The sad truth is, there isn't enough left of the Amazing Johnathan to make a documentary about. Years of dedicated drug abuse and health problems have flattened his affect, and I'm not sure he was that interesting a performer even before that. I enjoyed his comedy/magic show back in the day, but that's not necessarily the basis for an involving documentary. So, as others here have opined, the documentarian opts to make a documentary about making a documentary - and it is a miserable and unmitigated failure. I think the filmmaker is on camera about five times more often than his subject - and what a truckload of nonsensical angst he would have the audience suffer through with him. We watch what seemed like hours of him driving around in a beat-up car with a look of deep gravitas on his none too camera-friendly face as he tries to figure out how to rescue his documentary from the deep pit of nothingness it has wandered into. What he comes up with is a series of moronic rabbit holes that lead into even more nothing. This is one of those rare occasions when a filmmaking exercise is so flawed, so false, and such a complete waste of time that I add the auteur's name to a relatively brief list of people whose films I will never watch again. Oh, and those 10-star reviews about how the rest of us just don't get the brilliance blah blah blah - those are the usual shills who have some kind of investment in the film, and (I strongly suspect) close relatives of you-know-who. Three stars for a couple of moving candid moments here and there. You've been warned.
Review of The Amazing Johnathan Documentary
