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Awesome

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 22 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 3 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Documentary | Musical
Written by:
Directed by: Nathaniel Hornblower (aka Adam Yauch)
Release Date:
Theatrical: March 31, 2006
DVD: July 25, 2006
Running Time: 90 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: R for language
Starring Mike D, Adam Horovitz, Adam Yauch, Mix Master Mike, Money Mark, and Doug E. Fresh
A formally innovative feature film experience, the Beastie Boys handed out 50 cameras to audience members at their sold-out performance in New York's famed Madison Square Garden in October 2004. These 50 different passionate perspectives shot from the point-of-view of the audience take the viewer deep inside the world of a live Beastie Boys show, prismatically and kinetically capturing the experience of a live musical performance like no film has ever done. (ThinkFilm)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Film Threat Michael Ferraro
The Beastie Boys have delivered the ultimate gift to their fans and the title couldn't be more perfect.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Ann Hornaday
A killer concert film, an ecstatic testament to the joys of fandom and a tribute to the democratizing potential of moviemaking technology.
Read Full Review >Premiere Jessica Letkemann
Obviously, if you don't like the Beasties or live music, arena-style, it's unlikely that you'll like their movie. But if you've ever even privately caught yourself nodding your head to "Brass Monkey," or you have a soft spot for the big-venue concert experience, Awesome rocks.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Ken Fox
Needless to say, anyone who's not entirely down with the beastly noise of the Beastie Boys will hate every second of it. This one's strictly for -- and, for the most part, by -- the fans.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves
The result: a swirling, kaleidoscopic take on a familiar concept, and a raucous, you-are-there atmosphere.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
It's raucous and loud as hell; the hyperactive editing could trigger grand mal seizures.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
It's the next best thing to being front and center.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
If you're not a Beasties fan, you'll get almost nothing out of this after about two minutes. But if you like the band and want to see them rock hard in front of their oldest fans, it's a tasty treat.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
After this movie, the Beasties and their fans, camera-totin' or not, are left drenched, exhausted, delighted.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Ernest Hardy
The movie starts to drag near the end and feels longer than its 90 minutes - but that's cool. It's a love letter to the faithful in the first place.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Laura Sinagra
With Awesome's insistence on professional sound--only a few times do we get sonically dropped into the cavernous, thumping Garden--and cuts to pristine close-ups of things like Mixmaster Mike's admittedly sick scratch detail work, it plays like a hype victory lap rather than a boundary-smashing study of fan curiosity or pathology.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
Cutting to the beat of the Beasties' propulsive rap, Hörnblowér creates an experience that is simultaneously low-fi and state-of-the-art.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Boils down to a performance film with abysmal sound in which you rarely get to see a good, revealing close-up of the stars.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
Awesome will please fans of the band, but expect little crossover to nonfans. No new ground is broken here. From a cinematic point of view, Awesome represents simply a monumental postproduction salvaging effort.
Read Full Review >New York Post Kyle Smith
The film quickly ceases to be of interest to anyone but dedicated fans. The novelty of the deliberate ugliness wears off after a song or two.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Neva Chonin
The result, although a great idea, doesn't translate into a great movie.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Nathan Lee
As for the authorial conceit - assembling the movie from giddy, spastic, amateur photography captured from every part of the arena - at best it yields energetic perspectives on the show, at worst it looks like a cellphone video camera having an epileptic seizure.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Bob Mehr
Eventually the shaky, grainy visuals grow tiresome, but director Nathaniel Hornblower (aka Beastie Boy Adam Yauch) keeps things lively with a variety of editing tricks and sly humor.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Bill White
For the most part, the film is a chaotic blur of disconnected movement that re-creates the feeling of an unforgettably bad concert experience.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 9.0 (out of 10) based on 3 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Kevin D. gave it an8:
This film was definitely worth considering for best documentary. Second to the Block Party this year, the Beastie Boys are at the top of their game, bringing top solid rhymes as well as rocking it out with their instruments, as they keep it classic and old school, bringing many of their old songs back with their fervered energy. Their film work was a little shoddy, but also unique because it was done by amateurs, but it also gave it a sense of realism into the documentary. The short film about Nathaniel Hornblower (who is actually Adam Yauch, who is also known as MCA) was not too bad, the lead being played by Tobias from the critically acclaimed, Arrested Development. This film was definitely worth your time. This should add strongly to the collection of other Beastie Boys material.
