Stop Making Sense, the 1984 concert film by the Talking Heads directed by Jonathan Demme, stands as one of the finest works ever produced in the genre. Forty-two years later, David Byrne still takes the stage in a sequence of exhilarating performances, which this time will arrive in cinemas under the direction of Brady Corbet, who has filmed several dates from the tour “Who is the Sky?” (which brought Byrne to Italy, at the Lucca Summer Festival) and is currently in post-production on a film that will hit the big screen. Corbet follows Spike Lee, who directed American Utopia in 2020.
Brady Corbet for the new David Byrne concert film
Contrary to what he did with The Brutalist, Corbet did not shoot Byrne’s concerts in VistaVision, but in 70 mm. 8-perf and 15-perf formats (perforation refers to the film stock, though we won’t delve into technical considerations, given our limited knowledge on the subject). David Byrne’s comment was: “When Brad told me he wanted to shoot our show in 70 millimeters (70 millimeters!) I didn’t realize the difference until he sent me a few frames. He was right; it truly captures the panoramic vision of the show. I’ve never seen anything like it.” Nothing is known yet about the film’s distribution, which was shot over several evenings last May at the Baltimore racetrack, Byrne’s hometown. Speaking of David Byrne, one wonders why the 40th anniversary of True Stories, the film he directed, has slipped under the radar, and we would be delighted to see it restored and re-released.
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