Björk Puts A Wild Spin On Concert Film Conventions
By Joel Wicklund in Arts & Entertainment on Oct 10, 2014 3:05PM
Photo courtesy Cinema Purgatorio
How much you are "bio-feelin'" the love for the concert film, Björk: Biophilia Live depends, of course, on how deeply you are invested in Björk's music. That said, this is the rare concert film that stands as more than a mere recording of a performance. An often dazzling, multimedia experience, it fully justifies a big screen treatment.
Not having attended the final performance of the Biophilia tour in London in 2013, I can't say how closely the movie matches the audience's experience of seeing large format video assemblages playing as Björk, her band, and a large all-female Icelandic choir performed onstage. Taken on its own, however, the array of bright-to-burning footage of microscopic life, undersea creatures, solar bursts, nebula, time-condensed vegetation growth and a whole array of other "whatzits" adds an experimental edge. The result is as much psychedelic cinema as a concert film. Directors Nick Fenton and Peter Strickland (Berberian Sound Studio) do a nice job of alternating stand-alone imagery with shots of it hovering over the stage or otherwise incorporated into the live show.
The wild footage is accompanied by narration from noted naturalist David Attenborough at the start of the show, before Björk takes the stage in an enormous orange wig and blue face paint. The band is small but the sound is full thanks to computer-driven soundscapes, an assortment of odd musical instruments, and sensational percussion.
Björk - Biophilia Live - trailer from Cinema Purgatorio on Vimeo.
The music is wide-ranging and international in influence, as you might expect from the culturally curious Icelandic performer who first came to attention as the lead singer in the band The Sugarcubes. You can hear a bit of everything from traditional Asian instrumentation to pounding EDM rhythms in the eclectic mix. Despite the breadth of Björk's music vocabulary, there are times when a certain sameness sets in and the immortal words of Groucho Marx come to mind: "If you get anywhere near a song, play it."
But some selections do resonate, with "Mutual Core" conveying explosive power and an older song, "Possibly Maybe," getting a pretty infectious update. As for Björk's stage presence, it's hard to avoid the overused "pixyish" in describing her. Punctuating her singing with little hops and keeping the stage patter mainly to a quick and perky "Thank you," she seems perfectly at ease in her eccentric skin.
The Biophilia songs are some sort of statement on the universality of all living things, entwined with the influence of technology. Or something like that. As English is not Björk's first language, perhaps you can't be too hard on her for lyrics like "What you resist persists, nuance makes heat to counteract distance."
Even if she does walk the edge of pretention, it's hard not to admire Björk's ambition and distinctive vision, including the cinematic variety. The cookie cutter model of concert movies crumbles into something far more memorable in Björk: Biophilia Live.
Björk: Biophilia Live. Directed by Nick Fenton and Peter Strickland. 97 mins. Oct. 10-16 at the Gene Siskel Film Center. The film opens nationally today.