There's something very endearing about Jonathan Demme's eagerness to pay homage to Neil Young. It's led to one brilliant film (compare the pared-down elegance of Neil Young: Heart of Gold to the indulgent wackiness of CSNY/Déjà Vu or the choppiness of Jim Jarmusch's Year of the Horse). Next week sees Demme's attempt to make it two for two with the premiere of Neil Young Trunk Show, another stripped-back concert film, this time shot in a small hall in Pennsylvania.
Indeed it may well lead to more: Demme has expressed a desire to make it a hat-trick: "I don't know what the third one will be. Maybe it will be outdoors. Maybe in the woods. Maybe it will be on a farm."
It's rare to get a Hollywood big-hitter so keen to subsume themselves to what they consider a greater talent. It's lovely, this sort of blind fandom:
When I see him galumphing across the stage in the middle of No Hidden Path, so deep in a trance-state, making sounds that I've never heard and I find so thrilling … it's like if Tchaikovsky had been a guitar player. I just think in terms of the word master coming into my head. Look at this grizzled master just burning this stuff down.
What other mainstream directors do this? Oliver Stone seems a good comparison, with his reverent documentary portraits of South American firebrands. But aren't they as much a showcase for Stone as for his subject?
And - whisper it - might it be possible to have just too much Neil Young? Can even his most committed fans keep up with Demme's level of enthusiasm?
