Janis

Maybe it's just me, but I can't seem to get enough Janis. I have read a biography on her and watched other films, as well as attended the stage play "Love, Janis" and I'm always wanting for more.

I rated this a nine because a near perfect documentary about Janis would be at least four hours, imho. There could have been more interviews with her sister and brother and others who knew her intimately. It focused on her person and her heart more than other things I've seen. I was only ten years old when she died and my family was as straight laced as Janis' and Port Arthur, so I don't remember any fan fare regarding her. I didn't fully experience her music until I was eighteen and I fell hard as a Janis fan.

Interesting point to younger generations is that the media always focuses on the San Francisco scene when it talks about the 60's and the hippy era, when most of the rest of the world at the time was really closer to Port Arthur.

Strongly recommend this gem for any Janis fan. You won't be bored and you will find another little piece of her heart you may not have known about before. I imagined that she had a big heart for people in general, and this documentary solidified that belief.

A comment in the film about the level of emotion she reached in her singing was at a high price and that was a prefect summation of the art that was Janis Joplin.

It has not been a different life than the other 27's. It has not been a different life than other real stars. Filmin structure was not good. I guess they did it without much effort. He did not elaborate after Janis's death. No special music was made for the film. I did not like your director very much. The film has not succeeded in dramatic places as well. It was not nice without Janis. There was an air of sadness. Although a girl who was excluded in her childhood and adolescence was given a nice star, she had not been given any details when necessary.

This documentary really brought me back to the 60s and 70s. It never ceases to amaze me how tough it is to be a creative artist, just think Brian Wilson or Amy Winehouse. We are introduced to Janis's early life and the many struggles she had to go through growing up. She leaves for California and finds her roots and her tribe with Big Brother and the Holding Company. The live performances really show the incredible rapport she had with her audience during a concert. Coming down from such a high must have been an insupportable task. Janis finds a true love during her time in Brazil which for her was very important. Her letters to her family and friends were filled with hope and optimism right up to her tragic death. Interviews with her various friends and colleagues all painted a picture of a very unique and spontaneous person. The world was truly inspired by a pure spirit.

The recent documentary Amy, depicting singer Amy Winehouse's rise and fall at about the same age as Janis Joplin reminds me that all rockers are not the same, especially females. Janis: Little Girl Blue depicts Joplin as much more focused than Amy and much more in control of her own life. Except for in death, where both succumb to substance abuse, even the relatively more stable Amy.

This Janis doc does an effective job showing the arc of her brief life, from a country girl in Texas to the rocker who led the way for women in the industry and eventually the world. Why the eventual failure given her great fame and fortune? It's simple, really: She wanted to be loved, and not always finding that devotion, she could turn to music and drugs for support and fulfillment.

Along the way, the doc gives insight into what makes this blues mama run: In her own words she says ambition is the desire to be loved. She's not a "Cry Baby" about not getting the love she wanted from some of her friends and family; actually family members talk to us and appear to have supported her through it all.

Her straight-laced parents couldn't be expected to wholly embrace the counter-culture queen, who began innocently singing folk tunes in her early teens and ended singing blues that reminded one critic of "desperate mating calls." Professionally she gets plenty of love from the likes of Khris Kristofferson, whose Me & Bobby Magee was her best-selling single ever and band mate David Goetz, who observed that she turned into a caricature of the blues mama that the media had helped to create. Dick Cavett interviews her with an unusual affection different from his usually detached persona. At one point he can't remember if they were intimate—a nice touch of amnesia that doesn't belie a bit his attachment to her.

Janis: Little Girl Blue informs about Joplin's career from folk to hard blues, gives insight into the driving emotions of her ambition, and amply shows her singing talents that made her a child of Aretha Franklin and her own person.

A greatly satisfying bio of a great singer.

I will say up front that I am a fan of Janis Joplin and looked forward to seeing this (on the BBC) it details her life in chronological order from her days growing up in Port Arthur, Texas to her many incarnations with all of her bands including 'Big Brother and the Holding Company'.

There are interviews with friends, lovers and family. There is plenty of archive footage but only snippets of songs which includes the Monterey Pop appearance. Many songs are featured but the real reason here is to tell her story and her battles with drugs and alcohol and her of love of the blues, which she could sing so beautifully that even watching this I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rising.

It is amazing how she managed to put so much emotion and passion into her music and it seems the people around it saw that in her too. Her firmament burnt for too short a time but while it did so it was also one of the brightest and most loved. I truly think this is a great tribute to Janis Joplin – not just the star but the person – highly recommended.