The director of the documentary ‘Hail Satan?’ turns Kenny G<\/strong> into her latest reclamation project in this documentary, part of Bill Simmons’ ‘Music Box’ anthology.<\/p>\n Documentarian Penny Lane likes a challenge. After the humanizing, Super 8-driven portrait Our Nixon, she raised the stakes with her sympathetic-to-the-devil doc Hail Satan?<\/p>\n But where do you go from there? What widely maligned figure can you celebrate, or at least validate \u2014 or at least tolerate \u2014 after Tricky Dick and Ol\u2019 Scratch?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Bottom Line Good-hearted, if padded, sympathy for a musical devil.<\/p>\n The answer, it turns out, will either surprise you or seem oddly predictable, which might concern Lane if her goal is to be an artistic contrarian and not just a cinematic troll. Her latest reclamation project is smooth-jazz legend Kenny G<\/strong>, who receives the director\u2019s lightheartedly introspective treatment in HBO\u2019s Listening to Kenny G<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Like Garret Price\u2019s recent Woodstock 99: Peace, Love and Rage, Listening to Kenny G is part of Bill Simmons\u2019 Music Box anthology series. Though entertaining and very occasionally revelatory, this new entry suggests that Simmons has forgotten one of the lessons from the early entries of his ESPN 30 for 30 franchise: Not every documentary has to be feature length. Listening to Kenny G is never really boring at 96 minutes, but there\u2019s no point being made here that couldn\u2019t have been made in an hour.<\/p>\n In the opening scene, Lane is heard asking the artist formerly known as Kenneth Gorelick, \u201cHow are you feeling?\u201d With a smile he replies, \u201cUnderappreciated in general. But other than that, I\u2019m fine.\u201d Whether or not Lane\u2019s intent is to be seen as a troll \u2014 in the internet parlance, not the under-the-bridge parlance \u2014 Kenny G is absolutely and completely a troll, which is probably the best thing I learned from Listening to Kenny G.<\/p>\n And how could he not be? If you spend your life collecting absurd amounts of money with one hand and dismissive and derisive commentary with the other, being a troll might be the only legitimate response. You could either internalize and self-flagellate every time somebody criticizes you for destroying popular music and for being a goofball with curly hair, or you could smile broadly yet sheepishly and, to transition to sports-taunting, point in the direction of the scoreboard. Kenny G, who doesn\u2019t express an iota of malice at any point in the documentary, knows the exact sales of every one of his albums, and takes the healthier path.<\/p>\n You might think that the film\u2019s validation of a maligned icon from the \u201990s would make it a bit like the recent Netflix documentary on painter Bob Ross, but it\u2019s actually more like recent depictions of Anthony Fauci, because if you come away learning much of anything about Kenny G, it\u2019s that Kenny is a hard worker.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to be the best interview you\u2019ve ever had, and if that means sitting here for 12 hours and not eating or drinking, I\u2019ll do it. That\u2019s my problem,\u201d he says. The secret of Kenny G\u2019s success, if you\u2019re not so cynical as to attribute it to a collective lack of musical taste around the world, is that he likes to work hard. He practices his sax for three hours a day, and he has dedicated comparable time to learning to fly airplanes and to golfing, baking, doing laundry, being a father. It\u2019s here you might wonder why neither of Kenny G\u2019s sons is in the documentary, why no mention is made of his marriage, etc. I guess that\u2019s the result of the decision that only Kenny G himself is qualified to give commentary on Kenny G the man (as opposed to Kenny G the phenomenon).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n\n\nListening to Kenny G<\/h2>\n
Venue: Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF Docs)<\/h2>\n
Director: Penny Lane<\/h6>\n
Kenny G Greatest Hits Full Album 2021 The Best Songs Of Kenny G Best Saxophone Love Songs 2021<\/h3>\n\n\n\n