heart like a hand grenade is astounding in its ability to show the creative process from the raw twinkling of an idea to a polished gem. in other words, if you want to see what was going on in billie, mike and tre's minds when they were coming up with the licks you hear on the album, it's all there...you see every song on american idiot and the concept of the entire album constructed right before your eyes!!!
filmmaker john roecker followed the band around while they were in the process of recording american idiot and his film is funny, unassuming and visually, weird; weird good, not weird bad. for instance, the mod dance sequence to holiday (i think it was holiday, i didn't write it down, shit!)...it's a hard day's night hallucination. and that's not the only beatles' reference, which always makes me happy...
the secrecy of the venue worked. the egyptian theater, an old hollywood movie palace, wasn't overcrowded or loud; it was beautiful and comfortable.
and how about this, the whole show was free! free!! with t-shirts and posters, also free!!
roecker shot hundreds of hours of film then, collaborating with a genius editor, dean gonzalez, morphed the images into a time-lapse symphony of the best, strangest and possibly smelliest moments of billie joe armstrong, mike dirnt and tre cool in and out of the studio as they hatched american idiot. (also included is footage of the debut performance of the album at the henry fonda theater in 2004)
plus, there's nudity! (!!)
with the help of some green day travelin' fans, beth, diane, j'net, cheryl, andres and mark, i got into the theater--(i didn't know you had to be on a list!). my grammar is all fucked up!!!!
thank the flowers and the trees that john roecker and green day had the foreskin to know that the making of american idiot needed to be captured for the silver screen~(just wanted to see if you were paying attention!!!)
