Rent The Sparks Brothers (2021)

The Sparks Brothers review by Mark McPherson - Cinema Paradiso

I get the feeling Edgar Wright tried to show remarkable restraint with conceiving his documentary on the musical duo of The Sparks Brothers. Imagine being a huge fan and having someone asked confused “Who are the Sparks Brothers?” You can either fly off the handle with praise and act stunned that someone has never heard of the best band ever. Or you can collect yourself and prepare a uniquely engaging experience to introduce the world to some of the best music ever made.

The Sparks Brothers of Ron Mael and Russell Mael are interviewed for this mostly talking-head picture, with accompanying interviews from various people who worked with them and numerous celebrities inspired by them. They recount the legacy of the duo that led to over 20 records released over the course of decades. While they had struggled in their early days of music to make a mark, it’s clear when they first became a big deal. After taking their music over to the United Kingdom, they became a big hit when they debuted on TV’s Top of the Pops. It was there where the brothers were recognized as the one with the effeminate singing and the silent one who looks like Hitler. No, really, that was made audiences perk up, when they say Ron on the keyboard with that Hitler-esque mustache.

It sounded like a gimmick and it’d be easy to view them as such. But it was clear as time went on that they weren’t just trying to be some flash-in-the-pan subversives. They wanted to try new stuff and become experimental pioneers of trying out any kind of wild music and music videos they could muster. In the same way that the career of Weird Al progressed for decades (he also appears in this documentary with some insightful commentary on comedic music), the Sparks Brothers kept pushing forward, even when it seemed as though their careers might be over. There was more than one time when a new album would be released and some music host would be surprised that the Sparks were even still around.

The many opportunities the Sparks Brothers had for fame are remarkable not just for what came about but what didn’t rise above talks. Consider how in the early days, they had originally spoken with the revered French director Jacque Tati to help bring some youth to his films. This prospect did not come to pass, as Russell mentions in an interview that the toppling of some food at the table is a perfect metaphor for that deal. They would, however, play the soundtrack for the film Rollercoaster, a disaster film that few remember and the brothers openly admit was not exactly their big film debut.

One of the most unique prospects was during the 1990s when the brothers, at their lowest, placed all their chips on performing the soundtrack for a Tim Burton film based on a Japanese manga. Think about how wild that be: An entire generation wouldn’t be as perplexed by the brothers had they been a key player in a Tim Burton production. When that deal didn’t bear fruit, the brothers found themselves in tears. Yet they kept chugging away, working night and day trying to compose new and rhapsodic music, keeping a tradition alive of downing coffee in the afternoon and keep on playing.

The Sparks Brothers run rather long at 2.5 hours but this is mostly due to the length of material covered and the many interviews that take place. The archival footage is fantastically edited, the animated reenactments are cute, and the commentary by the likes of Patton Oswalt and Neil Gaiman is absolutely a treat for the ears, just as much as the music. Of course, the real stars of the film are the brothers who speak with such a subtle and grateful nature in their attempt to be incredibly amusing. This is a surprisingly wondrous documentary for how simply it goes through the lives of such celebrities (stick around during the credits for some absurd fun facts told by the brothers).