Listen to Me Marlon

Director: Stevan Riley

The first images we see in Stevan Riley's captivating documentary on Marlon Brando are of a digital image made of the legendary actor when he was alive. As the image turns and rotates, we see the mouth move and Brando's voice emanating from the computer-generated head. We hear him mention how images such as his will become the norm in entertainment; words that may prove to be prophetic, I'm sure. Brando's synthetic image resembles a classically sculpted bust; Greco-Roman, which is entirely appropriate, given his monumental stature as an actor on stage and screen. In spite of a troubled life and spotty career--his taste in scripts were sometimes less than equal to his outsized talent--the man and his work remain a subject whose depths have yet to fully plumbed.

Wedding archival video and film footage to audio commentary from a vast collection of recordings Brando made throughout his life, Riley's Listen to Me Marlon is a hypnotic tapestry of biography and filmography. We learn so much about someone we think we know yet the film leaves us with so much more to explore and films to assess or reassess.

In Brando's words, which serve as the film's narration, we hear about his early life in Omaha, Nebraska while photos of his childhood appear onscreen. Brando speaks of his father being a terrible man; abusive to his mother and unloving toward his son. Later, we see a successful Brando and his father during an interview. Though smiles appear onscreen, the lack of father-son love is palpable. So virulent was Brando's disdain for his father that we hear him later in the film speak of his effort to keep his children away from him. We see photos of Brando as a child with his mother, of whom he speaks more fondly though he is also candid about her flaws, which include her alcoholism.

The misery of school is also documented in photos and audio, as is Brando's early days on stage in New York and his tutelage under Stella Adler; the famed acting instructor. In one among many self-analytical moments, Brando discusses a plausible reason for his becoming an actor when he says when someone is unwanted, one looks for an identity that is acceptable.

He recalls feeling like a million bucks after an excellent night on Broadway. Of course his thoughts on playing Stanley Kowalski are rife and often revealing. He talks about how people expected him to be Stanley in person but Brando makes it clear he was nothing like the character when he says he hated that guy. In discussing Terry Malloy from On the Waterfront, Brando attributes the audience's sympathy for his character's every-man appeal when he says everyone in the audience feels they could have been a contender.

Brando's choice of political material is addressed as is his social activism; including his participation in civil rights marches. He acknowledges that he too risked his life; his fame would have hardly spared him the violence visited on so many.

Valuable commentary accompanies the more commonly known aspects of his life; his decampment to a Polynesian island, his troubled marriages, his torrid affairs, his professional decline and his triumphant return to box office glory and critical acclaim for his roles in The Godfather and The Last Tango in Paris, which netted him an Oscar for best actor. We hear a few words about the infamous Oscar acceptance speech by a Native American woman named Little Feather and later, in a tragic turn, the trial of his son Christian for the murder of his half-sister Cheyenne's boyfriend. Excerpts of the trial, in which Brando himself testified, are seen in all their luridness. If his son's predicament wasn't enough, his daughter Cheyenne's suicide half-a-decade after his son's arrest was another tragedy that must have sorely tried his sanity.

Everything we learn in Riley's film is hardly new. Every part of his life and career addressed therein is common knowledge. What makes Listen to Me Marlon something beyond the beaten path are Brando's audio-diaries, which had never been heard before. How Riley gained access to said tapes is information I'm not privy to but it hardly matters. The fact that they exist and Riley put them to effective use is all I need to know.

Other than Albert Maysles' film on Brando; which we see a few clips of in Riley's film, I can't remember seeing such a moving documentary on his life and career. Though Riley's film is hardly the definitive documentary on Brando, where else has the man been allowed to tell his story in his own words, save for his autobiography: Brando: Songs My Mother Taught Me?

Of course there is more to the story; many details about films and failed relationships and Brando's difficulties with other actors on sets, as well as his dalliances, are explored in greater detail elsewhere but where else have we seen a digitized Brando? Listen to Me Marlon is a very satisfying documentary; one to be considered among the year's best. Eleven years after Brando's death and sixty-four years after his groundbreaking performance in A Streetcar Named Desire, there seems to be no end to our fascination with the man and his career. I'm sure Riley's film, though exceptional, is hardly the last we will hear about him. Let this film be one that others are measured against.