Latest on MJJC

Ashley Banjo on Michael Jackson's 'Thriller'

Psychoniff said:
What did you think he meant (Gambacco)?
Click to expand...

I think he meant that Michael set a new 'bar'...to be truly great, a music track had to have a great video too. I think that's why he mentions Al Jolson, who is associated with the introduction of 'The talkies'. It is a new combination of media which people come to expect.
 
I really liked the way they used footage from Wembley, great seeing some guys like Greg Phillinganes and I liked the way they used the demos. Apart from that it was a typical MJ documentary, people who worked around him getting too much credit for everything and not giving MJ the credit he deserves. Why can't someone make a documentary showcasing the genius that Michael was ! Is it too much to ask ?
 
ChrisC said:
It was like a children's illustrated book version of how the Thriller album was made: fluffy and pleasant but little in the way of challenging ideas or of anything insightful.

For an artist with layers as deep as Michael it's a little insulting.
Click to expand...
What were you expecting? It's an itv programme, for a mainstream itv audience. Other programmes in the series have lenny henry opining on shakespeare and len goodwin, a reality dance show judge, on fred astaire so let's not make out that mj is being 'insulted' here. This is accessible television. This isn't some rarified bbc channel 4 arts documentary - it was a fun, engaging,informative programme that was intended to appeal to a wide cross section of people and yet wasn't dumbed down. Anything that widens mj's appeal outside his hardcore support is fabulous in my book. Thriller had it's 25th anniversary some years back, thriller 25 was released and sold 3m, mj was alive and yet absolutely no tv company decided to make a tv documentary about the world's best selling album so this programme was long overdue. When was the last programme about thriller, the 80s?

It's nice to see a mainstream UK network pay for something that I believe was intended to be mostly positive. But it's still not good enough. Not even close.
Click to expand...
You 'believe' it was intended to be 'mostly positive'? Unfortunately, short of estate sponsored documentaries i am convinced that you are never ever going to get a more positive documentary than this one in the mainstream media. If you wanted some arty, serious music documentary fronted by some music critic offering 'new insights' and 'interpretations' of thriller, i am absolutey sure that the narrative would be that it was all quincy, the thriller phenomenon was just down to 'reganomics' and that thriller was just a sell out compared to the rnb purity of off the wall and showed that mj just wanted to be white, blah blah.

And yes, i don't have a clue what gabaccino was talking about either.
 
Last edited:
Bonnie Blue said:
What were you expecting? It's an itv programme, for a mainstream itv audience. Other programmes in the series have lenny henry opining on shakespeare and len goodwin, a reality dance show judge, on fred astaire so let's not make out that mj is being 'insulted' here. This is accessible television. This isn't some rarified bbc channel 4 arts documentary - it was a fun, engaging,informative programme that was intended to appeal to a wide cross section of people and yet wasn't dumbed down. Anything that widens mj's appeal outside his hardcore support is fabulous in my book. Thriller had it's 25th anniversary some years back, thriller 25 was released and sold 3m, mj was alive and yet absolutely no tv company decided to make a tv documentary about the world's best selling album so this programme was long overdue. When was the last programme about thriller, the 80s?


You 'believe' it was intended to be 'mostly positive'? Unfortunately, short of estate sponsored documentaries i am convinced that you are never ever going to get a more positive documentary than this one in the mainstream media. If you wanted some arty, serious music documentary fronted by some music critic offering 'new insights' and 'interpretations' of thriller, i am absolutey sure that the narrative would be that it was all quincy, the thriller phenomenon was just down to 'reganomics' and that thriller was just a sell out compared to the rnb purity of off the wall and showed that mj just wanted to be white, blah blah.

And yes, i don't have a clue what gabaccino was talking about either.
Click to expand...

It just re-inforced a lot of myths about Michael, that's all. I don't think an ITV audience is so dumb that they need music documentaries in a distilled, spoon-fed format. I know you comment that it wasn't dumbed down, I'm not ignoring that, just that's how I see it obviously. ITV themselves stated on their write up that this is a 'factual film' series intended to 'delve deeper' into the subjects.

Anyone remember the BBC's Essential documentary from years back? I think just prior to Invincible. Gosh I can't remember. Intelligent, positive, gave Michael his dues. So there's a good example of how it can be done, and how it was. I'm sure there are others but that one always sticks out for me. I remember people in the days thereafter talking to me about it, the world genius kept getting said and the general feeling was that many had 'forgotten' various credible aspects concerning Michael - these weren't fans, they were just people watching TV of an evening. Of course that's purely anecdotal but I s**t you not. And that particular documentary had nothing to do with Michael - wasn't made by him or his representatives. Bad 25 was, of course, and I had my issues what that too which I've spoken about in the threads relative to that subject.

It seems from the language you used that you think I'm of the opinion that every take on Michael needs to be some snobby, arty, inaccessible format for music history intellects. I don't feel that way at all. However, Michael's music and art alone is accessible enough not to have to prop it up with documentaries that accent that. The work that needs to be done is to re-affirm the genius of Michael Jackson, and to dispell the myths that continue to be perpetuated over and over. To have a platform like that (albeit a very late one on a Sunday night) and waste it repeating the same old garbage is a shame. By all means make a fun, light entertainment show about Michael and put it on ITV - I have no problem with that at all. It doesn't need to cut into the core of his artistry or give Michael his dues - just like the majority of other documents out there in the mainstream - but just don't litter it with mis-infomation and back-handed compliments.

Oh and if there wasn't any documentaries anywhere in the world that didn't cover Thriller when the 25th anniversary happened I'm not remotely bothered. I wasn't at the time and I'm still not. It's hardly criminally overlooked relative to Michael's career.

As an aside, I don't come here to get into long arguments with people. I'm a 30 year old man that spent a fair amount of his teens doing just that on various forums. I'm past all that now. I'm happy to discuss my opinions with other people and I'm more than interested in reading theirs but being challenged on mine or challenging others on theirs is something I'm not really interested in. I realise we all come here for different reasons and perhaps it's appealing to some to argue for pages and pages.
 
As an aside, I don't come here to get into long arguments with people. I'm a 30 year old man that spent a fair amount of his teens doing just that on various forums. I'm past all that now. I'm happy to discuss my opinions with other people and I'm more than interested in reading theirs but being challenged on mine or challenging others on theirs is something I'm not really interested in.
Click to expand...
Sorry, didn't mean to come off so bolshy. I guess i was just disappointed that someone could have found the documentary insulting to mj, as clearly i thought it had been pretty positive and showcased mj's huge multi-talents. After the dismal spate of media sensationalism on the robson allegations and those cover up payments, i thought it was something to be cheerful about.

Thanks for the headsup re that essentials doc. I googled and it was on bbc2 broadcast in 02. It's on youtube, i'll watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWESnU79EuQ
 
Bonnie Blue said:
Thanks for the headsup re that essentials doc. I googled and it was on bbc2 broadcast in 02. It's on youtube, i'll watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWESnU79EuQ
Click to expand...

Watched it last night. Good and positive docu, but it's not perfect either. For one, Dangerous era is totally overlooked. Totally. No word about it at all. There is some small mention of HIStory ("it was an angry album, MJ letting out his frustration about the allegations") and that's it and some little word about Invincible.

I say it just as constructive criticism for future docus. Apparently there is an e-mail among the leaked Sony e-mails talking about a possible MJ documentary in the American Masters series ( http://www.mjjcommunity.com/forum/threads/135550-American-Masters-Michael-Jackson ). So if they are going to do it, these are the things they need to pay attention to IMO. I get it that the most popular era of MJ was the 80s. But that's exatly why I think showcasing his 90s stuff in a serious manner in depth would open a lot of eyes and it could offer perhaps more new things to most people than the 1000th Thriller-heavy documentary with the already well-known stories over and over again. I'm sure Brad Sundberg and other contributors during those eras would be happy to offer info.

And another overlooked era is the Jacksons era. Especially Destiny and Triumph needs to be showcased a bit more. So I hope if they make another docu they will take it on themselves to showcase those criminally overlooked eras as well.

Well, Michael's career is actually so big and so diverse that a serious, in-depth documentary could easily have 3-4 parts.
 
I don't think there is going to be a document of MJ that content of it makes every single fan happy.
First of all, people who are making documents, they are not fans like we are. They have not followed MJ's life and career like we have, some 30 years, some less, but all the same very closely.

Those document makers may only scratch the surface with their take on MJ and his music comparing to MJ fans knowledge. The only way I see that MJ fans would be happy with the results, is that some fans that have been following MJ for ages and knows his music like back of their hands, makes that kind of document.

Then again, that kind of document is no good for people who are not fans as such, but are interested in learning a little bit of MJ.

I'm trying to say that there is an audience for Ashley Banjo's type of documentaries, and we don't need to jump on it if it isn't perfect just for us, or didn't show us something that we didn't know it already. Wait until next documentary comes around, maybe it is right just for you.
 
There's nothing wrong to aim better and more accurate portrayal of Michael. The Ashley Banjo doc focused more on the artist, is it too much asking not perpetuating the myth others did all the work for Michael but acknowledging his genius and contributions instead?
 
respect77 said:
Watched it last night. Good and positive docu, but it's not perfect either. For one, Dangerous era is totally overlooked. Totally. No word about it at all. There is some small mention of HIStory ("it was an angry album, MJ letting out his frustration about the allegations") and that's it and some little word about Invincible.

I say it just as constructive criticism for future docus. Apparently there is an e-mail among the leaked Sony e-mails talking about a possible MJ documentary in the American Masters series ( http://www.mjjcommunity.com/forum/threads/135550-American-Masters-Michael-Jackson ). So if they are going to do it, these are the things they need to pay attention to IMO. I get it that the most popular era of MJ was the 80s. But that's exatly why I think showcasing his 90s stuff in a serious manner in depth would open a lot of eyes and it could offer perhaps more new things to most people than the 1000th Thriller-heavy documentary with the already well-known stories over and over again. I'm sure Brad Sundberg and other contributors during those eras would be happy to offer info.

And another overlooked era is the Jacksons era. Especially Destiny and Triumph needs to be showcased a bit more. So I hope if they make another docu they will take it on themselves to showcase those criminally overlooked eras as well.

Well, Michael's career is actually so big and so diverse that a serious, in-depth documentary could easily have 3-4 parts.
Click to expand...

Totally agree on that last part. I've said that all along. It would need to be, to me.

Regards that Essential documentary, I think that and the other BBC Culture Show documentary were getting mixed up in my head into the one documentary. I don't remember a great deal about either but some really memorable moments stick out from both.
 
ChrisC said:
Totally agree on that last part. I've said that all along. It would need to be, to me.

Regards that Essential documentary, I think that and the other BBC Culture Show documentary were getting mixed up in my head into the one documentary. I don't remember a great deal about either but some really memorable moments stick out from both.
Click to expand...
Is this the Culture Show doc that you are talking about?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqNzXFKOov4









(Part 4 is missing)
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top