If you needed any further evidence that Morgan Spurlock has slid from somebody who perhaps had an interesting viewpoint on modern contemporary life to a man who is churning out doc shlock, here it is: he'll be directing the One Direction 3D concert movie.
That's right, the latest boy-band sensation is following in the footsteps of Justin Bieber and Katy Perry and getting their own movie that will make its way to bargain bins and pop culture irrelevancy soon enough. For Spurlock it's another project in a string of lightweight movies that has seen him turn his ever winking camera to Star Wars nerds ("Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope"), male grooming ("Mansome"), himself/advertising ("The Greatest Movie Ever Sold") and hell, he even made the hunt for Osama Bin Laden seem pretty trivial with "Where In The World Is Osama Bin Laden."
This will be your standard (carefully vetted) "behind-the-scenes" plus concert-footage movie, and we don't see what Spurlock sees in this other than a paycheck and a chance to play with 3D. We're even more curious about how he was selected out of all people to helm this thing — the boys all would have been roughly ten years old or so when "Super Size Me" came out. Anyway, if you want to see the result of this union between commerce, labor and marketing, it will open on August 30, 2013. [ComingSoon]
Oh give it a rest. Spurlock is a huge hack. He makes McDocumentaries and I'm not even talking about the first one which was good. The rest are… lord.
I have to agree with the other commentators that nasty, snarky tone is pretty irritating. We get it, you don't like their music and you won't like the film. I'm fairly confident that most indiewire readers are in the same camp and it's fine to criticize things you don't like, but why be vitriolic and mean-spirited about it? I don't like their music, but other people liking them doesn't hurt me and One Direction makes millions of people of happy. That's a contribution to the world significantly greater than most people's. So, yes, go ahead and say you don't like their music, but I don't see the point of being cruel about it. Also, I'm now kind of hoping Spurlock delivers something as great as Maysles' and Zwerin's excellent Rolling Stones documentary "Gimme Shelter" just to spite you guys.
Wow, high brow and judgmental,much? Tell us how you really feel. I happen to enjoy some of Spurlock's films (not the best, but it's def. entertaining.) I don't get the One Direction fascination either, but if Suprlock's directing it, I doubt that's it's going to be the same run of the mill formula that these type of films often have.
You know, it's really bad journalism when you let your personal opinion affect the articles you write. Your bias peaks through very obviously and it's not appealing at all. You don't like One Direction's music? Fine, that's your opinion. They're not in your demographic anyway, so I don't know why you feel your opinion even makes a difference. They may not make the best music out there, but they're nice guys, they're talented singers, and they've worked their asses off to get where they are. They deserve their success. How about showing a little respect?
ThePlaylist comes across as really unappealing when you push the snarky hipster angle, which seems to be happening all the time lately. So you don't like One Direction? Newflash: they're not meant for you. Don't bother to report this story. Your Twitter feed in particular is infuriating, with "RP" and "KJ" never missing a chance to post some painfully unfunny snarky response to some news/pop culture item. You're getting like Nikki Finke, which is ironic since you profess to hate her so much despite gleaning 90% of the site's content from hers. Just give it a rest and focus on the good stuff; the features, the reviews, the films you're enthusiastic about. Oh, and deliberately misspelling Bieber's name doesn't make you cool.