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The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil

Original title: One + One
  • 19681968
  • Not RatedNot Rated
  • 1h 51m
IMDb RATING
6.2/10
3.1K
YOUR RATING
The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
DocumentaryMusic
While The Rolling Stones rehearse "Sympathy for the Devil" in the studio, Godard reflects on 1968 society, politics and culture through five different vignettes.While The Rolling Stones rehearse "Sympathy for the Devil" in the studio, Godard reflects on 1968 society, politics and culture through five different vignettes.While The Rolling Stones rehearse "Sympathy for the Devil" in the studio, Godard reflects on 1968 society, politics and culture through five different vignettes.
IMDb RATING
6.2/10
3.1K
YOUR RATING
    • Jean-Luc Godard
    • Jean-Luc Godard
  • Stars
    • Sean Lynch(voice)
    • Mick Jagger
    • Brian Jones
    • Jean-Luc Godard
    • Jean-Luc Godard
  • Stars
    • Sean Lynch(voice)
    • Mick Jagger
    • Brian Jones
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 40User reviews
    • 45Critic reviews
  • See production, box office & company info
  • See more at IMDbPro
  • Photos12

    The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    Mick Jagger in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    James Fox and Brian Jones in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    Iain Quarrier in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    Anne Wiazemsky in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    Jean-Luc Godard and Anne Wiazemsky in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    Jean-Luc Godard and Anne Wiazemsky in The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
    The Rolling Stones: Sympathy for the Devil (1968)

    Top cast

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    Sean Lynch
    Sean Lynch
    • Commentary
    • (voice)
    Mick Jagger
    Mick Jagger
    • Self - The Rolling Stones
    Brian Jones
    Brian Jones
    • Self - The Rolling Stones
    Keith Richards
    Keith Richards
    • Self - The Rolling Stones
    • (as Keith Richard)
    Charlie Watts
    Charlie Watts
    • Self - The Rolling Stones
    Bill Wyman
    Bill Wyman
    • Self - The Rolling Stones
    Anne Wiazemsky
    Anne Wiazemsky
    • Eve Democracy
    Iain Quarrier
    Iain Quarrier
    • Fascist porno book seller
    Frankie Dymon
    • Black power militant
    • (as Frankie Dymon Jnr.)
    Danny Daniels
    Danny Daniels
    • Black power militant
    Ilario Bisi-Pedro
    Roy Stewart
    Roy Stewart
    • Black power militant
    Linbert Spencer
    Tommy Ansah
    • Black power militant
    • (as Tommy Ansar)
    Michael McKay
    Rudi Patterson
    Mark Matthew
    Karl Lewis
      • Jean-Luc Godard
      • Jean-Luc Godard
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      The producer of the film added film of The Rolling Stones performing the completed version of "Sympathy for the Devil" at the end of the movie in an attempt to make it more commercial. Jean-Luc Godard was so incensed by this that he punched the producer during a talk at London's National Film Theatre.
    • Alternate versions
      Jean-Luc Godard's original director's cut (titled "One Plus One") runs approximately 110 minutes and consists largely of additional footage of the black power militants. The film's producers were dissatisfied with this cut and deleted 11 minutes, changed the title to "Sympathy for the Devil" to underscore the Stones connection, and added the final version of the title song to the film's soundtrack, over a freeze-frame of the last shot. These changes were all made without Godard's knowledge; when he finally saw them at the film's London Film Festival premiere, he allgedly went berserk and physically attacked one of the producers.
    • Connections
      Edited into Histoire(s) du cinéma: Une vague nouvelle (1999)

    User reviews40

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    8/10
    For Godard fans, a good film, for Rolling Stones fans, so-so. The middle ground might find it to be a minor masterpiece
    Sympathy for the Devil is one of the strangest, coolest, though oddly off-putting documentary/satires that I've ever encountered. If anything else, the film is also one of the few true time capsules, along with Easy Rider, Woodstock, and The Graduate among others, of what the political, social, and musical climate was like in the late 60's. On that end Godard gets it right. And being more than a casual observer of the Rolling Stones, I was no less than fascinated in the recording process of their classic cut off of Beggar's Banquet.

    On top of this, Godard does continuous, peerless shots back and forth across the studio, never cutting, just seeing through to what Mick and Keith and Charlie and the others are trying to work through in the studio. Godard doesn't just use this, however- using a narrator perhaps reciting from a book of literotica crossbred with classic literature, he puts together scenes of radical pieces of the times. This is where the flaw button might kick in for some viewers.

    It took me three times to finally get through all of Sympathy for the Devil- the first two times I turned it off halfway- not because I hated it, per say, but because it gave me a feeling like I was being ambushed by images and messages not of my time. Then the third time it sunk in and I really started to "dig" the feel of the film- Godard, much like his early 60's films, is doing a satire that goes against all the conventions that he got pummeled with as a film critic in the 50's. Like the others in the French new-wave, the attitude was this- either you get us or you don't, and if you don't, we're not sure you ever will. Sympathy for the Devil- or One plus One as its original title- gives a problem for two, or perhaps more, types of audiences.

    There will be some who have never heard of or seen Godard's works, and seek this out as being fans of the Rolling Stones. To this I saw be warned- you may be interested, maybe even enveloped, by how these guys work through this one song over a period of weeks and months. But, you may want to fast-forward past all the off-beat, supremely ironic vignettes detailing what a foreigner must think of ours and other's counter-cultures (in other words, if you didn't live through the 60's, most of it will pass over your head). And then for the Godard fans who might not be fans of the Rolling Stones, I don't know what to tell you, except to say that as a piece of creative non-fiction (not documentary- like one of Michael Moore's films it's hard for me to call this one a full-blooded documentary) it displays him at the near top of his game before his pits in the 70's.

    It's lucid despite it being crazy, and it's disparaging even though it's funny. Basically, Jean-Luc Godard gets the feel of the song in and of itself, and on that end he was successful.
    helpful•20
    10
    • Quinoa1984
    • Nov 14, 2004

    FAQ1

    • Why didn't Nicky Hopkins even get a credit in this film?

    Details

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    • Release date
      • April 22, 1969 (United States)
      • United Kingdom
      • English
    • Also known as
    • Filming locations
      • Battersea Railway Bridge, Battersea, London, England, UK
    • Production company
      • Cupid Productions
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Technical specs

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    • 1 hour 51 minutes
      • Mono

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