I've said this too many times before but I'll say it again, it's simply astounding how many film festivals happen here in São Paulo throughout the year. More astounding is how specific some of them are. This week just gone was In-Edit, a film festival comprised only of musical documentaries. And yet the festival schedule is jam-packed with new films, shorts and feature-lengths, as well as a few special screenings of slightly older musical documentaries (e.g. 'End of the Century: the Story of the Ramones'). Originally started in Barcelona 7 years ago, it now has editions in Santiago, Buenos Aires, and now São Paulo too. There were many films I wish I could've seen, such as 'Favela on Blast', a documentary about the roots of baile funk in Rio, or 'Godfather of Disco', which told the story of Mel Cheren who, together with Larry Levan, transformed Disco in New York into a cultural movement during the 70s and 80s. As ever, time constraints meant I didn't get to see either of these (this is in fact the second time I've missed out on 'Favela on Blast' as it was screened at the São Paulo International Film Festival last year as well). The only film I did get to see was a documentary about Nina Simone, entitled 'Nina Simone: Love Sorceress...Forever'

I've never really known much about Nina Simone. Apart from the more famous hits such as 'My Baby Just Cares For Me', 'Sinnerman', or 'Mood Indigo', I couldn't say I knew much about her style. I didn't know of her impassioned nature and her captivating stage presence. I didn't even that she spoke with such a strong African accent, or at least that she started to after spending some time in Liberia. It would be great to say that I found this all out from the well-structured and insightful documentary I saw. Unfortunately, that's far from the case.

The documentary was based around three alternating sections: an interview with a French friend of Nina Simone (whose name escapes me now), shots of a girl driving around Paris in a taxi, and footage from Nina Simone's performance at the 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival. The French friend waxes lyrical about Simone's forceful personality as we are indulged with entire songs from the performance, occasionally interrupted by the girl sightseeing from the back of a car. In the end, it's revealed that girl in the car is a jazz singer on her way to a concert and was listening to a radio show about Nina Simone (presumably, the audio version of the film we've just watched). After being reminded of how important and inspiring Nina Simone was in her life, the singer performs 'Feeling Good' to her audience. And on that meta-note, the film ends.

I must admit that I thoroughly enjoyed watching the documentary, but that's not to merit the filmmaker at all. What was so thrilling to watch was Nina Simone performing, each word she sings carrying her grace, her frustration and her sadness simultaneously. The interview was far from dull or pointless, unlike the inclusion of the other jazz singer, yet they both distracted from the concert footage which was simply incomparable. Perhaps it was from watching it on a big screen and loud speakers, but the energy she conveyed was so powerful that at times, one felt like applauding her at the end of a song. Incidentally, several people did do that a couple of times during the screening. But evidently, the filmmaker shouldn't receive any credit for this type of audience reaction since he had nothing to do with that footage. And it's not hard to find at all, one can very easily buy the Live at Montreux DVD. It feels as if calling this film a documentary undermines the work of countless other documentary filmmakers who've worked hard to research material, facts, find out things that even the avid fan might not know. If it was meant to be an ode to Simone and specifically that performance, why not show more around the show, about her time in Africa that she mentions and the effect that had on her and her music? Instead, we simply saw her concert with a few bits and bobs in between. As one person said as I was leaving the cinema, "They should've just shown the whole concert, it would've been much better". I couldn't have agreed more.

Having said that, I highly recommend finding a copy of the DVD. She truly is an enigmatic performer, as this clip from the concert will show. It's 10 minutes long but it's worth every second of it.