Meeting People Is Easy is not a rock film. There is not one performance in the ENTIRE movie that is in entirety (except for a muddy sounding "Exit Music [For A Film]" during the end credits and a rough mix of the b-side "Palo Alto" in the middle of the film). There are no song titles that tell you what you are watching.

It's a film about lights, sound and noise. In the truest sense of the word, it is a documentary.

The film starts with Radiohead in mid-1997 at the beginning of what would be their OK Computer tour, a time when Radiohead's third album was getting major attention and turning them into litterally the important band since the demise of Nirvana.

This is not a film where Radiohead sits down and talks with Grant Gee (the director) about their music and their problems. Gee takes a fly-on-the-wall perspective of the band and we begin to see that this film isn't really about Radiohead but how the outside world interacts with celebrity. The interviewers often find themselves more the spotlight of the scenes than the band members and the endless call tags that the band is forced to do throughout the film does a lot to dispell whatever mystique the entertainment industry had.

One of my more favorite scenes is a conversation between the director and producers of MTV's 10 Spot where they start whining about the band wanting to use a particular lighting set up. The director says it won't work and the lighting guy says that the band is being pricks about it. The director then asks the guy if he even ASKED and talked to the band about how bad it would look on TV, when the lighting guy admits that he hasn't even approached them. Or how about the little subtle touches of the band's handlers talking on a cellphone about how he thinks that Colin is whining about not enjoying his time at an awards show and how he's "just that way". Radiohead, to their credit, allows Gee to show them as sometimes inarticulate wankers who are moody and manic depressive. You find yourself asking, "why do they do this at all".

There is one point in the film where Thom Yorke is recounting that Pink Floyd shot a similar documentary but ended up not releasing it because it basically showed them going in and out of business meetings rather than living up to the touring lifestyle that most of us probably think being a rockstar is.

But its the live footage which reveals the the purpose, that these 5 men can completely let loose on stage and deliver this kind of music is the entire reason. It almost seems an antithesis to the starmongering that most rock stars are about today.

For the Radiohead fan, the film offers often too brief glimpses at amazing nights and performances. Gee also takes us in the studio where Radiohead record "Big Boots"/"Man-o-War"... one of the most requested fan favorites... that still has yet to be released because the band was never happy with it. An interesting glimpse at the brilliance of a song that was meant to be a throw away track on The Avengers soundtrack, that would be the highlight of most band's albums. Fans even bootleg the audio of the movie bits and you can download the song online. The film also shows us the genesis of some of the more popular Radiohead tracks, "Follow Me Around" and "Big Ideas (Don't Get Any)" that have yet to surface.

This is one of my favorite documentaries, and is recommended to anybody who wants a non-narrated tour of a band's experience in the music biz. There is really not enough of the band's music present in the film to detract if you don't particularly like the music.