The Wrecking Crew (2008)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Good concept, poorly executed.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Denny Tedesco directed this documentary about a group of session musicians in the center of popular music during the 60's collectively known as The Wrecking Crew. One of the stuffy old timers proclaimed that these new young players would wreck the music industry. Unlike the old timers who sometimes look down on rock and roll, these kids love the new music and often collaborated with the artists. The exact number of musicians vary and nobody really agrees on its members. One of them is Tedesco's father Tommy. They were there at the dawn of rock and roll, playing for Brian Wilson among many others, and are the ultimate unknown contributors to everybody's soundtracks of their lives including TV themes and commercial jiggles.The accolades are well deserved. They are late in coming but better late than never. It's amazing how much of the sound of the day were created by these musicians. They not only played off the sheets. They also riff new sounds not on the sheets. The stories in the film are mostly divided into the personal and the musical. The personal stories of each musician are not necessarily the most dramatic. Essentially, they barely had a personal life. Their families rarely saw them. They were so sought after that artists waited for them before booking studio time. They worked non-stop. Glen Campbell seems to be the only one who made it big. The music stories are fascinating for nostalgic purposes and that most people never considered their favorite bands not playing their own music. There is a Milli Vanilli naivety to music listening and by the 70s, the newer bands have the musical rigor to their performances. Nevertheless, I was still surprised at how much they contributed to the recordings. The nostalgia factor works best if one grew up on these songs. My time was a couple of decades after this and this movie is mostly academic for me. This would make for a great musical film if one could get the licenses for the songs.

As a really lousy piano player I am in complete awe of musicians like these who can do almost anything with their instrument.Riveting subject matter but the structure of this documentary is a complete mess. Part of the problem is that the distance in time from when the film was made and the events being chronicled. It would have taken a lot more money and effort to really do this subject justice.Another problem is that none of the musicians they interviewed were articulate speakers and had little to say but this could be blamed on the filmmaker not asking the right questions. The one exception perhaps was his father, Tommy Tedesco who had a few funny and revealing bits in the film.

I saw this at a special screening last year in Palm Springs. Director Denny Tedesco was on hand for an audience Q&A following the film with Wrecking Crew drummer Hal Blaine. Also on hand at the screening were Wrecking Crew guitarist Bill Pitman and movie mogul Jerry Weintraub. This film was conceived by director Tedesco as a 30 minute documentary featuring four of the members of LA's legendary studio musicians known as "The Wrecking Crew." Dozens of key musicians made up the crew during the decade of the 1960's as they provided the music for almost all the legendary recordings coming out of the Los Angeles recording studios during that wonderful era of music history. Tedesco arranged a round table discussion of their remembrances of that time with his father, guitarist Tommy Tedesco and fellow recording sidemen and women Carol Kaye, Plas Johnson and Hal Blaine. One thing leads to another and Tedesco found so much material was being covered that he needed to expand further and include more interviews with other musicians. This led to more archival interviews to supplement that, more music to add to the soundtrack and archival footage on film and from stills. This turned into a delightfully entertaining and thoroughly informative documentary that is a must see for anyone weather they lived in that decade or not because the songs live on are the part of the soundtrack of America itself. Look for interviews by Herb Alpert, Dick Clark, Cher, Glen Campbell, Frank Zappa, Nancy Sinatra, Mickey Dolenz, Peter Tork, Jimmy Webb, Bones Howe, Snuff Garett, Larry Knechtel, Lew McCreary, Larry Levine, Don Randi, Bill Pitman, Joe Osborne, Julius Wechter, H.B. Barnum, Lou Adler, Al Casey, Brian Wilson, Earl Palmer and many more. A monumental soundtrack featuring over 100 1960's classics. Micki Stern had the difficult but enjoyable task of Music Supervisor for the film and Bob Branow was the sound re-recording mixer. Denny Tedesco directs with cinematography by Trish Govoni, Rodney Taylor and Vincent E. Toto. Claire Scanlon does a masterful job of editing all this material. Just a wonderful film and a must see. As a documentary I would give this a 10 out of 10 and highly recommend it. You'll have a good time.

If you are an aficionado of music between the 50s and late 80s early 90s you will find this a fascinating documentary. It is the story of studio musicians who did most of the playing for the recordings of some of the great groups of this time period. The film is lovingly put together by Denny Tedesco and includes a particular focus on Tommy Tedesco who is his father and who recently died after having participated in interviews for this film with many other of these great musicians. You probably did not know that just about all the music of Beach Boys was not recorded by them but was played for the records by the musicians affectionately self named " The Wrecking Crew " The film also features Carol Bass who is obviously a great guitar player and is only really known by people in the music business as these musicians did not get any recognition on the albums they recorded. They were financially well paid during this time and have no regrets for their anonymity. There are film clips from many recording sessions including one with Frank Sinatra. Apparently potential distributors have been skeptical that the producer would be able to get the rights to include all the great music that is in this film but he did it as people recognized the historic value of this documentary. The soundtrack is unbelievable and is a concert in to itself and will make a great CD.FilmRap.net