD at a Butthole Surfer's concert, and from there on, his life takes a bleak turn, and he loses touch with reality. His parents christian influences take on a disturbing manifestation through the lense of his disorders, as he begins seeing satanic symbolism in everything, including the music he hears.

His music is definitely not for everyone, and while it can sometimes be heartbreakingly beautiful, more often than not, it seems the ramblings of a person suffering from a mental disorder (which is exactly what it is).

And when you're watching footage of his concert appearances, you're never sure if his fans are there for the music or for the mental disorder, I'm sure neither is 100%. In the end, maybe Daniel's putting on a little bit of an act.

The movie ends with an aged and overweight Danny dancing maniacally to one of his own songs, and it's a sad image until you think about this: he invisions himself as the young Daniel Johnston, and the young Daniel Johnston used to ham it up for cameras in the exact same way, so maybe there's not so much change as you think.