Wendy Ide 

A Poem Is a Naked Person review – a better slideshow than a documentary

This newly released 70s study of singer-songwriter Leon Russell has a retro beauty to its footage that surpasses its subject
  
  

Leon Russell in A Poem Is a Naked Person.
‘A vivid Kodachrome beauty’: Leon Russell in A Poem Is a Naked Person. Photograph: Courtesy of Janus Films

This free-wheeling, stream of consciousness documentary is as much about a scene as it is about its subject, singer-songwriter Leon Russell. Shot between 1972 and 1974, it’s unpolished, and at times seemingly unedited. The film works best as a kind of living street photography – footage of an Oklahoma “goose grab” and a marching band has a vivid Kodachrome beauty. Unfortunately, most of the film is given over to musicians, baked and bickering endlessly in recording studios.

Watch the trailer for A Poem Is a Naked Person.
 

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