An exhilarating high in the Rockumentary course I've been TAing all semester. Where other concert films sought to capture a live performance, Stop Making Sense is a much more thorough collaboration between artist and filmmaker. The choreography and shot compositions are meticulous, and yet the performance itself still feels spontaneous even if it clearly isn't. The resulting film feels less like a concert movie and closer to a full-blown musical. Aiding this feel is the fact that we don't get any reaction shots to the crowd until near the very end. Rather than stressing the scale or scope of the performance, these shots serve as an emotional catharsis. There's a greater sense of kinship between film viewer and concertgoer by the end because we've both experienced something together, now coming to an end.

It goes a long way that the band itself are in top fucking form. I've always liked Talking Heads music well enough, but this was something of a revelation.