Skip to main content

jamesmccafferty
30th March 2020

MANIFF 2020: Up From the Streets

Up From the Streets has a broad focus, but succeeds in creating a thoroughly enjoyable introduction to the musical history of New Orleans
Categories:
TLDR
MANIFF 2020: Up From the Streets
Photo: MANIFF

Produced and hosted by trumpeter and composer Terence Blanchard, Up From the Streets is a documentary film that attempts to chart the history and development of the city of New Orleans through music.

The film combines archive footage with live performances from contemporary New Orleans bands and interviews with influential figures from Robert Plant and Sting, to Harry Connick, Jr. and Wynton Marsalis.

Beginning with the city’s earliest musical moments, such as the African drumming brought to the American South by the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, Up From the Streets covers a vast period of time up to the present day and moves through genre charting the common elements that characterise the city’s musical output.

Partly as a consequence of this expansive time covered, it acts more as an introductory overview than an in-depth exploration.

Even so, the film succeeds at highlighting the important role of music within wider society. Throughout the film, music can be seen both as a product of the environment and societal conditions in which it developed and a tool for actively changing those same conditions. Key figures like Louis Armstrong are considered within the social structures that operated around them.

At certain points, the relatively short runtime does feel as though it holds the narrative back and it could easily be split into two or three separate features that focus more specifically on a particular genre, figure or time period.

In spite of this, Up From the Streets meets its key objective by providing an enjoyable, thought-provoking and moving timeline of the music of New Orleans.

3.5/5.


More Coverage

Wicked Little Letters review: Profanity and mystery in 1920s England

Come for the endless profanity but stay for Olivia Colman in this new comedy set in 1920s England

Preview: Manchester Film Festival returns to the Great Northern | MFF 2024

Manchester Film Festival returns once again to the Odeon Great Northern, this time they’re celebrating 10 years of introducing cutting-edge cinema to the city’s audience

Uncut film takes: The biggest Oscar snubs of the last 10 years

Which films deserved a win or even just a nomination? We’re here to correct history

My first night at the Oscars: The 2024 Academy Awards as seen from my laptop

The Oscars aired for the first time on ITV this year but is it really worth staying up to watch them?