Search - AIR: Eating, Sleeping, Waiting and Playing on DVD

Only worth it for the promos at the end of the tape...

thespaceboy@excite.com | Hamburg, Germany/Smethwick, UK | 05/09/2002

(2 out of 5 stars)

"This video's pretty old but I thought I'd contribute a review of it anyway...
Being a big fan of Air's music and videos, I was really looking forward to something special with this video but it really is the most boring bag of rubbish I've ever payed money for.
It's so disappointing.
All it seems to be about is the Air boys dossing around with their mates "Phoenix" and Beck's backing band... It's such a ridiculous idea to just simply release this "documentary" when they really should have made it as a supplement to the full concert. ....

In terms of music, all we are "treated" to are some short clips of them performing live but not enough to make it interesting.
...But it does have two redeeming features which is possibly worth the price of buying the video: The brilliant videos for "Sexy Boy" and "Kelly Watch The Stars" which are on after the main feature.I really can't see the point of getting this tape except for the promos.
Overall then: VERY disappointing."

Worth it for the videos

Jim M. | Springfield MA | 03/12/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The documentary on this DVD may not be the greatest, but it is worth picking up this DVD for the videos. Three of them are among the greatest ever made.

KELLY WATCH THE STARS which contrasts a ping pong game with the members of Air playing Atari, is an absolutely hypnotic song / video. You can watch it over and over again.

ALL I NEED, a sort of documentary of a couple of skaters in love has some of the most beautiful photography in any video. It is a perfect use of video and music.

SEXY BOY, a partially animated clip of a monkey in outer space, is absolutely stunning as well.

Those three videos alone are worth picking up the DVD for.

Again, the documentary is interesting, but is only something you will watch once. The videos however can be watched over and over again.

I'll put it this way. I don't own any AIR CD's, not the biggest fan of theirs, yet since I bought this DVD, it has become one of my most watched."

McDonalds.

Brian Lange | Chicago, IL | 10/24/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The first time I saw this documentary I simply loved it.

I will be the first to admit, is is NOT your typical run of the mill "here is this band" type of documentary. Mike Mills uses odd camera movements, often venturing off of the subjects mid-speech and showing their environment, with no worries about crew members in the shot. The movement for me becomes almost transient much like that of a lava-lite... it sort of lulls you, puts you into a hypnotic state that makes the seemingly boring and arbitrary questions the most fascinating.

A number of interviewees will tell the viewers whether or not they like McDonalds (often citing their favorite item on the menu), what kind of animal they would be, the importance of money, what they think of AIR (many of whom do not even know the band)... among a myriad of questions harpooned at AIR, whose slight language barrier often provides a comedic sort of sympathetic viewing experience.

The documentary is entirely in black and white, which doesn't affect my viewing. I personally am a big fan of b/w, especially when juxtapozed against a band such as AIR, who typically seems to have a lot of vivid color in their sound and aesthetic.

Finally I should say that I am not the biggest fan of AIR, but I still loved this documentary. I feel as though certain die-hard fans may not love it as much. Mills does ask a lot of personal questions to the band, often invading their hotel room or talking to them backstage or on the tour bus. We find out more about them through the live bandmates and AIR themselves... but the direction this documentary takes is much more of an avant-garde experimental documentary sort. I feel as though filmmakers would really appreciate this film for its unique qualities.

Though I think that AIR is the perfect subject for a doc like this, I also feel that, like an episode of "Behind the Music", this could be about almost any band and it would be interesting."