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Circle Jerks: My Career As A Jerk
Released by: MVD
Released on: October 23, 2012.
Director: David Markey
Cast: The Circle Jerks
Year: 2011
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The Movie:
Dave Markey's a name that will sound familiar to music documentary fans who remember the nineties clear enough to have seen his breakthrough project, 1991: The Year Punk Broke. His latest documentary takes a look at the rise and fall of Los Angeles hardcore band, The Circle Jerks - now more or less on indefinite hiatus, front man Keith Morris having moved on to form the mighty Off! a couple of years ago.
A mix of awesome archival footage from the band's career and newly shot interviews with Morris, guitarist Greg Hetson, bassist Zander Schloss and drummer Lucky Lehrer the movie offers some welcome insight into their career. We start with the early days when the band was formed out of the ashes of Black Flag and Red Cross through to the highs and lows of their success and then to more recent times, as the band would go on to have some pretty serious influence on modern punk rock.
Anyone familiar with Morris knows that the man likes to talk, and this documentary is proof positive of that. He comes off as very casual and easy going but at the same time, isn't afraid to tell his side of the story exactly as he sees it - sometimes he's the good guy, and sometimes he's not, so he takes the piss out of himself as much as he does some of the others but you always get the impression he's completely honest about it all. The other band members are a bit more reserved, as the documentary covers various problems with substance abuse, commercial success and staying true to their roots.
It's also interesting to hear from the different members about how and why the band started to fall apart. Morris' behavior could certainly have been a factor here but the more relaxed Hetson has to shoulder his share of responsibility too for having joined Bad Religion when he did. At this point you get the impression he wanted to maybe move on and obviously Bad Religion did reach considerably larger levels of success than the Circle Jerks did. There's more here than just who did what to who type talk, however, as the documentary also does a very good of charting the path that the band took over the course of their decades long career and it does so in the band's own words, making it pretty much the definitive statement about The Circle Jerks.
Along the way the band offers up some interesting trivia and little known facts about their work and their careers, pointing out some notable collaborators involved. There's an interesting mix of the celebratory and the sad throughout, with some members having fought for and found success outside of the group while others never quite got to that same level.
Video/Audio/Extras:
My Career As A Jerk was shot on video and is presented in 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen. Fullframe archival footage is matted and looks a bit off and the transfer is interlaced but it's watchable enough, even if some of that older camcorder footage is a bit worse for wear (not much you can do about that, really). The newly shot interview footage obviously fares much better and is quite clean and stable.
The English language Dolby Digital 2.0 track fares the same as the video does - the older stuff sounds rough and occasionally ropey, the newer stuff clean and properly balanced. No alternate language options or subtitles are provided. The levels tend to jump a bit here and there, with some of the live footage coming through with a lot more push than the interview footage.
Extras are limited to a handful of deleted scenes and some extended interview clips with the band members - there's about half an hour's worth of material here. Additionally there are menus and chapter selections.
The Final Word:
This is obviously going to appeal more to punk and hardcore fans, particularly Circle Jerks fans, than anyone else but My Career As A Jerk is a very well put together and comprehensive look at a band that almost broke through but never quite did, at least not on the same level as some of their cohorts. MVD's DVD looks and sounds good and includes some decent deleted material as well. Definitely check this out if you have an interest in the subject matter.
