MIFF 2024 Film Review - DEVO
Images courtesy of Common State.
Q: Are We Not Documentary Subjects? A: We Are DEVO!
Like many of my fellow millennials, I held a fairly surface-level understanding of Devo; the satirical juggernauts of snarky new-wave angst. Beyond familiarity with their 1980 hit Whip It – aside from a fondness for the 1981 sci-fi anthology Heavy Metal nurtured by the altered states induced in my teens – I had no real contextual understanding of what Devo was. What was with the Tyvek jumpsuits? Why are they wearing ziggurat shaped Shriner’s caps? I had many questions from the outside looking in. Thankfully, documentarian Chris Smith (Fyre, American Movie) offers a well-rounded, yet manic encapsulation of a misunderstood band born years ahead of their time. This is DEVO.
Forged from the chaos of the Kent State massacre in 1970, Devo’s genesis from a negatively received piece of performance art into one of rock music’s more baffling offerings is one which matches the group’s aesthetic: unadulterated synth-laden Dadaist freneticism. DEVO is as hyperactive as its subject; steadfast in its momentum as it propels you from their inaugural performances for hostile patrons in midwestern dive bars, to their subsequent dominance of the mainstream rock charts. Bolstered by a meticulous curation of footage from the group’s early years, we’re given a tremendous sense of Devo’s surrealist philosophies and their innate self-deprecation amalgamated with their satirical sense of humour – finding fans in the likes of John Lennon and David Bowie. Throughout their run, Devo was never one to shy away from their core principle – that western society was not progressing, but rather regressing. For the members of Devo, the promised utopian idealism of the 60’s had died that harrowing May afternoon in Kent State, instead becoming bastardised into a consumer culture which had rapidly become a parody of itself.
Growing up amidst the fallout of Reagan-era politics perpetuating well into the 21st century, it’s easy for millennials and Gen-Z to collectively romanticise a past which we never experienced. However, in lacking the perspective of an era unbeset by rose-tinted shades, our myopic tendencies hinder us from drawing the logical conclusion – the eighties also sucked. Upholding the group’s tongue-in-cheek, surrealist whimsy, DEVO unveils particularly striking parallels between the political and social climate of the group’s heyday, and today’s surrealist post-Trump landscape; the rigidity of corporate culture, consumerism, geo-politicised hysteria, and a right-wing ascendency reinforced by Reagan’s election promise to make America great again. Woah. Déjà vu.
Unlike many other music documentaries born in the wake of VH1’s Behind the Music, DEVO is anything but broad strokes. Instead, by eschewing the more standardised celebratory trope, DEVO provides much needed context to an enigmatic group of misfits touting themselves as “musical laxative for a constipated world”, showcasing their consistent satirical edge in the face of society’s perpetual regression. Like its idiosyncratic subject matter, DEVO is a poignantly hyperkinetic ninety-minute examination of rock music’s most misunderstood band. And it works. In fact, having viewed this film amongst a group of uncle-shaped men donning trademark energy domes, I can say now with utmost certainty – I love Devo.
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DEVO screened as part of the Melbourne International Film Festival, running in cinemas and online August 8th-25th.
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