Beware of Mr. Baker (2012)

BEWARE OF MR. BAKER  (2012)  ¢ ¢ ¢
    D: Jay Bulger
Of all the pharmaceutical adventurers who made it out of the 1960s, it's hard to imagine anybody less likely to have survived into the 21st century than Ginger Baker. Even in an era of epic drug use, Baker's consumption was legendary. Did he really shoot heroin into his eyeballs? Maybe not, but take a look at his eyes. So here's Baker in this documentary at about age 70, not only kicking and breathing, but as cranky and crazy as ever. Chain-smoking in an easy chair in his home in South Africa, Baker looks back, in a manner that's not the least bit mellow, on his career as one of the world's most accomplished and explosive drummers, and a personal life that's about as tidy as a freeway wreck. Film clips across the years show what he could do behind a drum kit. Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, Charlie Watts and Steve Winwood are among the witnesses. You get a better sense of Baker as a person than as a musician here, and the man emphatically, defiantly is who he is, take it or leave it, like it or not. You can't help admiring that in a way, but it's not clear Baker cares one way or another. It's startling when he chokes up talking about the percussionists he admires, but his attitude toward everybody else seems to be a well-aimed "Fuck off." It's not hard to see why his bands didn't last very long and other musicians and most of his wives walked away. He might've been a reckless, self-immolating asshole, and maybe still is, but he sure could play the hell out of a drum.