Slate’s Sam Adams uses a just released Justin Timberlake concert picture to adduce Jonathan Demme’s genius for shooting concert performances:
But despite the victory-lap setup, Demme frames the concert as just another day on the job, especially for musicians and dancers in Timberlake’s expansive retinue. Timberlake is the movie’s center, but it often seems more interested in the people off to either side. During “Let the Groove Get In,” Timberlake strides out onto a transparent catwalk stretched over the audience, the better to show off his impressive dance moves. But when it’s his turn to hold the spotlight, Demme cuts back to the stage, framing a distant Timberlake between a horn player and a guitarist whose bodies dominate the frame, as if to remind us who’s really responsible for that all-important groove.
Adams rather too strenuously assures readers that Timberlake is a minor performer, but it doesn’t matter. Demme’s method allowed vestigial talents their moment — and why not? Flattering the performers by emphasizing their labor on stage constituted Demme’s best talent; Demme had no patience for star turns. A pity he never filmed Drake.
