Crumb (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]

He’s a Crumb, but is he a crumb?
“Crumb” is a movie where you must learn to read beneath the lines as to who this artist is. Nothing about this man is as what it seems initially. But if you study this movie (as it is a film to be studied) you will realize the malice R.Crumb puts into his artwork is directed solely at the attitudes of society. And that includes every aspect and every class of people. It doesn’t seem to matter who they are. He is an artist that details everything he sees with frightening clarity and no regard for diplomacy. It’s an ability not confined to gender or color. His comics read like an illustrated passage of a diary. As you dig more into his backround (the film is NOT the last word on him) you realize that no one is exempt from his wrath. Not men, not women, not ethnics. After reading several reviews and chats about what they observed in this film, it’s obvious that many viewers took what they saw at face value.Looking at his artwork you realize R.Crumb combined the look of innocent comic strips of the early 20th century with more explicit content common today. No one else at the time had thought of drawing this way. The comic book industry in the 60’s was becoming increasingly progressive. The old look of comics, Lil Abner or Little Orphan Annie for example, were considered passe.The inspiration for R.Crumb’s art comes from a deeply dysfunctional family. It wasn’t an overly violent family but it was a morbidly depressing one. You learn that the problems Robert and his siblings had stemmed from the fact that their house was dominated by a father who saw manhood in only one way and was not lenient in his views to accomodate any of his sons’ artistic potential. As Robert pointed out, when his father came home from work any blip of a happy man dissapeared as soon as he entered the door. When it came to encouragement or artistic development all five children had only each other and were left to their own devices. Robert became the success perhaps because he, unlike Charles for instance, saw his talent as a way to define himself and not simply as a means of profit. He chose the format (comics) he knew best to make his point.The bulk of his material consists of two main topics:his family and women. His attitudes on women are far more complicated. His unpopularity with girls as a teen is due to a result of his inability to fashion himself into something they wanted visually. And he was equally frustrated at THEIR apparent inability to ignore those instincts and see him for the good person he felt he was. It has led to lifelong love/hate relationship with the opposite sex. One that is defined by pure lust and no real affection for females for who they are except in the case of his daughter Sophie.His views on blacks and the never ending debate as to whether or not he is racist is not given nearly as much screentime.He denounces the critism he has garnered by saying “it all came from white liberals.” That’s not exactly an ideal way of defending yourself in a largely white liberal society. Neither he, nor Terry Zwigoff (who made this movie), give a straight answer to the charge and leave other artists to answer for Crumb. But if you take into account Crumb’s true love of black music (specifically, delta blues of 30’s) it becomes harder to pin the “racist” label on him. Still, the movie lets him off a bit easy, its only flaw.Other aspects of his life such as his open marriage to wife Aline, his strained relationship with his son Jesse, and the overall study of the underground comix scene that he helped spawn are present but not as prominently featured. Engrossing, but somewhat incomplete, “Crumb” is an indepth character study of a truly misunderstood man.

Great Robert Crumb DVD!
A R. Crumb Collectors Item!

Mondo Bizarro
When I was a teenager growing up in San Diego, R Crumb’s comic books were available in every head shop. It was a lot hipper to have a stack of Crumb’s work stashed away in your room than it was to have a Playboy or a Penthouse. Crumb’s work was misogynistic, sexist, racist, and about as politically incorrect in every way that it could be yet it was the toast of the counterculture.I was visiting friends in Las Vegas when Crumb was first released and saw it while I was there. It made such an impression that I put it on my list of DVDs to own and finally got around to getting my copy this year.Robert Crumb is nothing if not bizarre. On watching the interviews with him, some of his family members, his friends and others around him I got the feeling that his perverted talents developed because of his dysfunctional upbringing rather than despite it. The raw talent was always there, it is just a twist of fate and mind that propelled him to fame as the foremost cartoonist of his generation.Think what you will of his subject matter, his work is undoubtedly great. Crumb taps into a vein of humor that springs from the darkest corners of his imagination and brings it to life in such a way that we can laugh while simultaneously being repelled. Nothing is taboo to Crumb, in fact he seems to revel in the most degenerate imagery. And to think that he is the most normal of the family members who were interviewed for this documentary! Incredibly, both of his brothers proved weirder than he, the one who still lived at home reminds the viewer of Goober from the Andy Griffith Show only stranger. David Lynch could hardly imagine an odder lot for one of his odder movies. (Crumb’s sisters declined to be interviewed for the film, probably out of embarassment).Since I enjoy Crumb’s work, I found it interesting to discover the things that made him the kind of guy he is. His awkward relations with women undoubtedly color the way he depicts them and its funny that while some of the women interviewed are appalled, others are more philosophical. The film didn’t touch on his relations with blacks although his cartoons feature black characters in the crudest caricature imaginable. That I find very ironic, because one of Crumb’s lifelong obsessions has been the promotion and preservation of early black music, particularly the blues.R Crumb is pure mondo bizarro. If you are easily offended, then this documentary is definitely not for you. However, if you are a fan of one of the greatest and most controversial illustrators of the second half of the twentieth century and would like to find out what makes him tick, you may find this film to be quite a revelation.

Great doco on my favourite cartoonist

I had never heard of this movie but when amazon recommended it I bought it on a whim. Crumb is definitely worth watching if you enjoy movies that are off the beaten path. Highly amusing and, although at times slightly troubling, a fascinating film!