Cool to see their approach for reviewing a concert film, and I definitely agree.

I think it's...CAT!

god the flash back I remember wating to see the review. The movie was not showing close to me! I had to drive to Houston! (wich is where my mom lived and we were going there anyway)

But notice how he gets Shelia and Shenna confused! I got so mad back then!

I remember waiting to see this review when it happened as well.
And I remember going to see the movie with my mom at a tiny shitty theater in in the back of a stripmall in Woodbridge NJ.

My earliest memory of this film was of it ending up in a Best Movies of 87/Year in Review on whatever CBS morning show was on at the time.

I remember when it was released on VHS. I had one of those mega watt tower stereo systems connected to my tv/vcr. It's a good thing my home was in a rural area, or I would've been paying serious $ for violating some noise ordinance.

I love their little joke about "buying" tickets and the hint to Prince's powers that be... and then the classic aside from one to the other.

I started watching these two back on PBS to catch scenes from movies that I was fascinated by like "The Howling" or "Dragonslayer" in 1981. Nostalgia.

[Edited 10/24/11 9:30am]

Fun review, even if Ebert was wrong saying Prince & Sheila do a duet in the film... he must've been thinking about Sheena.

I love the SOTT concert film, but doesn't he actually lip-sync it? I thought I read somewhere that he re-recorded the tracks to sound live, and then lip-sang the tracks.

Can one of you obsessed types clarify?

Johnart, you saw the movie as a young boy, saw Sheila in that reveiling costume, but you're still gay? lol.

Sheila, worship the nips.

imago said:

I love the SOTT concert film, but doesn't he actually lip-sync it? I thought I read somewhere that he re-recorded the tracks to sound live, and then lip-sang the tracks.

Can one of you obsessed types clarify?

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

SoulAlive said:

imago said:

I love the SOTT concert film, but doesn't he actually lip-sync it? I thought I read somewhere that he re-recorded the tracks to sound live, and then lip-sang the tracks.

Can one of you obsessed types clarify?

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

Was the ICNTPOYM performance shot at Paisley Park too?

PrettyMan72 said:

SoulAlive said:

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

Was the ICNTPOYM performance shot at Paisley Park too?

I think so does anyone know for sure?

I got the VHS, I seriously need to hook up a VCR to a tv somewhere in my house so I can watch the damn thing.

djThunderfunk said:

Fun review, even if Ebert was wrong saying Prince & Sheila do a duet in the film... he must've been thinking about Sheena.

I think he's referring to It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night.

Feels like I haven't seen this movie in years, I really need to pop the DVD in ASAP, that review got me all nostalgic for the movie.

Best concert movie ever! I couldn't sit still when I was watching this in a theatre I wanted to get up and start dancing in the aisle,lol

PrettyMan72 said:

SoulAlive said:

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

Was the ICNTPOYM performance shot at Paisley Park too?

The footage of the extended guitar part looks like it is original footage from the European shows (it goes quite grainy and you can see the huge stadium audience - much larger than PP).

Also, there's no need to be shocked about the lip-synching. It would be bad if he'd basically shot videos and lip-synched to the album material - that would be unacceptable. But, he's actually syncing to his own live performance because the footage was unusable, so its not like he didn't perform the songs live. And, I'm glad he did! He could have just abandoned the project once the visuals turned out to be so poor. Thankfully, he didn't - he spent even more money getting decent visual content to go with the live audio and produced one of the greatest concert films ever!

SoulAlive said:

imago said:

I love the SOTT concert film, but doesn't he actually lip-sync it? I thought I read somewhere that he re-recorded the tracks to sound live, and then lip-sang the tracks.

Can one of you obsessed types clarify?

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

I think the movie is absolutely brilliant and amazing to watch. Just incredible. But even so, I have never fully understood this explanation. He had the band, the instruments, the stage, the audience, the film crew...why not just do it live?

2freaky4church1 said:

Sheila, worship the nips.

amen

Efan said:

SoulAlive said:

Some of the European shows were professionally filmed but when Prince viewed the footage,it was all messed up and he couldn't use it.So he basically re-shot the entire show at his Paisley Park studio...lip-syncing to the live tracks.I was shocked when I found out about this.It's still the greatest concert film ever,imo.

I think the movie is absolutely brilliant and amazing to watch. Just incredible. But even so, I have never fully understood this explanation. He had the band, the instruments, the stage, the audience, the film crew...why not just do it live?

Because performing it all again at Paisley Park would not have captured the energy and vibe of it being performed out on the road for real, with genuine audience reaction. When an artist plays, they feed off the energy of the audience.

Just look at the Rave DVD - no audience energy whatsoever. Ok, they were invited and a lot were execs etc but still, you can see the effects of a contrived audience setting versus a genuine one (like Syracuse for example).

Mindflux said:

Efan said:

I think the movie is absolutely brilliant and amazing to watch. Just incredible. But even so, I have never fully understood this explanation. He had the band, the instruments, the stage, the audience, the film crew...why not just do it live?

Because performing it all again at Paisley Park would not have captured the energy and vibe of it being performed out on the road for real, with genuine audience reaction. When an artist plays, they feed off the energy of the audience.

Just look at the Rave DVD - no audience energy whatsoever. Ok, they were invited and a lot were execs etc but still, you can see the effects of a contrived audience setting versus a genuine one (like Syracuse for example).

Still not buying it. Do you mean Paisley Park isn't big enough to hold the right size audience he needed to get that energy? Fair enough, but he could have done a concert in a stadium then and filmed that.

Efan said:

Mindflux said:

Because performing it all again at Paisley Park would not have captured the energy and vibe of it being performed out on the road for real, with genuine audience reaction. When an artist plays, they feed off the energy of the audience.

Just look at the Rave DVD - no audience energy whatsoever. Ok, they were invited and a lot were execs etc but still, you can see the effects of a contrived audience setting versus a genuine one (like Syracuse for example).

Still not buying it. Do you mean Paisley Park isn't big enough to hold the right size audience he needed to get that energy? Fair enough, but he could have done a concert in a stadium then and filmed that.

Yes, he could. But then how many millions had he already blown on useless footage? He was still with Warners then - who was stumping the cash for the project? Who knows, maybe he wanted to go out and tour it again to get better footage, but the suits said no? There's always a cost element and in those days there was a label to answer to as well. So, the best and more cost-effective solution was to take the tour audio and marry it with PP footage.

And, I dunno, I'm not sure a PP concert is the same as going to, say, Madison Square Garden. There would be something about it being "Prince's rehearsal room" that would affect the vibe, I'd say.

Milty said:

My earliest memory of this film was of it ending up in a Best Movies of 87/Year in Review on whatever CBS morning show was on at the time.

Mine was seeing it in an all black theater in Philly and half the crowd walking out baffled because they thought it was Purple rain 2 or something. I don't think most folks knew it was a concert film like "Stop Making Sense"

herb4 said:

Milty said:

My earliest memory of this film was of it ending up in a Best Movies of 87/Year in Review on whatever CBS morning show was on at the time.

Mine was seeing it in an all black theater in Philly and half the crowd walking out baffled because they thought it was Purple rain 2 or something. I don't think most folks knew it was a concert film like "Stop Making Sense"

An excellent film

At the time of this film's release,there were all these rumors that Prince would soon be on tour in the States.I kept waiting and waiting for a concert announcement This film was a nice 'teaser' but it's too bad we didn't get the real thing.

Efan said:

djThunderfunk said:

Fun review, even if Ebert was wrong saying Prince & Sheila do a duet in the film... he must've been thinking about Sheena.

I think he's referring to It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night.

Which isn't really a duet. Either he doesn't know the difference between Sheila & Sheena, or, he doesn't know the definition of duet.

SoulAlive said:

At the time of this film's release,there were all these rumors that Prince would soon be on tour in the States.I kept waiting and waiting for a concert announcement This film was a nice 'teaser' but it's too bad we didn't get the real thing.

The US tour was cancelled, this was meant to be it's replacement.

djThunderfunk said:

Efan said:

I think he's referring to It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night.

Which isn't really a duet. Either he doesn't know the difference between Sheila & Sheena, or, he doesn't know the definition of duet.

It seems pretty clear he knows the difference between Sheila and Sheena. He spends a generous amount of time raving about her, and pretty much gives her more praise than he does Prince.

Need this on Blu-ray NOW!!