Documentary Gimme Shelter - Rolling Stones

Viewing Gimme Shelter, A Maysles Films Inc Production, recently released on Blu-ray Disc by Criterion Collection, is a worthwhile trip back to December 1969, and the Altamonte Speedway near San Francisco, where we visit a free Rolling Stones Concert that some say ended an era.

This Direct Cinema (Cinema Verite) documentary ultimately brings us to a Rolling Stones Concert, the final stop on a North American tour in 1969. There along with 300,000 mostly stoned flower children, a couple dozen mostly intoxicated Hell’s Angels acting as security, Jefferson Airplane, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Ike and Tina Turner and of course the Rolling Stones, we witness chaos in the making.

The documentary begins with New York concert footage and then takes us to a film editing room where Mick Jagger, along with the filmmakers are watching film clips of the Altamonte Concert playing on a flat bed editing machine. The footage shows events’ unfolding at the time a man was killed. After being disarmed of a pistol, this man is stabbed and beaten to death by a group of Hell’s Angels right in front of the stage. The murder is shot from the stage, as the Rolling Stones perform “Under My Thumb,” but it’s difficult to tell exactly what’s going on until the footage is viewed frame-by-frame. There were, in total, 4 deaths and 3 births at the concert that day.

Early in the film we see scenes of the Rolling Stones performing at venues, including Madison Square Garden where relative calm prevails. But after watching the promoters arrange to bring the concert to the Altamonte Speedway, it soon becomes clear that disaster is looming. At the concert venue we see long lines of cars coming to the concert, people getting stoned, running naked and hanging out. The musicians performing before the Rolling Stones have difficulty keeping the stage clear and a Hell’s Angel hits one musician.  When Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones start performing “Sympathy for the Devil” it seems to transform the crowd into an unruly mob.

Gimme Shelter does not have any interviews. Typical of a Direct Cinema documentary we are brought into the story as observers. In this case we are more then “flies on the wall.” It feels somehow that we too are in danger. This documentary is a fine example of the work of David Maysles, Albert Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin.  Who are the same team that made other documentaries including Salesman in 1968.  Salesman takes us door-to-door with Bible Salesmen selling bibles. We sit in as they pitch prospective customers, go to sales meetings and the local diner. In both Direct Cinema documentary films; the filmmakers seem to be invisible.

Gimme Shelter started out as a concert tour documentary but not a lot of pure performance scenes were used as more attention is paid to the upcoming concert in California. Events created a story no one anticipated, one that came together in the editing room. Still the scenes with Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones performing are revealing of what the band was like in those days; perhaps the perfect gift for a Rolling Stones fan with a Blu-ray Player.

This Blu-ray Disc release has excellent sound and has been totally restored and enhanced using the original 16mm color negative. It is well worth owning and viewing.

J R Martin