CHUCK BERRY HAIL! HAIL! ROCK ‘N’ ROLL Screens Thursday March 8th at Schlafly Bottleworks

CHUCK BERRY HAIL! HAIL! ROCK ‘N’ ROLL screens Thursday March 8th at 7:00pm at Schlafly Bottleworks (7260 Southwest Avenue Maplewood, MO 63143). This is part of the A FILM SERIES “Culture Shock” Film Fest which has moved to the second Thursday of every month. 

On October, 18th 1986, on the sixtieth birthday of Chuck Berry, there was a concert at the Fox Theater in his hometown Saint Louis. With CHUCK BERRY HAIL! HAIL! ROCK ‘N’ ROLL, director Taylor Hackford does a phenomenal job in this movie. Chuck Berry, one of the most complicated and conflicted figures in the history of rock and pop music is rich territory and Hackford managed to catch Berry in all of his many guises – charming, professional, intelligent, thoughtful, bitter, petulant, unprofessional, difficult, and combative. What really marks this movie as a superior documentary is Hackford refusal to judge Berry to focus on just documenting the man and his behavior in a variety of situations and from a variety of sources. There really is no ax-grinding going on in this movie and there is no whitewashing – everything is what it is whether it’s Berry in a touching scene with his mother and father or it’s Berry in a petulant rehearsal stare-down with Keith Richards when Berry isn’t getting his way.

Hackford’s other great achievement in this movie is the excellent recording of Berry’s 60th Anniversary Concert, the predominate reason for the whole project and the involvement of other pop/rock music notables at the Fox Theatre. Backed by Keith Richards, Johnnie Johnson (Berry’s pianist and forgotten early influence), Steve Jordan, Bobby Keys, Robert Cray, and Joey Spaminato, Berry performs a spectacular show. Hackford catches the performer’s excitement, the crowd’s excitement, and Berry’s energy and showmanship in a way those of us too young to have seen or heard Berry can begin to understand why he serves a such a seminal influence in pop and rock music.

The movie is full of entertaining nuggets. Hackford’s interviews with Keith Richards are fascinating. Richards’ comments are just insightful about Berry, the influence of Berry’s music, and the influence of Johnson of Berry’s songs; they’re also fascinating in just watching and listening to Richards himself – part mystic, part philosopher, part drunk. Also particularly interesting is a three-way conversation between Berry, Little Richard, and Bo Diddly who go into great detail about their early careers, music, business, and how racism negatively affected their careers and their recognition as the earliest purveyors of rock and roll.

I think this movie is interesting regardless of whether your actually interested in Berry beforehand or not. It is as fine a documentary that any director could produce and you should catch CHUCK BERRY HAIL! HAIL! ROCK ‘N’ ROLL March 8^th when it screens at Schlafly Bottleworks in Maplewood.

A Facebook invite for the event can be found HERE
https://www.facebook.com/events/197087531044314/

$6 for the screening. A yummy variety of food from Schlafly’s kitchen is available as are plenty of pints of their famous home-brewed suds.

“Culture Shock” is the name of a film series here in St. Louis that is the cornerstone project of a social enterprise that is an ongoing source of support for Helping Kids Together(http://www.helpingkidstogether.com/) a St. Louis based social enterprise dedicated to building cultural diversity and social awareness among young people through the arts and active living.

The films featured for “Culture Shock” demonstrate an artistic representation of culture shock materialized through mixed genre and budgets spanning music, film and theater. Through ‘A Film Series’ working relationship with Schlafly Bottleworks, they seek to provide film lovers with an offbeat mix of dinner and a movie opportunities.