'Birth of the Cool' does Miles Davis justice

I'm admittedly late to it, but if you are looking for an interesting watch amid the quarantine chaos that so many of us are living with right now I'd recommend the Miles Davis documentary The Birth of the Cool on Netflix (or give The Irishman a whirl, it's a masterpiece and you have the time now!).

I'm an enormous Miles Davis fan -- but I imagine even if you're not there will be a lot to appreciate here in this warts and all biography. The director, Stanley Nelson, has previously made an in depth doc on the Black Panther movement, which was similarly thorough and sophisticated.

Davis has always been one of the most fascinating, mercurial figures in music history and his story seems to cry out for the cinematic touch. Unfortunately, the one major attempt so far, Don Cheadle's Miles Ahead, was pretty forgettable.

He has so many different periods and looks and love affairs and mood swings... it's hard to pinpoint what the ideal story to tell in a narrative movie, especially since -- like so many iconic artists -- he too had a brutal descent into drug abuse, the kind of detour which has ruined many a biopic.

With The Birth of the Cool, Nelson is able to take the long, traditional view, starting with Davis' birth in East St. Louis through his final, feeble appearance at a jazz festival.

Not only is the music throughout phenomenal, but it gave me a brand new insight into Davis' process that I never had -- for instance, I learned for the first time that most of my favorite compositions of his were apparently improvisations. My mind was blown.

The talking heads are often first hand witnesses and not particularly intrusive and a narrator mimicking Davis' signature raspy whisper of a voice to narrate the proceedings. I assume the excerpts come from Davis' scorcher of an autobiography.

I read that book in college and found Davis to be a proud, arrogant and colorful character who clearly had a lot of beef with his contemporaries and with some contemporary music. You definitely don't walk away thinking he is a nice guy, and you won't feel that way after The Birth of the Cool either.

Still, it puts Davis in context as the remarkable crossover artists in music history. There simply isn't anyone attempt the kind of genre fusion he attempted in the back half of his life. And although the music he created is not for everyone's tastes and horrified jazz purists, it's certainly original.

So was Davis.