As the joke goes...Q. How many guitarists does it take to change a light bulb?A. Five. One to screw it in, and 4 to say, "You suck."Now as anyone could predict, when someone dares to portray the deservedly deified Jimi Hendrix, you're going to get the equivalent of the light bulb joke multiplied by thousands.I'm not a guitarist, I'm a keyboard player. And while I have been known to hurl candelabras at TV screens when the actors don't play the piano right (like Ed Harris in "Copying Beethoven" yelling "B-flat! B-flat!" as he hits an F), I've mostly come to realize what most movie fans already know: actors are actors & musicians are musicians. Each should be respected for his or her particular craft being showcased.Wood Harris does a fantastic job of staying true to the personality, quirks & mannerisms of the eccentric genius Jimi Hendrix. Jimi's gentle tone of voice, his boyish shyness in social situations, his signature laugh (a baritone "huh!") and even a lot of his stage moves, like the rapid fire over-the-neck pick slide, were recreated with an authenticity that tells me Wood must've studied as many old Hendrix clips as I have.The story itself? Of course no one can encapsulate Hendrix in 90 minutes. What this biopic does is it avoids trying to be a narrative, and instead it gives us vignettes of who Hendrix was as a human being. In other words, you don't get a typical linear biography but rather, a series of short, almost disorienting scenes of Jimi giving an interview, interspersed with scenes of his life. With this presentation, we don't always get the whole picture of--for example, Jimi opening for the Monkees and getting drowned out by 16-year-old girls shouting "We want Davy!" and subsequently quitting the tour while, as a joke, a newspaper reporter floated the rumor that he was banned by the Daughters of the American Revolution for being too erotic--that's not in there. Instead we just catch a glimpse of his frustration at being marketed so poorly for the sake of a buck. And that's what the meat of this film is about: Jimi's constant struggle with managers & big money who kept undermining his growth as an artist.If you watch this film, realize that that's the biggest conflict that Jimi had, and perhaps that's what ate him up. A rare musical visionary, he was never truly appreciated for what he wanted to do because the pop powers kept telling him to play shows and write 3 minute radio-friendly songs. Jimi wanted the opposite, and as the film notes, he sunk gobs of his profits into building Ladyland studios where he could indulge in 14-minute poetic masterpieces like "A Merman I should turn to be". This movie, I think, faithfully depicts that all-too-common battle between art & life. Few artists fought it as rebelliously as Mr. Hendrix.While I enjoyed this film & the performance by Wood Harris, I have to dock it a bunch of points for a glaring oversight: it doesn't feature any of Jimi's music!! When I say "Jimi's music" I'm not talking about the great songs "Hey Joe", "All Along the Watchtower" & "Wild Thing" which are indeed in the film. But Jimi didn't write those songs. Since this movie focuses on Jimi the creative visionary, shouldn't they have featured a few of the songs he actually wrote? The only way we can hope to get into Jimi's mind is through his brooding masterpieces "The Wind Cries Mary", "Manic Depression", "Merman" ...what about "Little Wing"?My guess is that it may have been some licensing problem, because really there's not a single songwriting credit to Jimi. So because of that, I drop this film from a solid 8 or 9 down to 7 stars. It's still very much worth watching, but it may leave you a bit unfulfilled. No worries, the best education is to listen to a Hendrix album.

I didn't see the beginning and came upon this movie just by "zapping through", in the scene where Faye Pridgeon (Vivica A. Fox) tells Jimi "The Village ain't no neighborhood for a black man, Jimi, you'll see!" What follows then (not surprising for a made-for-TV movie) is a ridiculous medley of some terrible acting, really bad wigs and wannabe sixties set productions, reminiscent in parts of Oliver Stone's Doors movie. I guess I was watching for a little while just for amusement, when it occurred to me that Wood Harris as Jimi was catching my attention. He is giving a consistent performance throughout this inconsistent movie, channeling "his" Jimi Hendrix, who comes across as curious, vulnerable, friendly, pacifistic, bottled up, addictive, selfish, self-destructive, sad and complicated. That for me is an accurate enough description of the real-life Jimi to be satisfied. Also Harris looks a hell of a lot like Jimi and has the only talented wardrobe person on the set working for him (I wouldn't be surprised if he himself chose some of his own wardrobe). It is a hard task to begin with for an actor to portray a legend like Jimi, also performing on stage, making us believe he plays the guitar like one of the most unusual virtuosos of our time. On top of that, the concerts he is required to reenact are some of the most viewed (and admired) Jimi Hendrix performances: Monterey Pop Festival, Woodstock etc. but I think he does it really well. The moment where he addresses the crowd at Monterey and tells them something like "I can't tell you 'thank you', 'thank you', 'thank you' enough - I just want to hug you all, squeeze you, like, uh..." you get this fuzzy feeling of a Hendrix who was not a cool and distant rock-star but a boyish, tripping (he just dropped acid), loving musician who did manage to transcend some of that love through his music. Wood Harris stands up to any close-up shots. He has a vast repertory of emotions going through his face, his eyes becoming more and more distant and blind throughout the movie, indicating effectively the disillusion with life and inability to 'understand' and cope that tormented Jimi Henrix. I do like also that the use of drugs is subtly indicated and not used in a melodramatic way. After all, they were the 'chosen' remedy against the disillusion and not its cause. There is a scene where Chas Chandler says goodbye to Jimi who talks but isn't really there. During the conversation he feeds his void, constantly swallowing pills, flushing them with alcohol, taking a drag off a pipe, while saying things like "Yeah, I'm cool man" in this almost, but not quite convincing tone. The drug use is indicated as barely noticed by Jimi himself, but very much noticed by his surroundings, unable to stop it or even address it. There is another scene which sticks with me: The "Plaster Casters" are visiting Jimi to make a cast of his penis. They show him the cast of Keith Moon's penis which is apparently not quite matching up to Jimi's size. The laugh with which Jimi responds is not one of an arrogant rock-god, but eerily confused, part what he feels is expected of him, part surprise with the seriousness of the "Plaster Casters" and part amusement with him winning this "contest" without having actually done anything. The movie seems so plump and with no real direction for the actors that it is beyond me how Wood Harris managed to give such a versatile performance. I wonder if he will be equally stunning in portraying completely different characters or if he just managed to channel Jimi Hendrix so well. I will certainly keep his name in mind and hope he will get interesting parts offered in more serious, important and artfully done movies. The worst part of "Hendrix" is the ending - no symbolism, no poetics, no mystery, just a text appearing informing us (what we already know ) how he died and this quote of his about transcending love and spirituality - well, dear director, that is exactly what your movie was supposed to do, to SHOW us what is in this quote, leaving no need to SPELL it out in the end....

He turns in a cool performance. I recall when they were shooting this in in the summer. Recreating a purple hazy Woodstock on a modest budget. And I know that a lot of the actors didn't know how to play (including the drummer), but I especially enjoyed some of the foxy ladies and those scenes of Jimi's band and guitar roadie (Michael Stevens) striding through the airport in slo-mo. This film is a Jimi Hendrix 'experience' ...

I'm a big fan of Jimi,and this music totally ruins itself soon after it starts. The camera work for one,is horrible. The zooms and constant angle changes don't convey any kind of meaning, they just make you dizzy. Also, I didn't like how it went from stock footage from the actual 60's to pretty little film, it didn't fit. The plot was extremely slow, and the only reason I kept watching it was because of the music, and the acting was good, but horrible direction.