Part of Music City Mondays and Restoration Roundup
Bruce Weber’s gift for gorgeous black and white photography made him famous, and as a filmmaker, he found the perfect subject in jazz icon Chet Baker, a remarkably photogenic figure. Through archival footage, we sample Baker’s early career, a television appearance, a jazz festival gig, and a couple commercial films — and sprinkled throughout are spot-on reminiscences from friends, family and fellow musicians. But the film’s true poignancy lies in the contemporary footage of Baker as he plays, sings, and almost sleep-walks through life as seen from early footage of his honeyed voice and James Dean-like visage to the weathered voice and cratered face Weber would shoot in what would be the final year of Baker’s life.
Restored by Cineric, New York City from a 16mm reversal original of the film, Supervised by Bruce Weber.
“LET’S GET LOST stands as a gorgeous gravestone for the Beat Generation's legacy of beautiful-loser chic.” —Jim Ridley, Village Voice
“I hadn’t seen LET’S GET LOST since it first came out, in 1988, and what I remembered, mostly, was the downbeat glory of the movie’s textures…. What I hadn’t recalled — or, more accurately, hadn’t appreciated — is the way that Weber created just about the only documentary that works like a novel, inviting you to read between the lines of Baker’s personality until you touch the secret sadness at the heart of his beauty.” —Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly
“The enduring fascination of LET’S GET LOST, the reason it remains powerful even now, when every value it represents is gone, is that it’s among the few movies that deal with the mysterious, complicated emotional transactions involved in the creation of pop culture — and with the ambiguous process by which performers generate desire. Mr. Baker isn’t so much the subject of this picture as its pretext: He’s the front man for Mr. Weber’s meditations on image making and its discontents.” —Terrence Rafferty, New York Times