Brian Eno, documentaries, Eno, film festivals, Gary Hustwit, movies, music, reviews, Sundance, Sundance Film Festival
July 27, 2024
by Carla Hay
Directed by Gary Hustwit
Culture Representation: The documentary “Eno” features award-winning British music producer/artist Brian Eno talking about his career and outlook on life.
Culture Clash: After getting critical acclaim and big hits for his work with rock artists such as David Bowie and U2, Eno got a lot of criticism for his solo ambient music, which many critics described as self-indulgent and wimpy.
Culture Audience: Besides appealing to the obvious target audience of Eno fans, “Eno” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching documentaries about underrated musicians.
The highly unique documentary “Eno” is a fascinating look into the creative mind of music producer/artist Brian Eno. Showing different versions of the movie at various screenings doesn’t seem gimmicky and is actually as bold and visionary as Eno himself. This particular review of “Eno” is for the version of the documentary that was shown at Film Forum in New York City on July 26, 2024. The theatrical release of “Eno” in select cities around the world has a different version of the documentary for every day that the movie is shown at the screening venue. Each version of the documentary will never be shown again.
“Eno” is directed by Gary Hustwit, who is also one of the film’s producers. Releasing different and changing versions of “Eno” not only involves commendable imagination but also a deep commitment to long hours of altering the film editing, in order to keep the movie dynamic and fresh. Most filmmakers would not do this extensive work or take this risk for any of their movies.
“Eno” had its world premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival and screened at the 2024 editions of Sheffield DocFest and the Nantucket Film Festival. One of the ways that you know you’re watching a unique version of the documentary is that some of the transition editing between scenes shows flashes of captions with the name of the venue where you are seeing the film. The film editing throughout “Eno” is somewhat artsy but not pretentious.
Another unique aspect of “Eno” is that a different famous person does a few quick interludes (about 10 seconds each) in each version of the movie. For the version watched for this review, former Talking Heads lead singer David Byrne is seen taking a small card (the size of a game card) out of a box and reading it to the viewing audience. In one of these interludes, which sounds like a call for intermission, Byrne says (as if talking to whoever’s watching the documentary) that it’s time to take a break. At the very end of the film, Byrne does this card demonstration agan and says, “Go outside. Close the door.” Avant-garde singer Laurie Anderson is another celebrity who does similar interludes in another version of this documentary.
Eno is the only person interviewed for this documentary, which consists of a wealth of archival footage, interspersed with the interviews that Eno did exclusively for this film at and near his home in England. In the documentary, he comes across as a somewhat introverted deep thinker, who is comfortable with technology and with nature. He freely admits that he has workaholic ways when it comes to being in the studio. And when it comes to creating or discussing music or other art, he thinks a lot of about philosophical and sociological issues.
Eno was born on May 15, 1948, in Melton, England. The documentary does not dwell too long on his childhood and teenage years or discuss what his life was like at home or at school. His parents and younger brother Roger Eno (who is also a musician) are not mentioned at all.
Instead, the version of the documentary that was seen for this review has Eno talking about the songs and artists who were his biggest musical influences as a child, starting with two hits from 1957: Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” and the Silhouettes’ “Get a Job.” Eno says in the documentary that he was immediately enraptured by the singers’ voices and melodies. Eno comments, “It took a long time to realize that this was American black music.”
Eno says his sexual awakening as a teenager could be traced back to hearing Ketty Lester’s 1961 hit single “Love Letters.” In the documentary, Eno says he became immediately fascinated by Lester’s sultry voice and had the type of instant crush where he felt like he wanted to get to know her and similar women. Eno doesn’t talk about his two marriages (to ex-wife Sarah Grenville and to his second and current wife Anthea Norman-Taylor, whom he married in 1988), but the documentary has an archival 1990s interview where Eno talks about how having children (he has three) made him change his work priorities to not take jobs that would keep him away for home for too long.
As for Eno’s impressive body of work, the version of the “Eno” documentary that was watched for this review focused mostly on his producing work for David Bowie and U2, as well as Eno’s solo projects. Eno’s work with Roxy Music and the Talking Heads are also featured, but don’t get as much screen time. There’s an archival clip from the late 1970s where Eno calls the Talking Heads “music of the future.” Eno produced three of the Talking Heads’ classic albums: 1978’s “More Songs About Buildings and Food,” 1979’s “Fear of Music” and 1980’s “Remain in Light.”
In the documentary, Eno discusses how starting his music career in the 1960s had a tremendous impact on him because it was during an era when many British rock artists were former art school students, which gelled with Eno’s idea that the best music and visual art are creatively intertwined. He mentions British bands such as the Beatles, the Who and Pink Floyd as among those whose art-school influences were manifested in the band’s visual presentations.
Eno and Tony Visconti produced Bowie’s 1977 albums “Low” and “Heroes” and 1979’s “Lodger”—all recorded in Berlin, during a transitional time in Bowie’s life when he was trying to clean up his drug-fueled lifestyle. In the documentary, Eno still sounds in awe of Bowie’s vocals for the song “Heroes” and how Bowie perfectly expressed the vulnerable yet strong tone that Eno wanted for the song. In an archival interview from the 1990s, Bowie says it’s hard to define Eno’s style as a producer, but that Eno is highly collaborative and open to musical experimenting.
Eno’s biggest album hits have been with rock band U2, the most commercially successful music artist from Ireland. Eno-produced U2 albums are arguably U2’s best albums: 1984’s “The Unforgettable Fire,” 1987’s “The Joshua Tree,” 1991’s “Achtung Baby,” 1993’s “Zooropa” and 2000’s “All That You Can’t Leave Behind.” Daniel Lanois produced all of these albums with Eno, except for “Zooropa,” which was produced by Eno and Mark “Flood” Ellis.
The “Eno” documentary has rare footage of Eno in the studio with U2 for “The Unforgettable Fire” and “The Joshua Tree.” “The Unforgettable Fire” footage is more extensive, as it shows part of the recording of “Pride (In the Name of Love),” which would end up being the album’s first single. It’s a song about civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
In “The Unforgettable Fire” footage, Eno politely interrupts U2 lead singer Bono during the recording of the intense vocals because Eno thinks something seems off-kilter with the song. Eno suggests they slow down the song’s tempo. They try it again with a slower tempo, and it works to everyone’s liking. The footage shows Bono sitting on a couch and listening to the playback with an expression on his face indicating that he knows how special this song is, and he’s happy with this recorded version, which is what ended up on the album.
Eno also talks candidly about the mixed reactions that he’s gotten for his solo albums of ambient music. He says he was hurt by negative reviews from critics and how the term “Eno-esque” became a description for music that was considered to be “wimpy.” Eno confesses that he was so affected by this criticism, he wanted to distance himself from ambient music.
It led to what Eno calls “the biggest mistake of music career.” Eno doesn’t name the year that this happened, but he said that around the time that he grew sick of being seen as an ambient artist, Joni Mitchell called him and asked him to do an all-ambient album with her. He politely declined the offer, which is a rejection that he says he now regrets, and he would now love to do an ambient album with her. Eno says with a chuckle: “Joni, I’m still here. I’m ready.”
“Eno” has several scenes of Eno in his home recording studio, where he has several computer monitors hooked up to his keyboard. If the songs he talks about have music videos or live performances on YouTube, he’d rather play what’s on YouTube instead of audio versions of the songs. Eno comments on making music, which he compares to evolution in nature: “I always think about that happens in nature,” he says. He later comments, “I’ve always drawn on my experience of rural life and watching how nature works.”
When Eno isn’t making music in the studio (which he says he prefers infinitely more than doing live performances), he likes to read books or putter around in his garden. There’s a scene where Eno takes photos of insects on the leaves of one of his plants. At first, he thinks they’re tiny spiders, but on further examination, he sees that the insects are beetles. Eno makes an analogy of creating a song to being like planting a flower seed: “I created things that will carry on and have [their] own life.”
One of the best aspects of “Eno” is that it’s not a typical celebrity documentary that follows the usual formula of showing the celebrity’s rise to fame and any pitfalls the celebrity experienced along the way. Viewers of “Eno” are invited to look at the bigger picture of what music can mean to the artists who make this art form in ways that have more meaning beyond fame, fortune and awards. Eno has a lot to say about it.
Eno comments in the documentary: “Why do we like music? I never lost interest in answering that question.” He likens a music scene to being an ecosystem: “If you take one person out of it, it has far-reaching effects.” Eno also talks about the importance of live concert experiences being nourishing for human souls because humans have a natural instinct to want to be part of something social.
As for why he likes creating music, Eno comments: “It’s my way of creating a space for myself. It’s a way of entering another world.” Although Eno says that he often wakes up each day feeling pressure or worry about what he will be creating that day, those feelings are eclipsed by what he feels when he’s actually creating music and other art. “Eno” is not the type of documentary that is interested in tabloid gossip or scandalous stories, like many other celebrity documentaries. It’s a thoughtful and well-edited portrait that—just like music artists who never perform the same concert twice—is meant to be ephemeral and special to the people who experienced it.
Film First released “Eno” in New York City and in London on July 12, 2024. The movie’s theatrical release has limited engagements on varying dates in select cities around the world.