Shine a Light

The Rolling Stones play two nights at the Beacon Theatre in New York. The hall is far smaller than the band is used to, and that is deliberate. Martin Scorsese puts cameras everywhere around the stage, and the opening of the film lays out the actual problem: Mick Jagger will not hand over the setlist until the last moment, and the director has to know where to put the cameras. The concert was recorded in 2006 at an evening for Bill Clinton's foundation, and Clinton introduces the band himself. The camera crew is unusually large and unusually senior. Among the operators are cinematographers who have won awards in their own right, and the result is a shoot that is uncommonly clean and composed for a concert film. Old interview footage is cut in. It is not there to tell a story but to make a comparison: the young band being asked the same questions in the sixties, and the men in their sixties on the stage. Jack White, Christina Aguilera and Buddy Guy appear as guests, and the Buddy Guy passage is the strongest moment in the film. It opened the 2008 Berlin film festival. Who it is for: listeners of the Rolling Stones and anyone who likes concert films. Who it is not for: this is not a documentary but a concert recording, and a viewer curious about the band's history learns nothing.