If you want to see an out-of-control orgy in an airplane, watch this film. If you want to see the Rolling Stones engage in coke-sniffing, watch this film. If you want to see Stones' groupies injecting heroin in their veins, albeit in black-and-white, watch this film.
"Cocksucker Blues" exists as an occasionally sluggish yet often compelling fly-on-the-wall approach on the Stones 1972 tour (though the band allegedly stated that some of the scenes were staged). The band didn't want this film screened at all, though what did they expect unless they had no memory of such hedonistic, practically sexualzed moments. Banal also comes to mind when I see Keith Richard slumped over and laying on a woman's lap after ingesting heroin. Banal are Mick Jagger's comments about Southern diners - it is nothing too memorable to chew on other than their diners' superiority to British food. In fact, not much goes on in "Cocksucker Blues" which is likely the point of its own sluggishness - the life of a rock star band is all it is purported to be. Maybe the late director Robert Frank (a photographer noted for his work in "The Americans," not to mention the famous photo album collage on the Stones' own "Exile on Main St." album) is making the point that rock bands may indulge in excesses that result in nothing but stages of endless, perpetual boredom. Their lives are spent in hotel rooms where they watch the political shenanigans of the day, such as George Wallace running for office.
Still, I was fascinated by the whole film despite finding some of it wearying. Frank does a fine job of assembling possibly hours and hours of footage into something relatively concise at 90 minutes. The director does get to show off the Stones on stage, particularly an electrifying concert with Stevie Wonder singing "Uptight, Everything's All Right" segueing to the Stone's own "Satisfaction" (a song I always prefered on their album, rather than the live recordings). Jagger on the harmonica during the "Midnight Rambler" performance is energetic and exciting. And you do get quick moments of celebrities visiting the Stones backstage such as Andy Warhol, Truman Capote and interviewer Dick Cavett. There is a far too brief moment with Tina Turner which I wish led to some concert footage of them performing. And there is a singular moment with a fan, a mother who lost custody of her children due to her being on acid, that is truly a time capsule moment of the movie and of the times.
Lastly, if you want to see Keith Richards throw a television out the window in his hotel room, watch this film. Charles Fleischer once had a quote that if you remembered the 60's, you weren't there. Keith Richards might not have remembered ever touring with the Stones in the 60's and early 70's so, perhaps, he wasn't really ever there.
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