Krazy Koz is an American treasure accessible to the world. One day his dazzling lyric sheets and blue, nylon-stringed guitar will be under glass in his own museum. The Mark Kozelek Museum. Whether it's the heart-skinned, emotional honesty of Red House Painters, the epic storytelling of Sun Kil Moon, or the meta-narration, kick down the 4th wall, hard-bopish improvisation of his recent solo deluge, he's a champ every time. And the champ always fights himself first. He's also a fine boxing historian and stand-up comic who will give you fits of gale-force laughter to help balance out all of your ugly crying after listening to heartbreaking beauties such as: Ruth Marie, Duk Koo Kim, Katy Song, Lost Verses, Make Like Paper, and, more recently, R.I.P. R. Lee Ermey. You can trust him, he loves cats; always a pure sign of high character and degree. Plus his face reminds me of that Hemingway quote about a man's face being his autobiography and a woman's face being her work of fiction. Great one. On a technical level, I love the decision to go all in on the Bergman black & white. Paul Simon was totally wrong about everything looking worse in b&w.
P.S. I am not Mark Kozelek, I do not share a consanguinity with Mark Kozelek, nor have I been bribed by Mark Kozelek to write this review, which I know approaches sycophancy, but he richly deserves it. Watch this film. Listen to the man's music now and often. Buy his books too. He is his own species.
