The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2005)
Complex Corporation, This Is That Productions

Description

Daniel Johnston is a manic-depressive genius singer/songwriter/artist, revealed in this portrait of madness, creativity and love. The Devil and Daniel Johnston is a stunning portrait of a musical and artistic genius who nearly slipped away. Director Jeff Feurzeig exquisitely depicts a perfect example of brilliance and madness going hand in hand with subject Daniel Johnston. As an artist suffering from manic depression with delusions of grandeur, Daniel Johnston’s wild fluctuations, numerous downward spirals, and periodic respites are exposed in this deeply moving documentary.

Tags

Sundance award winner, Psychiatry, Manic-depressive

Collected reviews and ratings

10 The Onion A.V. Club | Noel Murray

By the time Feuerzeig gets to his final shot—an artful portrait of Johnston's parents, with their son looming over them like a curse—he's emerged with the most harrowing and aesthetically keen portrait of madness and artistic inspiration since Crumb.
Read full review (Cinema)

10 Stylus Magazine | Chris Flynn

As Feuerzeig’s documentary progresses, it is difficult not to fall under the Johnston spell and feel ashamed you have not heard of him before. Those who have must be saluted.
Read full review (Cinema)

10 The Documentary Blog | Jay C

This film worked for me on so many levels. It’s visually stunning, the music is great and the story is told with amazing honesty.
Read full review (DVD)

9.0 Daily Mirror

Touching, funny and sad, it's the best music doc since DIG!
Read full review (Cinema)

8.8 Reel | Tim Knight

A haunting, frequently unsettling documentary about the blurry line between madness and genius, The Devil and Daniel Johnston chronicles the "stranger than fiction" life and career of songwriter/visual artist Daniel Johnston, who's struggled with manic depression since adolescence.
Read full review (Cinema)

8.8 Rolling Stone | Peter Travers

Bouts with LSD and devil phobias took Daniel off the deep end. No wonder Kurt Cobain was a fan. But it's the way Feuerzeig walks with him on the line between creativity and madness that digs this haunting and hypnotic film into your memory.
Read full review (DVD)

8.3 Entertainment Weekly | Owen Gleiberman

He's the Chauncey Gardiner of indie rock - a mirror of his audience's I-can-be-a-star-too narcissism - and the movie's infuriating intrigue is that it all but begs us to turn ourselves into groupies to watch it.
Read full review (Cinema)

8.0 Amazon user reviews

You will never see a documentary that delves so deeply into one person's life as does this one. As sad and disturbing as most of it is, it nonetheless ends as happily as it is possible for someone with the world of troubles afflicting Johnston.
Read full review (DVD)

8.0 filmcritic.com | Chris Cabin

The Devil and Daniel Johnston somehow has the power to be both emotionally resonant and completely entertaining without copping out of any faction of Johnston’s life. Feuerzeig’s film, whether you’re a fan of Johnston’s or not, is a definitive statement of an artist who can’t get rid of the monsters in his head.
Read full review (Cinema)

8.0 New York Times | Dana Stevens

Jeff Feuerzeig, who won the best-director award at the 2005 Sundance festival, cobbles together a moving portrait of the artist as his own ghost.
Read full review (Cinema)

8.0 Salon.com | Stephanie Zacharek

We know we're watching a human being unraveling. Feuerzeig has to include footage like that if he's going to tell Johnston's story honestly, and he does so without being exploitive: You get the sense that he's always cutting away at just the right moment, erring on the side of showing us too little rather than too much.
Read full review (Cinema)

7.0 Slant Magazine | Ed Gonzalez

The Devil and Daniel Johnston is a compelling and obsessive humanization of an American eccentric.
Read full review (Cinema)

6.0 Los Angeles Times | Kenneth Turan

A performer of formidable self-absorption, Johnston has inspired a film with the same trait, and the results are about what you might expect.
Read full review (Cinema)

6.0 The Guardian | Peter Bradshaw

Johnston has presence and charisma, certainly. If a feature were to be made of his life, Sam Rockwell would play Young David, and Jon Lovitz would be Old David.
Read full review (Cinema)