BEFORE: It's time to wrap up the Big Summer Music Concert series, with one last documentary about a music star. I'd say this year's been very female-oriented, with the Go-Go's and Joan Jett and Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt, but I also worked Pavarotti in there, Frank Zappa and the Bee Gees, so I'd say it was pretty balanced in the end.
Oprah Winfrey carries over from "Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project". And I'm just four steps away from posting my "Black Widow" review, FINALLY. Counting today's film, there are just 90 films left to watch in 2021, so I'm glad that I have a path to Christmas, because once summer's over, the fall's going to go by very quickly. 90 films, that's just about three months' worth, but I have a little over four and a half months (141 days) to watch them. No worries, I've got this.
THE PLOT: Exclusive access to the Grammy Award-winning artist to celebrate her career.
AFTER: Tina Turner's done with show biz, she wants everybody to know that...umm, right after this documentary. And right after her Broadway musical, which had the bad fortune to open in November 2019, just a couple months before everything shut down. But I think they're planning to bring that show back this fall. One more reason for any holdouts to get themselves vaccinated, because starting in September, non-vaxxed people aren't going to be let into Broadways shows, or even movie theaters in NYC. Just get the damn shot, people, I think there's even like a C-note in it for you now. Jeez, I got vaccinated for COVID in February and I got nothing except immunity from a deadly virus, what a dope I was.
Let me get this straight, Tina Turner spoke about the years of domestic abuse she suffered at the hands of Ike Turner in a People magazine article in 1981. This is a complex issue, I understand - victims of domestic abuse are often reluctant to talk about it, and they may even blame themselves, or needlessly excuse their abusers. But then, years later, after finding commercial success on her own with a hit record, Tina was constantly asked by reporters about her relationship with Ike, and her feelings about the issue, and the resulting trauma. This documentary holds those reporters responsible for re-traumatizing Tina, again and again. While I agree that most reporters are either too dumb, too insensitive or too enterprising to care about what they were doing, there was a simple solution. As a celebrity and a known quantity, all Tina and/or her manager had to do was simply say, "There will be NO questions during this interview about Ike Turner. If the reporter even mentions his name, this interview will be OVER and Miss Turner will leave the studio, and get in a cab to go have an interview with a rival network." The end, that's all. Most interviews these days have established, pre-formed questions, anyway, and quite often both parties agree on what will and won't be covered. Why on Earth wasn't this done for Tina Turner's interviews in the 1980's?
Plus, somebody then went on to write her biography called "I, Tina", and didn't THAT book discuss the years of abuse? If she didn't want to talk about it any more, maybe writing a book about her life isn't such a great idea - nor is making a movie adaptation of her life story, followed by a definitive-ish documentary years later. She sure talks about it a lot for somebody who doesn't want to talk about it any more - or has something changed? I read an interview with the directors of this film who decided NOT to interview other music legends like Mick Jagger and Bruce Springsteen to discuss how Tina Turner's career changed the music industry. Well, why the hell NOT? Isn't that stuff important, too?
The film also focuses on two turning points in Tina Turner's life - one is that decision to give that interview to People magazine, and the other was making the decision to leave Ike. The second one seems way more important to me than the first, but then again, what do I know? If sharing her story can help other women who are being abused or in danger of being abused, maybe the interview was just as important in the long run. But there's also a bit of a disconnect when the opening of the film holds Tina's parents responsible for leaving her at an early age, and then she sort of does the same thing, leaving her sons behind. Of course, she HAD to leave, and out of those four sons, only two were hers, the others were from Ike's previous relationship. But still - even when we see her later, working hard on her solo career, all that touring meant spending time away from her children, didn't it?
There are some other things that don't really add up - like Tina claims in interviews that she never received any musical training, but then we learn that she sang in a church choir. Don't they usually teach people the songs in church, why doesn't that count as a form of training? I sang in church choirs and school choruses, and it was always work for everyone to learn the songs and the notes. That's called training. Don't give me B.S. about how it's all natural, like you were born with that ability to sing, because nobody is, it's just that some people learn to sing better than others.
Then when we get to the point where Tina leaves Ike, it's implied that she gave up EVERYTHING in order to retain her stage name, Tina Turner (which is not the name she was born with, Anna Mae Bullock - or was it Martha Nell Bullock, this is a bit unclear) but that really isn't true. Yes, Ike retained all publishing rights to their songs, but she got songwriter royalties - also two Jaguar cars, plus fur and jewelry and custody of two children. That's not really giving up everything, just saying. Why lie about this, just for dramatic effect?
The musical performances here also represent some odd choices - they include Tina's cover of the Beatles' song "Help", which apparently was included on the international releases of "Private Dancer", and OK, maybe that song says something about where she was in her life in 1984, I get that - but still, it's not a Tina Turner song, it's just a cover. Didn't she have a whole bunch of songs that were more iconic, like "Proud Mary" (no, wait, that's a cover, too) and "Let's Stay Together" (whoops, no, that's a cover, also) and "Gimme Some Lovin'" (jeez, ANOTHER cover song?). OK, what about "Better Be Good to Me", and "We Don't Need Another Hero" and her duets with Bowie, Clapton and Bryan Adams? Why do I have to listen to "I Can't Stand the Rain" instead of "Private Dancer", a song that everybody knows?
NITPICK POINT: They used footage from Tina appearing on "Late Night with David Letterman" (or perhaps it was "Late Show"), but they failed to use my favorite clip of all, when Letterman had Tina Turner on his NBC show and presented her with a RonCo product, the tuna turner. It was a bit like a salad spinner, but to get the oil or water out of your tuna fish. As a comedy gag, it was just priceless.
Also starring Tina Turner (last seen in "20 Feet from Stardom"), Angela Bassett (last seen in "Otherhood"), Carl Arrington, Erwin Bach, Ann Behringer, Terry Britten, Roger Davies, Rhonda Graam, Katori Hall, Kurt Loder (last seen in "Atomic Blonde"), Lejeune Fletcher Richardson, Craig Turner,
with archive footage of Lucille Ball (last seen in "Follow the Fleet"), Christine Baranski, (last seen in "The Bounty Hunter") David Bowie (last seen in "I Am Divine"), Grace Jones (ditto), Zelma Bullock, Johnny Carson (also carrying over from "Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project"), O.J. Simpson (ditto), John Carter, Cher (last seen in "Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President"), Dolly Parton (ditto), Diana Ross (ditto), Doris Day, Mel Gibson (last seen in "Fathers' Day"), Whoopi Goldberg (last seen in "Bad Reputation"), Ron Howard, Tom Jones (last seen in Muscle Shoals"), Rod Stewart (ditto), B.B. King (last seen in "ZZ Top: That Little Ol' Band from Texas"), Kris Kristofferson (last seen in "Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice), Paul McCartney (ditto), Toni Tennille (ditto), Cyndi Lauper (last seen in "Quincy"), David Letterman (last seen in "Zappa"), Peter Marshall (last seen in "Ensign Pulver"), Irish McCalla, Olivia Newton-John, Bernadette Peters (last seen in "Alice"), Julianne Phillips, Dinah Shore (last seen in "Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond"), Phil Spector (last seen in "John & Yoko: Above Us Only Sky"), Bruce Springsteen (last seen in "Pavarotti"), Stevie Wonder (ditto), Barbra Streisand (last seen in "The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart"), The Temptations, Ike Turner (also last seen in "20 Feet from Stardom"), Adrienne Warren, Mary Wells (last seen in "Hitsville: The Making of Motown"), Loretta Young,
RATING: 4 out of 10 European tours
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