SXSW 2022: This Much I Know To Be True
More than five years after the tragedy that was chronicled in their last documentary, One More Time with Feeling, director Andrew Dominik and musician Nick Cave create something that’s as deeply moving and filled with examples of the brilliant work each artist is known for, in the new doc This Much I Know To Be True.
It's a barebones experience. Select songs from the albums Ghosteen and Carnage are played in one cavernous London building. Collaborator Warren Ellis accompanies Cave, along with a stripped down band and backup singers. If you want a “concert film,” you’ll get one here. You won’t have time to breathe as they go through song after song—after an extended conversation with Cave at the start of the film, there are only a few breaks between the setlist.
The sound mix is incredible, and the fact that it’ll be available in 5.1, 7.1, and Dolby Atmos should make any audiophile excited. It’s reserved when it needs to be, and LOUD when necessary. A song like “Albuquerque” gets up close—Cave’s melancholically eccentric lyrics are front and center. But as soon as “Hand of God” hits, the light show, the camera work, Cave, Ellis, and the backup singers, all were turned up to 11. Watching it on a big screen in a theater, I could feel that song bring down the house, as if I were watching these performers live. Each song comes to life in new ways, thanks to Dominik’s direction (he also sequenced the light system) and Robbie Ryan’s cinematography. The seamless cutting together of multiple takes, the constantly rotating camera, the shifting aspect ratio—This Much I Know To Be True is more than just capturing the live experience of watching Cave and Ellis. These aren’t music videos all cut together; we’re in this space with these artists who are playing with the medium, experimenting with sound, light, and space.
Compared to One More Time with Feeling, less is spoken here outside of the songs—we get some glimpses inside the duo’s creative process (just wait until you see Ellis’s laptop). Most importantly we check in with Cave. If you’ve seen One More Time with Feeling you’ll feel certain moments in This Much I Know To Be True have more emotional weight as Cave alludes to his son’s passing without directly mentioning it. He shows off the porcelain figures he’s made during the pandemic and how he’s been connecting with his fans online thanks to the The Red Hand Files forum—he answers one question about how to deal with the cruel nature of life that sums up how he’s grown, not as an artist, but as a human being.
I watched One More Time with Feeling at an important time in my life in 2016, grateful for Cave's willingness to open up about his experience. The Much I Know To Be True is the much needed follow-up to that brilliant work—through the songs on display and Cave’s comforting words, it’s a welcome respite and melancholic reminder of the unruly life we’re all living.
