This was broadcast under the title "Spice Girls: How Girl Power Changed Britain", Girl Powered is the working title. This documentary is a history of The Spice Girls with references to the girl group promoting feminism. Love them or hate them, The Spice Girls were no doubt the biggest bands in the UK and maybe the world for about two years. I appreciate that they have been a massive influence on pop culture and I like some of their songs, but I'm certainly not a superfan.
The documentary features a lot of talking heads from people like Miranda Sawyer who attempts to clumsily make out The Spice Girls are in some way feminist icons. Matthew Wright who wrote several hit pieces on The Spice Girls attempts to clear his name after being made out to be a villain. Some of The Spice Girls PR team from back in the day recount their experiences of the band. It is all good stuff, but like most people I would have liked to hear from the girls themselves. Instead we are just shown archive clips.
The documentary manages to gloss over a few key events and the cynic in me would suggest this feels more like a puff piece than a serious documentary, especially given it is nearly 3 hours long in its entirety. The Spice Girls panned commercial flop "Spice World" movie wasn't mentioned to my knowledge or if it was I blinked and missed it. A pivotal moment in that it suggested The Spice Girls maybe weren't as popular at that time than was made out. Very little was mentioned of Mel B's single - "I Want You Back" with Missy Elliot which was massive. Also to my knowledge no mention of the Mel B documentary "Voodoo Princess" which was made for Channel 4. If I remember correctly there was no mention of the original demo version of Wannabe which was a slow R&B song similar to something like The All Saints "Black Coffee" in terms of tempo. There's no doubt in my mind giving it a fast paced europop style tempo gave it the kick in the face it needed to be a chart success; especially given dance music was dominating the charts in 1996.
The latter half of the documentary manages to segue in some frankly jarring references to feminism and even features footage of recent-ish protests for nearly 15 minutes. I think it's maybe a stretch too far. The Spice Girls were absolutely massive, but as important as Stevie Nicks or Debbie Harry at influencing young women into pursuing musical careers? I honestly don't know. I do know nostalgia for the 90s is bang on trend at the moment. The 00s will be next! This documentary took a few years to put together and 100s of hours of clips were sorted through and carefully selected. It is a real shame that some of the footage isn't better quality. A press conference video on episode 3 looks like an awful 240p YouTube clip and some footage looks has watermarks. On a big budget documentary I expect higher production values. With a press conference surely the original source clips are available. This isn't the only documentary to use low quality clips, but it is a real shame especially now as most people watch films and TV on HD quality equipment.
This is a mixed bag. The opening episode is fantastic and gives a good history of how the band got started with some rare footage. As the documentary goes on it looks like a bit of a filler was used or maybe my interest ran out. I think for anyone interested in 90s pop culture or asks the question "Mummy, who were The Spice Girls?" this is a pretty good watch.
The documentary features a lot of talking heads from people like Miranda Sawyer who attempts to clumsily make out The Spice Girls are in some way feminist icons. Matthew Wright who wrote several hit pieces on The Spice Girls attempts to clear his name after being made out to be a villain. Some of The Spice Girls PR team from back in the day recount their experiences of the band. It is all good stuff, but like most people I would have liked to hear from the girls themselves. Instead we are just shown archive clips.
The documentary manages to gloss over a few key events and the cynic in me would suggest this feels more like a puff piece than a serious documentary, especially given it is nearly 3 hours long in its entirety. The Spice Girls panned commercial flop "Spice World" movie wasn't mentioned to my knowledge or if it was I blinked and missed it. A pivotal moment in that it suggested The Spice Girls maybe weren't as popular at that time than was made out. Very little was mentioned of Mel B's single - "I Want You Back" with Missy Elliot which was massive. Also to my knowledge no mention of the Mel B documentary "Voodoo Princess" which was made for Channel 4. If I remember correctly there was no mention of the original demo version of Wannabe which was a slow R&B song similar to something like The All Saints "Black Coffee" in terms of tempo. There's no doubt in my mind giving it a fast paced europop style tempo gave it the kick in the face it needed to be a chart success; especially given dance music was dominating the charts in 1996.
The latter half of the documentary manages to segue in some frankly jarring references to feminism and even features footage of recent-ish protests for nearly 15 minutes. I think it's maybe a stretch too far. The Spice Girls were absolutely massive, but as important as Stevie Nicks or Debbie Harry at influencing young women into pursuing musical careers? I honestly don't know. I do know nostalgia for the 90s is bang on trend at the moment. The 00s will be next! This documentary took a few years to put together and 100s of hours of clips were sorted through and carefully selected. It is a real shame that some of the footage isn't better quality. A press conference video on episode 3 looks like an awful 240p YouTube clip and some footage looks has watermarks. On a big budget documentary I expect higher production values. With a press conference surely the original source clips are available. This isn't the only documentary to use low quality clips, but it is a real shame especially now as most people watch films and TV on HD quality equipment.
This is a mixed bag. The opening episode is fantastic and gives a good history of how the band got started with some rare footage. As the documentary goes on it looks like a bit of a filler was used or maybe my interest ran out. I think for anyone interested in 90s pop culture or asks the question "Mummy, who were The Spice Girls?" this is a pretty good watch.
