Friday, May 4, 2012

The Other F Word

My best friend from high school is a huge fan of punk music. So much so that he bought all 4 versions of the Blink 182 album “Take off your Pants and Jacket”.  He did this so he would have the “clean” version and then the 3 different versions that’s only difference was the bonus song at the end of the album and CD cover art.  Although we were not “punk rock” in high school, the music, attitude, and persona of many of these bands influenced me. Even though I liked the music there was something inside that told me I might later regret my choices if I had to explain to my own children why I got a giant neck tattoo of a checker board.  This idea of what happens when these guys who have been leading this movement grow up and get families is the story being told in the 2011 Andrea Nevins documentary “The Other F Word”.  It is really interesting to see how these punk icons interact with their families and how they handle some of the daily problems that other parents have.  The public eye sees them always in the middle of a party, going balls to the wall, not having a care in the world.  This documentary shows them dealing with helping the kids get homework done, worrying about making it to their kids school functions, and struggling with the thing all dads deal with the time allocation between work and family.   I really liked seeing some of the bands and hearing how they got their start then watching them as they settle down and become real dads like the rest of us.  There are some very interesting moments when you see this antiestablishment attitude that hates the structure and rules of the world that starts pushing some of these guys toward complete self destruction.  And ironically the order and structure of their families is what saved them from their downward spiral.  This is a fun little documentary that will really humanize people who have been painted by the public as crazy over the top characters only interested in sex, drugs, and rock and roll.  Don’t get me wrong the movie addresses sex, drugs, and rock and roll, without the first one how do you think they would have gotten these families to begin with.  I don’t think that this is a life altering documentary that will change the way you will think about the world, but it is worth seeing famous punk rockers struggle with the same things you do just slightly more inked up.   



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