Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
A funny, intimate and heartbreaking portrait of one of the world’s most beloved and inventive comedians, Robin Williams, told largely through his own words. Celebrates what he brought to comedy and to the culture at large, from the wild days of late-1970s L.A. to his death in 2014.
A deeply moving biographical documentary that benefits enormously from Robin Williams' own charisma and candor — the archive footage and interviews let him essentially 'act' as himself, earning a high mark there. The ending carries genuine emotional weight given the circumstances of his death and mental health struggles, handled with sensitivity and restraint. The narrative structure is fairly conventional for a celebrity doc, limiting novelty and plot scores, and the cinematography is functional rather than distinctive. Still, the subject matter and the intimacy of the portrait elevate it well above the average documentary.