WINNER
2002 National Society of Film Critics Awards
Best Non-Fiction Film

WINNER
2002 New York Film Critics Circle Awards
Best Non-Fiction Film

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Genre: Arts and Entertainment:
Film (Movies): Documentary

Director: Paul Justman

Cast: Richard 'Pistol' Allen, Jack Ashford,
Bob Babbitt (II), Bootsy Collins, Johnny Griffith,
Ben Harper (II), Joan Osborne

Country of Origin: USA

Review by Margaret Pomeranz:

Motown, the record label founded in 1958 which spawned some of the great music of the sixties and seventies and which created the sound for such names as the Supremes, Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder was founded on the backbeat talents of a group of musicians known as the Funk Brothers. Standing in the Shadows of Motown acknowledges their contribution to the sound of Motown and recalls the people and the times of the company's heyday. The Funk brothers - the ones that are left - regroup to talk about old times, revisit old haunts and to play music again with some incredible contemporary vocalists. This is fascinating stuff, delving behind the hits that are familiar to so many of us from so long ago now. There are some great stories, there's some terrific music, and there's a great acknowledgement of the contribution made by these background musicians when the fame and fortune went to others. There's no bitterness, there's only joy in the memories and in the music.

Margaret
David - No Review SBS Movieshow
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Review by Megan Spencer:

Music documentaries are always well worth the trip. How often do we get to hear people discuss the alchemy of music making? Not often enough.

Standing In The Shadows of Motown is one such music film and like the hugely successful feature length music documentary Buena Vista Social Club before it, Standing In The Shadows of Motown heralds a band of unsung heroes in popular music.

Standing In The Shadows of Motown tells the story of the original Motown studio "Hitsville USA", founded in Detroit in 1958 by legendary music producer Berry Gordy. In archive footage, present-day interviews and new concert recordings, we visit the surviving musicians from that pivotal 60s soul era, affectionately dubbed the Funk Brothers. And a funkier bunch of old dudes you're never likely to find, especially when they're given nicknames like "The Chunk of Funk".

Standing In The Shadows of Motown might not be the definitive Motown documentary, but it isn't a bad start. A stronger, more comprehensive and cohesive film would have gone harder on the politics of the era of "race music" in America, and traced the music's lineage back to the days of blues and gospel, instead of building foundations on the Funk Brothers' anecdotes. (Perhaps the filmmakers were a little too 'in awe' of these music legends?)

Instead the film enlists the help of Ben Harper, the fabulous (and wild) Bootsy Collins and such, to not only sing the Funk Brothers' classics, but their praises. These contemporary artists lend testament to the legacy of this group of - until now - sorely overlooked musicians.

Standing In The Shadows of Motown thus settles for being a musical tribute to the men who made the Motown sound, and that's just fine.

3 Stars ABC TripleJ film review

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from Standing in the Shadows of MOTOWN website:

In 1959, Berry Gordy gathered the best musicians from Detroit's thriving jazz and blues scene to begin cutting songs for his new record company. Over a fourteen year period they were the heartbeat on "My Girl," "Bernadette," I Was Made to Love Her," and every other hit from Motown's Detroit era.

By the end of their phenomenal run, this unheralded group of musicians had played on more number ones hits than the Beach Boys, the Rolling Stones, Elvis and the Beatles combined - which makes them the greatest hit machine in the history of popular music. They called themselves the Funk Brothers.

Forty-one years after they played their first note an a Motown record and three decades since they were all together, the Funk Brothers reunited back in Detroit to play their music and tell their unforgettable story in STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MOTOWN.

With the tumultuous sixties as a backdrop, Motown's unsung heroes take the viewer on a compelling journey in time as they trace the evolution of The Motown Sound" from its origins in Detroit to its demise in Los Angeles during the seventies. Through the eyes of the riveting characters who ruled Hitsville's studio by day and the club scene of Detroit by night, we enter a world of unparalleled soul and emotion as the Funk Brothers revisit the sites of their musical roots, triumphs, and eventual heartbreak.

For more than four decades, from the dance floors of the world, to the Detroit riots of 1967, to the war in Vietnam, the music the Funk Brothers created has played a major role in the cultural fabric of all of our lives. STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MOTOWN finally puts some faces on that music and introduces these heroic musical figures to the world.

Fourteen years in the making, this film is based upon a book of the same title that won the 1989 Rolling Stone / BMl "Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Award", STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MOTOWN was shot in 35mm film, on location in Detroit and elsewhere. This one hour and forty-eight minute documentary and performance film tells the Funk Brothers' saga through archival footage and still photos, narration, interviews, re-creation scenes, 20 Motown master tracks, and twelve new live performances of Motown classics with the Funk Brothers backing up Chaka Khan, Ben Harper, Bootsy Collins, Montell Jordan, Meshell Ndegeocello, Joan Osborne, and Gerald Levert.