Hacker Cinema
Crumb
1995 · Film · documentary · 121 min
Directed by Terry Zwigoff
This movie chronicles the life and times of R. Crumb. Robert Crumb is the cartoonist/artist who drew Keep On Truckin', Fritz the Cat, and played a major pioneering role in the genesis of underground comix. Through interviews with his mother, two brothers, wife, ex-wife and ex-girlfriends, as well as selections from his vast quantity of graphic art, we are treated to a darkly comic ride through one man's subconscious mind.
18 positive7 neutralfrom 25 commenters
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Speaking of "crummy," R. Crumb talked about an afternoon he spent driving around the suburbs in the 1980s taking pictures of houses, streets, and strip malls so he could draw realistic backgrounds for his comics.
> “People don’t draw it, all this crap, people don’t focus attention on it because it’s ugly, it’s bleak, it’s depressing,” he says, “The stuff is not created to be visually pleasing and you can’t remember exactly what it looks like. But, this is the world we live in; I wanted my work to reflect that, the background reality of urban life.”
https://time.com/3802766/r-crumbs-snapshots-source-material-of-the-legendary-comic-artist/
I don't have a reference for it (it might be from the film "Crumb") but I remember him saying that people would rave about how he artistically exaggerated the proliferation of poles, signage, and overhead lines to create over-the-top dystopian images, when he was just copying backgrounds from photographs of suburban California.
Little mentioned is the fact that the three crumb brothers had two sisters. Neither of them agreed to take part in the movie, and very little is known about them.
Along similar lines, Steve Buscemi's character Seymour in "Ghost World" (2001) is pretty clearly heavily inspired by Robert Crumb. Seymour collects old blues records and it put off by rock music, not to mention normal mainstream American culture. "Ghost World" was based on a comic book and was directed by Terry Zwigoff, the director of "Crumb".
Wasn't one of the brothers also a (heterosexual) stalker with an Asian fetish and a habit of drawing art about it? Presumably that was Maxon. It's been a long time since I've seen the documentary.
TFA is also frankly pretty underhanded in talking up Crumb's love of inter-war blues recordings while saying very little about his forays into anti-black racism, including one example which is so notorious that the Crumb documentary confronts him directly about it.
I strongly recommend the documentary. But "a little off" is an understatement. By the time of the documentary, his highly intelligent brother Charles is still living with his amphetamine-addicted mother in his late 40ies and rarely leaves his childhood bedroom. He admits on camera that he has "homosexual pedophiliac tendencies" and fantasized about killing Robert as a teenager, and complains that he cannot have an erection anymore because of his medication. Tragically, Charles killed himself shortly after filming of the documentary wrapped. Crumbs other brother Maxon [0], an accomplished and highly talented painter who earns money as a beggar on the streets, tries to find some peace of mind by living a zen-like life in celibacy, in a decrepit hotel room, full of meditation on a bed of nails, and is struggling with his intense sexual desire, several sexual harassment suits, and the fact that he cannot physically have sex, because the pleasure is so intense for him that it triggers epileptic seizures. All three brothers appear to have problems with extreme sexual desire, and Robert is the only one who seems to be able to function at all, although the documentary shows him several times in a trance-like, babbling state induced by the sight of a woman (in older age, he once said in an interview that he is "no longer a slave to a raging libido" [1]).
[0] https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/Still-in-the-shadows-an-artist-in-his-own-right-2487551.php
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/mar/07/robert-crumb-i-am-no-longer-a-slave-to-a-raging-libido
Anyone see the documentary about him: "Crumb" (1994)? Everyone in his family is a little off, but back in those days, you just did the best you could with what you got and if you were a gifted artist like Crumb, you turned being an odd ball into a career.
If I have a favorite genre of doc, it's the ones about outsider artists. In addition to American Movie I love "Monster Road", "In the Realms of the Unreal", "Exit Through the Gift Shop", and my personal favorite "Crumb".
I think it was in the documentary Crumb where they explained how R. Crumb lovingly filled in random urban junk in the landscape, like TV antennas, power lines, traffic lights, and all sorts of clutter that many artists would elide from an attractive panorama. And yet Crumb found it somehow beautiful in this random jumbled-up morass of artificial trees. I found it admirable.
Stumbled on the documentary "David Lynch: The Art Life" before YouTube took it down.
That and "Crumb" are a couple of films that convinced me that some people just are artists. It's not ego, or some desire to be eccentric ... they can't help it. They live "the art life", damn the consequences.
You could handily list any number of other people (John Waters just came to mind).
Similar to the author of the blog post, I have sort of demurred when asked if I was an artist. Partly it sounds arrogant to say, "Why, yes I am."
Partly it seemed to be a thing in the eye of the beholder. "I don't know, do you think I am an artist?" Plenty of people don't think Andy Warhol was an artist, Jackson Pollock....
Sometimes I have treated "artist" as a profession. Do I get paid for my art? Why no, I do not. I get paid for programming. Although when I write a game I am both programmer and "game artist". (Or is perhaps designing an elegant API for a framework a kind of art form? Okay, maybe not.)
If an artist can be a hobbyist the way many of us are amateur musicians, woodworkers, cooks, mechanics, (construction contractors), in our spare time then, yes, many of us are artists.
I think the older I get though (and maybe the more films I see about artists) I am slowly coming to accept that, sure, I'm an artist too. Just maybe not a very good one.
Off topic, but the first illustration in the post is by Robert Crumb; for anyone who hasn't seen the documentary on him, titled "Crumb"[1], you're missing out!
[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109508/
> I seriously felt like "society had no interest in me".
I'm pretty sure society is not obligated to have an interest in you (I'm not trying to put words in your mouth however).
I think you become truly actualized only when you decide what it is you want, what you imagine for yourself. If what you want is in conflict with what society wants of you, you have to decide then whether it is important enough to you to take the road less travelled.
Watching biographies of various artistic people ("The Art Life" about David Lynch comes to mind, also "Crumb") it's clear that some people are just "a certain way" and will choose to live that way - society be damned. (Of course, that there are documentaries about these luminaries tells you that a few at least have found societal acceptance after all.)
> The article mentions Crumb living in France. He moved there right when he was being filmed for his biographical documentary "Crumb" (1994). It's considered one of the best documentaries ever made.
Yep, obligatory recomendation for that movie (which was re-surfaced to the wide public by Jordan Peterson BTW, as a great opportunity for an in-depth look into certain psychopathologies, exhibited by members of the Crumb family). It's one of my favorite movies, documentary or not. His life story is more interesting than most fiction screenplays.
The article mentions Crumb living in France. He moved there right when he was being filmed for his biographical documentary "Crumb" (1994). It's considered one of the best documentaries ever made.
The film chronicles Crumbs rise to fame. As the film tries to understand Crumb's obsession with obscenities, it dives deeper through interviews with him and family members. There, we see a painful portrait of an American family; a temperamental father in the Marines traumatized from war, but conforming to the "pleasant" social decorum in 1950s American suburbia; a mother who becomes unstable after taking amphetamine for dieting. His brothers appear in the film, one of which take a cocktail of anti-depressants. (He committed suicide before the film completed.)
The NYT article touches upon his estrangement in France: "Crumb’s followed in the long line of artists and writers who have exiled themselves from America." Perhaps his emigration overseas is a way to distance himself from the place of painful memories.
Just want to agree, the film Crumb is a wild documentary,and totally worth watching for adults who have any interest in counter culture.
+1 for the film. I went to a showing in Atlanta where the director was doing a Q&A afterward. The ticket was free and I didn't have much interest in Crumb.
The documentary is absolutely fascinating, if just for the window into his family's life, if not for his work. Highly recommend.
At the end of the movie "Crumb" he moves to France.
To be cancelled you have to first be part of acceptable society and want to remain there, which Crumb never was and never wanted to be. He's a creep who likes to make interesting cartoons, even if they are filled with misogyny and bitterness. He comes from a creepy family, which the film "Crumb" makes clear with Crumb's blessing. He's doing alright considering.
I'm not a Crumb fan but I highly recommend the "Crumb" documentary that you mention. It was very interesting hearing that he and his brothers were creating their own comic books, and there are some other useful insights to the creative process.
I am a Crumb fan and enjoyed this piece, although I guess I'm not surprised at some of his world views. The 1994 movie "Crumb" referenced in this article is really, really interesting. Fun fact: I've been through Winters, California many times on the way to Napa and had no idea he used to live there.
A few people have mentioned Apollo 11 but I prefer (and my favorite documentary of all time is) For All Mankind (1989). They’re similar, iirc they share a lot of the same footage, but For All Mankind gives you a great sense of what it was like for those early astronauts to take that trip to the Moon. It has all the best footage of the moon we have ever taken. For All Mankind is a must, but both are worth a watch if you’re a space fan.
Crumb is also pretty good. It’s about an offbeat artist and gives you the look into the mind of someone that wouldn’t normally be in the spot light.
I love documentaries, and these are my favourites. All very worth a watch.
- The Crash Reel
- McConkey
- Buck
- Apollo 11
- Carts of Darkness
- The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia
- Samsara
- Baraka
- Brooklyn Castle
- Spellbound
- Drew: The Man Behind the Poster
- Crumb
- The Jinx
- The Art of Flight
- King of Kong
- Indie Game: The Movie
- Capturing the Friedmans
- OJ: Made in America
- The Barkley Marathons
- The Seven Five
- Murderball
- Unbranded
- Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee
- Big River Man
- Hoop Dreams
- Word Wars
- Free Solo
- Long Shot
- Meru
- Being Elmo
- All This Mayhem
- Jiro Dreams of Sushi
- The Cove
- Project Nim
- Alone in the Wilderness
- Behind the Curve
- The Dawn Wall
- Grizzly Man
- 13th
- Winnebago Man
- Man vs Snake: The Long and Twisted Tale of Nibbler
- Get Me Roger Stone
- Icarus
- 13th
- Koyaanisqatsi
- The Thin Blue Line
- An Inconvenient Truth
- Oklahoma City
- Virunga
- The Staircase
- Evil Genius
- Undefeated
- Betting on zero
Crumb. Its about the iconic counter-cultural cartoonist Robert Crumb (creator of the 1960s/1970s underground comics Fritz the Cat, Keep on Trucking, etc.). The Wikipedia entry for it[1] says (along with other accolades):
"Crumb was met with wide acclaim from critics, earning a 95% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Gene Siskel rated Crumb as the best film of the year...Roger Ebert gave the film four (of four) stars, writing that 'Crumb is a film that gives new meaning to the notion of art as therapy.'"
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crumb_(film)
In that great documentary "Crumb" cartoonist Robert Crumb shows his notebooks in which he keeps pictures of all sorts of mundane infrastructure that he incorporates into his drawings.
It's really effective in this sequence "A Short History of America":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IFVUHg_tUc
That one always gets me...
IOW, they tried so hard to make the game realistic that the intended gameplay was no longer enforceable
Realism is sometimes a misguided goal. Games are media, just like movies. What you want most of the time isn't realism, but an impression of realism. Robert Crumb and his son sometimes do "realistic" portraits, but in the biographical movie about Crumb, he reveals that his "realistic" portraits actually contain very subtle elements of caricature, to draw the user's attention to the most interesting aspects of the subject's face.
Contrast this with films of war vs. actual war. Head-cam movies of modern soldiers in combat look like people in battle gear taking cover while yelling at each other about people you can't see or barely see, then calling in air support. There's nothing cinematic or easily parseable by the viewer. If you're on a modern battlefield, and you're posing for the cameras in a nicely composed scene laid out by the "Rule of Three" you're likely to get shot in the very next second.
Documentaries and action films are very different things. Both of those are very different from documentary-styled fictional films. Analogies to sandboxes, various other game genres, and sandboxy games apply.
An excerpt from the Monster Road documentary which is a great watch and is quite similar to David Lynch's Crumb documentary film.
"Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117293/
A group of young men are accused of murder because, basically, they look like goths and have the misfortune of living in a conservative Christian community.
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The "Seven Up" series:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058578/
A group of British kids from various socio-economic backgrounds are interviewed starting when they are 7 years old, and interviewed again every 7 years.
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"Manufacturing Consent"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104810/
Based on Noam Chomsky's book about the influence the mass media and other institutions have on Americans.
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"Crumb"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109508/
The life of Robert Crumb, a hugely influential underground cartoonist.
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"Born Rich"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/
About kids who are born in to insanely wealthy families.