Moonage Daydream

“Moonage Daydream” is the third track on David Bowie’s seminal 1972 album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Yet, if you asked any casual fan to name 10 of his songs (even 20), it probably wouldn’t get a mention. Still, it’s a perfect title for this cruise through Bowie’s career, which is less a documentary and more of a feature-length music video.

Written, directed, produced, and edited by Brett Morgen, this is a sonic collage by the documentarian that weaves Bowie’s music, concert footage, and performance with various unrelated films. You’ll see snippets from Metropolis, Ivan the Terrible, Triumph of the Will, Nosferatu, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and even Plan 9 From Outer Space. The images will pop up again and again but without context. Are these his favorite movies? Did they inspire him? Are they merely pretty visuals? Who knows?

We also get cinematic examples of the man himself. Snippets from The Man Who Fell to Earth, Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, The Hunger, and Labyrinth show up. Behind-the-scenes footage from Gerry Troyna’s Ricochet — which chronicled Bowie during the tail end of the “Serious Moonlight Tour” in 1983 — makes an appearance too. The artist wanders around Bangkok, staring blankly as he rides up and down escalators at night. The scenes are utilized so frequently that they gradually lose their impact.

The cinematic journey is a stream-of-consciousness head trip without regard for time, order, coherence, or details. It inundates the viewer for 2 hours and 15 minutes. The chronicle covers roughly 1969, when “Space Oddity” was released, on through the massive “Glass Spider Tour” in 1987. There is no narrative, although subtle points are made. He was an artist that constantly evolved, and a nomadic lifestyle reflected this — moving from the UK to LA because he hated the city (!) to Berlin. The gender-bending persona of Ziggy Stardust at the beginning of the film juxtaposed with a man that sold Pepsi in 1987 while dancing with Tina Turner. It’s a shocking dichotomy. “I’m sorry, but I’ve never found that poverty means purity,” he defends.

The inclusions are just as telling as the omissions. Any direct mention of his cocaine addiction from the 1970s to the early 1980s is absent. However, he’s clearly under the influence in a limo while drinking from a carton of milk (in a scene from the 1975 documentary Cracked Actor). Bowie’s marriage to Iman is presented as the realization of a life in search of love — a feeling he once called a disease. “Word on a Wing” underscores these images in the final quarter. It’s a touching moment. However, his equally famous marriage to Angela Bowie, a significant influence on him throughout his career in the 1970s, is wholly stricken from the record.

This production is simply an invitation to bask in the music of a legend. Under the full cooperation of the Bowie estate, Brett Morgen was given unprecedented access to his archives which included his journals, photography, and art. You’ll hear rare or previously unreleased live tracks, as well as newly created remixes. The soundscape of musical mashups and live performances curated by longtime producer and friend Tony Visconti looks and sounds as pristine as if it were recorded yesterday. There is an immediacy to the effort that excels. These are interspersed with monologues from Bowie himself. His observations are often delivered to interviewers like Dick Cavett. Bowie speaks timidly, in stark contrast to his avant-garde identity on stage. His thoughts are coherent and polite, although not particularly groundbreaking.

Whether you’re a die-hard fan or a casual observer is irrelevant to what you’ll glean from this. You won’t learn much. If anything, this document renders Bowie’s life even more confusing — a life lived as a fever dream. But hey, what a fantasy! Director Brett Morgen has cited Disneyland as an influence in his filmmaking. “I like to think of my movies as theme park rides where you’re getting all the sights and sounds and scents.” This is appropriate. I learned as much about NASA while riding “Space Mountain” as I did about David Bowie while watching this. But oh boy, what a ride!

09-27-22