For all our coverage of SXSW Film 2017, click here.
What a great South By Southwest it was. There were some truly incredible premieres, some mild disappointments, and a truly excellent television pilot shown at this year’s festival. Here’s almost everything else I saw there this year (we’ll have some reviews of the SXSW films showing at the Boston Underground Film Festival coming later this week), excepting the one movie I walked out of, A Critically Endangered Species, whose first 30 minutes had experienced a combo of pretentious and boring that I didn’t exactly find palatable.
May It Last: A Portrait of the Avett Brothers
I almost recused myself from reviewing this documentary about the North Carolina folk-country siblings, as I grew up with the brothers’ music (their best record, Emotionalism, hit when I was a junior in high school) and had friends who were obsessed with them, but I was super interested when I heard that Judd Apatow co-directed it (along with Michael Bonfiglio), so I went.
May It Last is a swell little documentary about the Avetts recording their sixth record, True Sadness, and all of the moments in their lives, good and bad, that led them to this moment. It openly admits there’s not going to be very much conflict between the members right as the film starts (the brothers, Seth and Scott, are practically best friends) and, to its credit, documents other, more interesting, aspects of their recording process. There’s a fascinating scene where we follow the complete creation of a song (the adorable “I Wish I Was”), from a few awkward lyrics behind a slight melody all the way through to a live performance of it on tour, that Apatow and Bonfiglio handle with an interesting and uncommon propulsion. Throughout, the brothers bare their souls in ways both sad and beautiful, and it only enhances the gut-punch of some of their songs. It’ll make the die-hards happy, while also serving as an interesting primer for those looking to learn more about the Avetts. Happily, it’ll be on HBO at some point this year, so it’s an even easier proposition than having to seek it out in a theater.