Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool

A decent biography. As a younger fan I certainly learnt quite a bit. But while it is interesting to hear about Miles' personal life, relationships, addiction issues, etc I would have liked the film to balance the screen time a little more towards the music and essentially, why we are all sat here in 2020 watching a documentary about this guy - his musical genius. The most interesting parts of the film to me were where we were given insight into Miles' musical motivations, what it was like in the studio with the interview commentary from Hancock, Shorter etc. The part about Miles' improvised score for the French film 'elevator to the gallows' was great - a work of music I wasn't aware of and made me desperate to watch that film. On the other hand sad to see in a silent way given no mention - very signficant as the stepping stone to the full on fusion of brew, and an incredible album. 5 minutes of personal life stuff could certainly have given way for some discussion of the musical ideas behind that project in my opinion. Still, if you want to know more about Miles, his personality, his life story this will fill you in pretty well.