The Oregonians Dig! Review
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The Oregonian
at Sundance Film Festival
By Shawn Levy
January 22, 2004
Note: Non-Dig! parts of the article are not included
And "Dig!," easily the best-liked nonfiction film of the early going, reveals the effect that place has had on a pair of rock 'n' roll bands - Portland's Dandy Warhols and their onetime best friends and now enemies, the L.A.-based Brian Jonestown Massacre.
Seven years in the making, the film, narrated by Dandy frontman Courtney Taylor-Taylor, chronicles the bands' efforts to forge careers in the record business, making the best music they can and trying to negotiate the dangerous waters of the industry. The Dandys make a go of it, albeit with some bumps along the way. As a result, the Brian Jonestown Massacre, led by the gifted and demented Anton Newcombe, grows to envy and mock the Dandys' success while undergoing a nonstop slide into self-destruction and bizarre, dangerous behavior. It's the ultimate purity-vs.-sell-out story, with the caution that the pure band is absolutely bonkers and the sell-outs aren't really sell-outs at all and, in fact, have never stopped honing their sound and style.
"Dig!" director Ondi Timoner, attending the festival with her 11-week-old son in tow, agrees that the Dandy Warhols are trived, at least in part, because of the relative calm in which they live in their hometown. "Portland is cozy and rainy and you sleep in and everyone knows one another," shes says. "And the Dandys have that as a home to go back to. It's an intrinsit part of their identity." She points to the Odditorium, the recording studio/soundstage/arts center the band has built in Portland as proof of its sense of community and home.
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