The Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter"
This eerily beautiful movie has the dubious distinction of being the only rockumentary to capture a murder on film.
When I was a baby journalist, I wrote about music and pop culture, feeling I had just found the second act of the best part of my career in the arts.
I found this in my archives today as I was cleaning up my computer and it made me want to watch Gimme Shelter again. If you haven’t seen it, you should.
If you have, you should watch it again.
It’s Not Only Rock ‘n’ Roll
Music and History Collide In 30th Anniversary Release of Gimme Shelter
By Therra Cathryn Gwyn, staff writer
1969. Man walked on the moon. The NY Jets won the Super Bowl. Marilyn Monroe had been dead for five years and the Sex Pistols were still in grade school. Prince Charles officially became the Prince of Wales and Sesame Street debuted on US television. Madonna was 12, Bill Clinton was 23, and rock ‘n’ roll as we know it was not even two decades old.
Yet, even in 1969, the Rolling Stones were knee-deep into their tenure as the bad boys of rock and no one had any idea just how long that tenure would last. The times, indeed, were a-changing and the recent re-release of Gimme Shelter shows a mood and moment like none before or since. Arguably the greatest rock documentary ever made (some will vote for The Last Waltz and I won’t quarrel) this eerily beautiful film has the dubious distinction of being the only rockumentary to capture a murder on film.
Originally released in 1970, filmmakers Albert and David Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin created a work that almost never made it into general release at all.
From cutting the more colorful language and shots of bare-breasted women (reinserted in this restored version) just to secure a PG rating to wrangling releases from hostile Hell’s Angels (disgruntled over the bad publicity) the film did not have an easy birth.
Columnist Liz Smith said of it, ” It’s overwhelming. I can’t get it out of my mind. It’s a wild experience.”
Intended as an onstage and backstage record of the Stones’ 1969 North American tour the movie opens innocently enough with comical footage of drummer Charlie Watts riding a donkey. The film then flips back and forth in time from concert footage at various locales to Mick Jagger & Co. at the famed Muscle Shoals recording studio.
Interspersed throughout the movie and leading up to the events at Altamont Speedway in San Francisco is footage of Watts and Jagger watching unedited clips of the film and concert. They look dazed and confused at times, a postmortem meditation on what went wrong that winter day.
It’s a grim Jagger who views the killing of Meredith Hunter on a monitor after the fact. Still, he doesn’t give much away about what he thinks about the 18-year-old who rushed towards the stage and was grabbed by the Hell’s Angels providing “security” for the event. Hunter drew a .22 Smith & Wesson pistol and was stabbed and beaten to death by Alan Passaro, a member of the Hells Angels.
The drunken Angels had been clashing with concertgoers and even the bands all day (roughing up Marty Balin during Jefferson Airplane’s set and causing the Grateful Dead to leave early and not play at all because their road crew was in fear for their lives).
In watching the events unfold on film, it’s obvious that following ”Under My Thumb” Jagger can see from his vantage point onstage that a scuffle has broken out but we never know if he saw the gun.
At the time cameraman Baird Bryant didn’t realize what he was filming. It simply appeared to be one of many of the troublesome fights that plagued that evening. With 300,000 people in attendance, there would be many who didn’t know what had happened until later.
The film, despite its sobering finale, is a fantastic representation of essentially the end of the flower-power era.
Both the Stones and their fans are young and beautiful. The concert footage, from the riveting slow-motion ballet of ”Love In Vain” to the force of “Street Fighting Man” is gritty and graceful.
The opening acts on that tour varied from city to city and included B.B. King, Ike and Tina Turner, Janis Joplin, and Grand Funk Railroad. One especially memorable scene of Tina Turner blatantly fondling her mic while moaning her way through a sexually-charged ”I’ve Been Loving You Too Long” is worth the price of admission alone.
This Stones tour went much as big tours went in those days, and as it wound its way to the free concert in San Francisco, we are treated to plenty of the onstage Jagger, preening and pivoting in front of adoring crowds.
Jagger is simply a one-man grad course in Being A Rock Star. He’s compelling onstage and enigmatic off. Also included here is the sometimes highly amusing behind-the-scenes legal maneuvering by attorney Melvin Belli (best known for representing Jack Ruby after he shot Lee Harvey Oswald) in trying to find a suitable location in California for the show that in years since has become known simply as “Altamont.”
Woodstock had happened a scant four months previous and the Stones were eager to host their own groovy love-in by headlining a day of music that included Carlos Santana, Jefferson Airplane, Crosby Stills Nash and Young, and the Flying Burrito Brothers.
Altamont ended up being anything but a love-in for those nearest the violent outbreaks that erupted that evening. Yet, elsewhere in the huge crowd, four children were born.
Some of the most fascinating footage in the entire film is of the audience that sunny day; a half-naked woman dancing ecstatically to Jefferson Airplane, a German Shepard wandering nonchalantly across the stage as Jagger sings, an earnest young blonde soliciting donations to release jailed Black Panthers, ending with this plea against police brutality, ”They are just negroes!”
It’s a prolonged snapshot of a time we will never see again.
The restoration and re-release of Gimme Shelter provides a vivid and unparalleled look at a time in history that still affects the way things are done today, both politically and musically. For some, it will be a trip back in time to when they were young and idealistic, when pot was cheap and love was free. For others, it will be a glimpse into a world they’ve heard of but never lived in.
It’s a shock-to-the-system, brilliant bit of filmmaking and should be required viewing for all students of American pop culture.
Gimme Shelter will be playing at Cinefest Feb. 9-15.
2001.Reprinted by permission.
I've only seen clips and pieces of it, but I do remember wondering (before seeing the climactic scene) about the young guy in the lime-green suit who seems to be following the camera around at the final show, photobombing at every opportunity. I've done a little event security and if I'd noticed that sort of behavior amidst the general anarchy I might have tagged that guy for particular attention. Or maybe not, I don't know. But onscreen at least the foreshadowing is strong.