Down from the mountain (2000)
Pennebaker Hegedus Films

Description

On May 24, 2000, the historic Ryman Auditorium was booked to offer Nashvillians an evening of sublime beauty. Label executives and soundtrack producers so loved the music of O Brother, Where Art Thou? that they brought it to life as a benefit concert for the Country Music Hall of Fame. Filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen loved it so much that they hired famed documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker to record the show for posterity. The concert that unfolded that night was one of the greatest musical moments in the annals of Music City. Performers: John Hartford, Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, Chris Thomas King, The Cox Family, Fairfield Four, Union Station, Colin Linden, The Nashville Bluegrass Band, The Peasall Sisters, Ralph Stanley, David Rawlings, The Whites. 98 minutes.

Collected reviews and ratings

9.2 digitallyobsessed.com | Dan Heaton

Down From the Mountain presents a superb collection of musical talent together for one memorable concert of folk tunes. This documentary stands well as a concert film, but it also offers a personal look at the minds behind the songs.
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9.0 Amazon user reviews

If you love the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack, D.A. Pennebaker, Chris Hegedus, and Nick Doob's exhilarating concert film Down from the Mountain will be sheer heaven. And if you're new to bluegrass and "old-time mountain-style" music, the performances (also on CD) will be a revelation.
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9.0 New York Times | A. O. Scott

A number of songs performed in "Down From the Mountain," a documentary by D. A. Pennebaker, Chris Hegedus and Nick Doob, are about the promise of life after death. If you have any affection at all for traditional American music, the movie itself, which opens today at the Screening Room, is pretty close to heaven.
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8.5 DVD Verdict | Patrick Naugle

Aside of a few recognizable faces, Down From The Mountain includes riveting performances by a vast majority of unique, relatively unknown musicians, each one bringing something new to the melodious roundtable. Fans of this genre of music are going to really enjoy Down From The Mountain.
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8.0 The Guardian | Peter Bradshaw

It's an enjoyable foot-tapping romp and you have to have a heart of stone not to respond to some of the numbers.
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8.0 Eye For Film | Angus Wolfe Murray

As the celebration of a soundtrack, the Coen brothers and T Bone Burnett organised a concert for those who played on the film, O Brother Where Art Thou. It turned out to be a great deal more than an end-of-shoot wrap party.
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7.5 Austin Chronicle | Marrit Ingman

A crowd-pleaser at this year's SXSW, the film is intimate and rich, showcasing some truly transcendent moments of effortless musicianship and down-home soul. Yet it's also thinner than you might expect from legendary documentarian Pennebaker.
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7.0 Variety | Robert Koehler

There was a sly, running spoof throughout the Coen Brothers' "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" of the ways in which "old-timey music" was being marketed and broadcast during the depths of the Depression, and in a very real way, the new docu "Down From the Mountain" is a part of that marketing.
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7.0 San Francisco Chronicle

The runaway success of the soundtrack to the Coen Brothers' slapstick odyssey "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" ensures an audience for this follow-up concert documentary. Like the old-timey music that inspired it, "Down From the Mountain" is sweet, serene and utterly unconcerned with polish.
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7.0 Washington Post | Richard Harrington

Famed documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker ("Don't Look Back," "Monterey Pop") and co-directors Chris Hegedus and Nick Doob were called in late and given a minimal budget, limiting nonperformance filming mostly to informal rehearsals and waiting rooms backstage.
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6.7 The Onion A.V. Club | Keith Phipps

Pennebaker and frequent collaborator Hegedus generally excel at behind-the-scenes material, but they limit themselves here; their conversations with the artists, though frequently entertaining, rarely reveal much.
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4.0 DVD Times | Mark Boydell

Although probably not as mesmerising in style as Buena Vista Social Club nor as groundbreaking as Pennebaker's own Dylan documentary (Don't look back), this is still a very good film of (and around) a concert which is well worth the detour for die-hard fans and neophytes alike.
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