I dug it too.

I don't know if it's the greatest, but it's certainly one of the most culturally and historically significant documentaries ever made.

The Eras tour movie of Miss swift might take that cake....

TrivialPursuit said:

funkbabyandthebabysitters said:

TrivialPursuit said:

I don't know if it's the greatest, but it's certainly one of the most culturally and historically significant documentaries ever made.

Joe Lauro, a filmmaker and archivist, said this on FB at the time: "I am commenting here on “Salamishah Tillets’ recent “ Summer Of Soul” article and interview with Questlove . [Edited 10/17/23 23:22pm]

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

This is a pretty good list, but I think the Zaire 74 film Soulpower deserved a mention

funkbabyandthebabysitters said:

TrivialPursuit said:

I don't know if it's the greatest, but it's certainly one of the most culturally and historically significant documentaries ever made.

Joe Lauro, a filmmaker and archivist, said this on FB at the time: "I am commenting here on “Salamishah Tillets’ recent “ Summer Of Soul” article and interview with Questlove . In the piece it is stated “ For nearly 50 years, this ( Harlem Festival tapes) just sat in a basement and no one cared”. As well as one of the key premises of the film itself, as stated in the opening montage, that the Harlem Festival footage was LOST FOR 50 YEARS. This statement at best is hyperbole. The reality is that in 2004 I tracked down director/producer Hal Tulchin after screening a 16mm syndication print of an episode of his first, Harlem Festival series Mr. Tulchin and I went to lunch to discuss the Harlem Festival footage and shortly thereafter he signed a representational agreement with my company Historic Films. The idea was to license clips to third parties from the 40+ hours of Harlem Festival footage as well as develop a feature length documentary on the event. I pulled the video tape masters from his Westchester County basement, digitized the reels, logged their contents, archived the 1” submasters at the Historic Films offices and insisted that Mr. Tulchin copyright all of the reels. In fact I filled out the forms for him and filed the copyright registration on his behalf ( and on my dime) with the Library Of Congress . The Library Of Congress was also sent a complete set of videos of the 40+ hours of Harlem Festival footage as is their requirement for copyright filing. Through the years of our representation, we licensed excerpts of the footage to several productions including SONY RECORDS who used a sizable portion of the “lost” Nina Simone set in one of their home video releases. Morgan Neville ( Academy Award Winning director TWENTY FEET FROM STARDOM) Robert Gordon ( Emmy winning co-director BEST OF ENEMIES, author of IT CAME FROM MEMPHIS) and I developed a feature length documentary film on the festival framing the event within the politics and civil right unrest that existed at the time, created a trailer and shopped the production around to several possible distributors. A deal with a major distributor was in negotiation in 2007 and we were in contract negotiations. To our surprise the negotiations broke down and the rep from that company jumped ship and teamed with Mr. Tulchin dumping Neville, Gordon and myself taking the Harlem Festival project on as his own . Some 15 years later we have SUMMER OF SOUL. As an archivist and filmmaker who has spent his 35 year career creating music documentaries, and unearthing and preserving rare musical content, I am delighted that this film has finally been produced. I only ask that credit for the Harlem Festival footages' re-discovery be properly given. Producers of a doc such as this that is touting it’s righteousness and quest for truth should at least give credit where it is due. I assure you, if it were not for my efforts the Harlem Festival master tapes would likely still be molding in Mr. Tulchin’s Westchester County basement and Questlove would still be in total ignorance of their existence. Joe Lauro" Robert mugge - Robert Mugge critiques the movie on Facebook "Whatever your response to Questlove's new 2-hour doc SUMMER OF SOUL, I have to take exception with his fleshing out of his title with a parenthetical variation on Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," even though neither Gil nor his song are featured in the film.... It's also depressing knowing that Questlove says he picked these brief excerpts from 40 hours of available tape, and of course, whenever possible, he picked things that fit his themes, rather than the best songs by these artists. So, instead of using some of the more brilliant songs Nina Simone was performing at that time, he used well-meaning schmaltz like "To Be Young Gifted and Black." Not exactly theme music for a revolution, or the sort of powerful work we know her by. And although I thought the Mavis Staples/Mahalia Jackson performance of "Precious Lord" was thrilling, why do I need to see Stevie Wonder playing drums, the Fifth Dimension doing their "Hair" medley, or David Ruffin performing a mediocre version of "My Girl"? Considering that a professional musician "directed" this film, I found a lot of the musical choices to be really lame." This is my main issue. The film pushes the main angle that it was left unseen forever when it was televised in the states and in europe (questlove the director is all about hyperbole though so thats no surprise), and prob cos the notion of erased black history has a lot of currency right now, but doesn't really show as amazing or long footage as it could do. I felt like its a doc first, concert movie second. [Edited 10/17/23 23:22pm]

Hasn't QeustLove proven enough times by now that he's full of shit?

Stop Making Sense

funkbabyandthebabysitters said:

One problem i have with it is that the footage wasnt buried It had been televised! And that programme of the show prob had more footage than questlove used It was also used in the Netflix nina simone doc. So the idea it was silenced is plain false. The issue is just that it had been languishing in someones house for years.

I think the idea was simply that the event was undervalued in history, not censored.

RJOrion said:

Im curious to know...how has Questlove proven enough times by now that he's full of shit?...especially in regards to the documentary "Summer Of Soul".

His contant hyping of everyting with bullshit.
Before his doc came pout it was already known that the fotage was never lost like he claimed.
And well, those bullshit seminars he does about Prince. He claims to be a 'Prince' scholar yet he dosn't even know the basics. etc.
And I like the guy and what he does, but he needs to check himself.

"I know more about Prince than you do!"

"No, I know more about him! I know he was 5'4, not 5'3! Get it right, people!"

No

As a concert movie? Obviously no.

As a documentary about a more than 50 years old festival with interviewees often talking over a relatively small selection of songs from over 40 hours of recorded footage over 6 Sundays in 1969? That is different question.

IanRG said:

As a concert movie? Obviously no.

As a documentary about a more than 50 years old festival with interviewees often talking over a relatively small selection of songs from over 40 hours of recorded footage over 6 Sundays in 1969? That is different question.

I could have used a bit more music.

Cinny said:

IanRG said:

As a concert movie? Obviously no.

As a documentary about a more than 50 years old festival with interviewees often talking over a relatively small selection of songs from over 40 hours of recorded footage over 6 Sundays in 1969? That is different question.

I could have used a bit more music.

I could have used the entire festival in 4K on as much BluRays as needed.