A little over a year ago we went to a movie theater here in suburban Denver to see Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man, a concert film cum interview centered on the works of Leonard Cohen, and it was terrific. Its terrificness aside, the showing drew a total of one other couple - this was on a weekend night - and half of them were asleep by the time the lights came up. As much as I'm glad they screened it, I can't help wondering what a programmer for a multiplex in McMansion-strewn Highlands Ranch, Colorado, was thinking.
This was before OPC was unleashed upon the world, so I wasn't able to blog about it then, but I recently watched the DVD version, so I can now, and I can say that the film isn't quite as good as I initially thought. Rufus Wainwright delivers an appealingly sleazy rendition of "Everybody Knows," but it's awfully distracting to see him keeping his eyes aimed toward the floor after every line, reading the lyrics. (Rufus also does the necessarily sleazy "Chelsea Hotel, No. 2" and the not-sleazy-at-all "Hallelujah.") And while it's great to hear Leonard himself talking about the real woman named Suzanne who served him tea and oranges that came all the way from China, Nick Cave offers up a horrible recitation of that song.
Most of the songs, though, are great -- it's Leonard Cohen, so how could they not be? I'm Your Man still gets the OPC Seal of Approval. Here's Rufus (without Chaka Khan, sorry) from the movie doing "Everybody Knows":
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