Film Review by Wayne Cresser
One of the measures of a successful film should be hitting the mark the filmmaker sets out to hit, whether it’s to tell a feel-good story, scare the bejesus out of the audience, or give them pause to consider the future of mankind.
In most cases, the former objective speaks to something intimate, a story involving a microcosm of some kind, like one’s immediate family, while the latter swallows the world and spits it out in massive gulps.
So, when a film about a small group of musicians turns out to be about making enduring music that appeals to millions of record buyers, the formula is flipped. The small story expands to something epic, and the result in this case, is universal appeal.
Immediate Family is director Denny Tedesco’s (The Wrecking Crew) narrative tribute to a group of players that came to be known as the Section, mainly four Los Angeles-based studio musicians whose collaborations with James Taylor, Carole King, Jackson Browne, Linda Ronstadt and Warren Zevon, powered those singer-songwriters to the top of the charts for more than a decade and defined the Golden Age of the singer-songwriter
Among the group, the strength of connections to particular artists might vary. Guitarist Danny “Kooch” Kortchmar’s association with James Taylor, for instance, goes back to boyhood days on Martha’s Vineyard. And in a series of short interview segments, Don Henley credits Kortchmar with helping him forge a solo career after the Eagles split.
There’s a special link between guitarist Waddy Wachtel and songstress Stevie Nicks, and Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, drummer Russ Kunkel and Jimmy Buffet, and just about anybody who has crossed the path of bassist Leland Sklar and Leland Sklar, but especially Phil Collins, with whom he started working in 1985. See the movie for Sklar’s facial hair alone; it’s it own kind of situation.
These stories unfold through clever animations, live performance footage and seamlessly edited cutaways to the artists themselves, who share their appreciation for their cohorts. James Taylor, Carole King, Linda Ronstadt, and Jackson Browne all attest that their work has been enriched by the chance to work with Kooch, Waddy, Russ and Leland, whether it was in the studio or as part of their touring bands, or both.
One of the keys to their success was that early on someone in their circle of producers and artists, had the idea to list their names on the records they supported, a necessary change from the era of anonymity their 1960s studio forerunners, the Wrecking Crew, worked in.
And brother, did the hair grow, the word spread, and the work pile up.
Even if this laid back, West Coast singer/songwriter style of music with all its branches and vines, including Joni Mitchell, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Neil Young, Don Henley, Stevie Nicks and others, isn’t the brand of pop music that rocks your world—admittedly, it was not my go-to when it was in full bloom— the essential genius of these players is undeniable.
The Section would expand to five with the addition of keyboardist Craig Doerge for several years in the mid-seventies, and release three albums of rock/jazz fusion, in addition to answering the call of an ever-expanding roster of rock n’ roll artists, thus padding their already impressive resumes.
In a way, Tedesco’s film acts as an introduction to the latest incarnation of the group, who have been joined in recent years by guitarist, songwriter Steve Postel, and have returned to recording and touring as a band called, you guessed it, Immediate Family, which in short, is the way they feel about each other and the music they make after an astounding fifty-plus years together.
Immediate Family is a confection of a movie, about people who make you feel good about the art they’re creating. As Carol King put it, “This film is a window into the lives of my musical brothers, whose gold standard is to make sure that every song they play on comes out even better than the songwriter imagined. Now they’re doing that for their own songs, and this film tells their story beautifully.”
Indeed.
Just a few words about the screening. Kudos to Newport Film, who presented Immediate Family as part of their Outdoor Film Series, on the Lawn at Chateau-sur-Mer with free popcorn, food trucks, great sound, and an entertaining opening set by musician Julio Amaro.
The film is scheduled for a theatrical release in the Fall.
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