THE WALL (A FILM BY ROGER WATERS AND SEAN EVANS)

This concert film is not only appealing because of the music of "The Wall" presented by Roger Waters and his band, but because of the story behind the stage. The story reveals the anti-war message and the movie offer to the viewer other surroundings than the actual stage. But don't worry, we have the complete show here. The fact that it was not only a concert made me appreciate more the music of "The Wall" which has never been my favorite Pink Floyd album. The visuals are spectacular in this super production with the big wall, the lights mainly in the red color and the projections on the screen. The musicians are almost out of the picture, except Roger. The surround "atmospheric" sound place you in the show. And on top of that, you can watch this in plenty of languages choices with the subtitles, while this is more important in the extras with the documentary. In the extras, you can see David Gilmour played "Comfortably Numb" on top of the wall. My favorite parts of the show are the atmospheric songs outside the typical rock songs of the "Another Brick in The Wall" suite. The story behind the concept of "The Wall" is beyond the simple anti-war message, but is also based on the concept of alienation that humans fear in their lives in general. The idea of Roger Waters to dedicated this show to the people who have died in the war is really touching considering the fact that his father and grandfather died in this situation so that his universal message of peace has a personal resonance on him. Recommended not only to music listeners, but also those who enjoy a good musical movie.

After Alan Parker's film and the Berlin political show, what can Roger Waters do to excite us, Pink Floyd veterans? well, it seems that quite a bit. First, the visual presentation is absolutely stunning: Waters uses cutting-edge 3D projection techonology to transform the huge wall into a virtual reality platform. The projections are utterly captivating, moving around the stage like it was real, making our eyes wonder if it's real or some kind of trickerry. It's a sight to behold. Waters uses every magic in his vault to include modern political references, satire and social commentary. This is the main reason to get the blu-ray edition (don't settle for DVD, it's not good enough, sorry).

So it's a huge show and it's visually very satisfying. In the musical department, there's not much room to improve, really. OK, the audio quality is much betterh than Berlin or the 80s, easily. But although the mix if fine and the performance of Dave Kilminister and Snowy White is superb, it doesn't really innovate. Roger's vocal performance has deteriorated because of his age, so most of the time he's using playback, which is a sad sight to see.

The live footage wasn't good enough for Rog, apparntly, so he's added a sad and gloomy documentary, which sometimes interrupts the show and makes us wish it won't. Honestly, the docu parts should have been dumped into the "EXTRAS" section of the product. Too many graves, too many dull moments, too many "Sad old Roger" talking about war like a really old man.

So if you're considering getting the blu-ray version, enjoy the stage spectacle but don't expect to be thrilled with the docu bits, thrown here in there to make stuff more "serious-looking". The Wall show in its 2010-2013 version was really a fine audio-visual production, but it has been slightly marred by Roger's car trip around Western Europe, looking for dead people in the grass.

This movie has been available on Netflix for a while. It's part documentary, part live registration of The Wall (recorded between 2010-2013). The opening of the movie was exemplary for what was to come. Music by Roger Waters. Script by Waters. After an idea by Waters. Starring Roger Waters as Roger Waters. The cinematography of the documentary is great, but the idea is artistically corrupt. Old men chatting about, saying things that mean nothing, speaking as if it's a great revelation that comes with old age. In one scripted scene Waters sits at a dark lit bar in France with a French bartender who doesn't speak English. But he wants to tell the story of how his father died in the war anyway (in English). Roger Waters wants to tell his deep story no matter if it relevant/welcome or not.

This reflects back on the live footage of the complete The Wall record. The story has lost its relevance since WO II is more then halve a century ago. Schools have become child friendly. Drugs are known to be dangerous. People get help with their depressions. Communism and Fascism are dead. The Berlin Wall fell thirty years ago. Confusion has been replaced by a bitter understanding of reality or a flight to digital fantasy worlds. The original critique of his generation has actually changed society for the better - destroying its initial power. However, the Wall is still a work potent of a long list of classic symphonic rock songs. Yet Roger Waters has chosen to focus on an impressive show full of dated symbols. Yet again hiding the band behind a meaningless (personal) wall he has failed to tear down all his life. A plain crashing with special effects, brilliant visual material portrayed on the set and a stage full of dummy soldiers. The music sounds worn out, not even that well recorded, as if played by tired people. The average tempo of the songs is much slower then the original and extra instrumental passages add to the feeling of drag. If you would listen to a David Gilmour dvd next (choose any) you'd hear the Pink Floyd legacy played with way more fresh energy and atmosphere.

I could not recommend this film to any-one other than the hardcore fans of Roger Waters. Preferably people who have lived under a pile of bricks themselves for the past four decades.

The Pink Floyd rock opera, The Wall, whose themes of abandonment and isolation are explored through a character called Pink, are appropriated by Roger Waters through a personal journal to follow the last traces of his father, who died in the Second World War in battle for Cassino in Italy. Unsurprisingly the two align since Waters wrote the original lyrics to The Wall. The character Pink, a Rockstar whose star is fading, is alienated from his fans, so goes into a form of self-imposed exile where he substance abuses. He eventually comes out the other side after he abandons his self- isolation. The symbol of this self-isolation is a wall that society erects to protect it's own citizens, but is overtly used to seal itself from the truths of it's own folly. The collapse of Communism in the East Europe in the eighties, associated by the fall of the Berlin Wall, bore the venue for Roger's celebrated 1990 concert which raised money for the Memorial Relief fund charity.

Roger Waters seeks to address his abandonment by his father by journeying to Cassino to pay his respect at his father's grave site. The picturesque site of the hills of Cassino are a perfect place to build the memorial and it is very moving to watch the solitary figure of Roger take a trumpet out of his car and play tribute to his father.

The documentary is cleverly interspersed with the concert performance of The Wall in such a way as to not disturb the flow of the concert. Roger Waters is a master at using silences to highlight the musical nuances within a song. Despite that I would have preferred the documentary to be played before or after the concert, not during it.

A superb cast of musicians have been assembled to play the concert. You couldn't get better guitarists than Dave Kilminster and Snowy White. Multi-instrumentalist Jon Carin shares keyboard duties with Roger's son, Harry Waters. And Graham Broad on drums and percussion has been featuring with Roger Waters since the nineteen eighties. Roger Waters does most of the singing and hasn't lost his touch on voice. He has a chorus of singers including a boys' choir to support him.

The concert itself is a visual feast of lasers and lights, very theatrical, with screen projections of attacking aeroplanes and huge life size floating blimps. Marching Nazi like troops join the stage with Roger firing a toy machine gun over the heads of the audience. As the band plays, a gigantic cardboard brick wall is built around and over the heads of the performers until it reaches a point where most of the musicians are concealed behind the wall. Then after performing the finale song, The Trial, Roger screams at the audience to tear down the wall and the whole thing comes down.

How does this concert performance compare with Pink Floyd's studio album of The Wall? Basically, I think the two support each other. Neither is perfect. This one is longer. Many of the songs are stretched. Others are shortened. The last side of the Pink Floyd album drags a bit after the song Run Like Hell. In Roger's version the wailing sirens of Run Like Hell gives the song more expression and leads to a more fulfilling conclusion when the wall comes down. The first part of Roger's version is impressive as well. From In The Flesh to Mother, through the middle chorus of Another Brick In The Wall, it moves more freely. Where it can't compete is side 3 of the Floyd album from the opening Hey You to Comfortably Numb. While Dave Kilminster performs a great guitar solo on Comfortably Numb there is nobody who can play this solo as well as Dave Gilmour.

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Posted Friday, May 29, 2020 | Review Permalink

Even if it's a movie I'm sure that nobody will be concerned about possible spoilers. I assume that everybody knows the story of The Wall,based on extracts from the lives of both Roger Waters and Syd Barrett mixed in the character of Pink, also considering that Syd was an orphan, too.

This is not just another re-edition of the 1979 album, and it's not just a concert DVD. It's a sort of documentary about the ideas and mainly the feelings that contributed in creating the album and the movie. The concert is taken from the 2014 tour (I've been at the gig in Rome) which featured between the huge number of musicians, two great guitarists like the bluesman Snowy White who was in the original tour and features also in Richard Wright's Wet Dream together with G.E. Smith, singer-songwriter other than session musician.

The movie has a long intro starting from the certificate of death of Eric Fletcher Waters, then Roger goes to the Memorial to play "Outside The Wall" on trumpet. The coming of an airplane starts suddenly "In The Flesh". As in the original tour the Wall is partially built. It will be completed during the concert, but the visual effects are, I presume more impressive than in the 80s. Roger is in his "nazi" uniform, metaphor of the war in this case. It's not yet the distressed rockstar of the reprise.

On "The Thin Ice" a photo of daddy is the first dispalyed on the wall followed by a sequence of people killed in different wars or even under terrorist attacks like a firefighter at the twin towers or the young Brazilian guy killed by mistake by the London police.

Everything is red with sequences of children on "Another Brick In The Wall Part 1". Here there's the first "interruption". Roger is inside a car in a rainy day and reads the letter received by his mother informing her of her husband's death. Roger's crying appears sincere, even if it may appear strange: an old man crying for the death of a father that he never knew more about 70 years before.

Back on stage, "The Happiest Days Of Our Lives" has the Teacher, realized from the pictures created by Gerals Scarfe. About 20 children dance and sing the choir of "Another Brick In The Wall Part II" On their shirts is written "FEAR BUILD WALLS". Interestingly Trump and his wall at the Mexican border were still to come, but Roger had already witnessed the IDF brutality against the Palestinians near "that" wall. He cancelled a tour in Israel after that episode.

On "Mother" he plays in synch with a video recorded during the original tour. Quite impressive.

Now Roger is in his car with a friend. speaking about the deaths of both father and grandfather, one in WWI and one in WWII. Again in a graveyard, the one where his grandpa is buried, reading a book. I don't know which one. The sentence that resonates in my mind is "They are objects". Together with him there are two sons and a grandson. The red haired Harry is the one who said "Look mummy, there's an airplane up in the sky" when he was a child. His recorded voice starts "Goodbye Blue Sky" also now.

This is the most controversial part of the show: An airplane drops bombs but they are in the forms of religious, economical and political symbols. I remember the zionists actually calling Roger anti-semite because the David's star was one of the symbols dropped, despite the fact that the christian cross and the half-moon where present as well, together with the dollar and pound signs, the communist symbol and some multinational commercial brands. I have to say that in the last 30 years, he doesn't seem to like any "David", one in particular.

"Empty Spaces" features the animations from the movie. Good choice. It's a pity that the sudden passage to "Young Lust" that's my favorite transition on the studio album, has been sacrificed to the extended version of this song. In the meantime the wall is being built. The Empty spaces are being filled and the band is already disappearing behind it.

?One Of My Turns" starts with Roger in a country mansion, apparently abandoned. Just for the intro, then the stage again, but with "Don't Leave Me Now" there's again the inside of that empty house for a while. On the stage the face of a young woman is bleeding from her eyes and mouth until the whole wall is bleeding.

Roger is in France driving to Italy, crossing the Alps with that friend. It's a quite long sequence that ends in "Another Brick In The Wall Part III".Now only Roger is visible nehind the wall on stage. There's n instrumental reprise of some of the previos songs while the last spaces are being filled. "Goodbye Cruel World" closes the first part of the show. Now the wall is completed. The world is outside.

I know that it's getting too long, apologies...second half

The bar of a dark hotel in France, I suppose. Roger explains the battle that caused the death of his father. It may be historically interesting but it's a bit too long.

"Hey you" starts from this dark place, then on stage but completely behind the wall which is now a big screen for amazing visual effects. "Is There Anybody Out There" follows.

Right left there's a hotel room where Roger, now "Pink", sings "Nobody Home" sit inside. I suppose everybody knows that this song refers to an episode of Roger's true life.

Movie again. Roger has now crossed the Alps and is on the Northwerst of Italy, still chatting with his travel partner. On the wall/screen the moving scenes of parents back from war to their sons are the backgrouind to "Vera". A photo of Vera Lynn appears for a while at the beginning. On "Bring The Boys Back Home" the wall is "painted" with the sentences by .D. Eisenhower.

Roger is finally on the beach south of Anzio (I know that place) watching the sea. The chorus "Comfortably Numb" is sung by Robbie Wyckoff from the top of the wall while Roger is down in front of the public.Dave Kilminster in an excellent Gilmour on the two solos. Roger hits the wall starting a colorful visual effect that prepares the scene through "The Show Must Go On" for "In The Flesh Reprise". The choir is already in simil-nazi uniforms. During the tour a German politician, likely close to the zionist movement tried to cancel the tour accusing Waters of anti-semitism. No German was concerned in 1989 when Roger wore the same uniform after the fall of the Berlin wall,it was clearly an idiotic revenge attempt for Roger's positions in favor of Palestine. The famous pig flies above the public. "Run Like Hell" starts immediately after. It's the most "interactive" moment of the show. If we think that the whole opera was inspired by the distance between the artists and the public it's like the years have given Roger more wisdom.

Big red worms walk on the wall while "Waiting for the Worms" closes the "fascist" saga. The animation on the wall is reminding to "When The Wind Blows", an old movie with Roger involved in the soundtrack Only piano and voice say "Stop"...and the trial is about to begin.

As in the movie, the various characters: teacher, mother, judge, appear on the wall. The effect of the wall turning on itself, showing the internal part is impressive. Roger doesn't sing on many songs, but on The Trial he showed to actually have still his screaming high-pitched voice. On the final, scenes of war are displayed while all the public screams "tear down the wall". And the wall falls down.

Back to the memorial. Roger is alone. He sees the name of his father on golden letters on the wall, together with the other soldiers of his batallion. He sits, like he's parying, but being an atheist he's more likely just thinking. FInally he takes the trumpet again and plays "Outside The Wall". The lyrics are quite different from the album. There's a choir, baked by acoustic guitar and concertina. The images fade into the last act of the concert. The musicians are presented and it's done.

Brilliant musicianship, moving subject and amazing visual effects. Of course, "if you are the kind of I like Pink Floyd but I can't stand Roger's politics...well do yourself a favor and don't buy this DVD".

The bonus material is just a documentary about how the sets were built in Athens and in Buenos Aires. Again, apologies for the length of this review. I'll be shorter in the future