Off The Charts

Year: 2003

Grade: B

Country: USA

Director: Meltzer

Review

this is what documentaries should be about – exposing you to a little known segment of society in an interesting and engaging way. in this case the subject is song-poems seen through the eyes of those who create, collect and request them. essentially a song poem is a song that is made from a person’s poetry or lyrics. person a finds an ad in the newspaper or a trade magazine and pays person b to turn their poetry into music. needless to say the documentary filmmakers introduce us to some eccentric individuals and, in the process, we learn a good deal about this little known aspect of society. strangely enough there were actually two songs in the film that i had actually heard before; i must have heard them on kdvs or on an npr story about the documentary. at any rate, the film is worth the 60 minute run time if you’re at all interested this kind of documentary.