Brian Eno had a significant impact on me in college. His Oblique Strategies and approaches to the artistic life felt — and still feel — congruous with how I want to live.
So, I didn’t come to this doc expecting to learn much but rather to see some of that killer behind-the-scenes footage of him working with David Bowie, Talking Heads, and, to a lesser extent, U2.
The problem with an algorithm choosing from 100s of hours of footage — or perhaps just this algorithm — is that it doesn’t have a concept of pacing or variability.
So, our version was wall-to-wall Eno talking, with maybe 4 minutes of Bowie, 3 minutes of U2, and nothing regarding Talking Heads. We visited a few cool places in his history, but it was far from comprehensive or linear.
With 40 minutes left, I was ready to leave the movie. But we waited it out because it could have changed. It didn’t.
You may ask, then, why I am giving this three stars. A) I like Brian Eno, and hearing an hour of him talking was enjoyable, bordering on inspiring. B) Your experience could be a different movie altogether, and the promise of that is, at this moment, unique to this film.