Spend an Evening with Saddle Creek (2005) (V)

User Rating:

7.2/10   

Directors:

Jason Kulbel
Rob Walters (co-director)

Release Date:

23 August 2005 (USA)

Genre:

Music

Plot:

Spend an Evening with Saddle Creek is the story of the record label as told by the people who made it happen...

Cast

Clark Baechle	...	Himself
Bright Eyes
Gretta Cohn	...	Herself
Dapose	...	Himself
Orenda Fink	...	Herself
Todd Fink	...	Himself
Tim Kasher	...	Himself
Joseph Knapp	...	Himself
Andy LeMaster	...	Himself
Jenny Lewis	...	Herself
Matt Maginn	...	Himself
A.J. Mogis	...	Himself
Mike Mogis	...	Himself
Robb Nansel	...	Himself
Justin Oberst	...	Himself
Joel Peterson	...	Himself
Clint Schnase	...	Himself
Ted Stevens	...	Himself
Maria Taylor	...	Herself
Jacob Thiele	...	Himself

Runtime:

USA:90 min (DVD)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Filming Locations:

Omaha, Nebraska, USA

A film that never should have been made

As a fan of much of the music that has come out of Omaha in the past 15 years, I was very disappointed at this shoddy excuse for a documentary. The filmmakers should have engaged in a bit of genre research and watched a film like 'No Direction Home', where Scorcese traces the evolution of Dylan's music with the breakdown of social order in 1960s America. As it is, 'An Evening With Saddle-Creek' makes no effort to connect the music, bands or community with the world outside Omaha. The viewer is left to remark, "who cares?," no matter how much they may or may not like the music. Of course, it may be argued this little music community doesn't actually have any connection or relevance to anyone that isn't immersed in the indie-pop music scene. Even if this were the case (and I tend to agree that it is) an interesting film could still have been made. It would have been a wise move to focus on one or two especially interesting characters and turned the film into a character study a la 'Don't Look Back'. Instead, 'An Evening' tries to pretend that every band on the label is equally compelling, so it stitches together a series of mini-documentaries (some a mere 5 minutes long) on each petty project that each peripheral friend of the label is engaged in. Big boring mistake. Let's face it, all people want to see is Conor anyways.