1. Charlie Is My Darling, directed by Peter Whitehead and produced by The Rolling Stones’ manager Andrew Loog Oldham, was the first documentary film about The Rolling Stones. The film was shot during the band’s second tour of Ireland that year, on 3 and 4 September 1965, and was finished in the spring of 1966.It was given its premiere at the Mannheim Film Festival in October 1966, but was never released officially in its full length, due to the legal fights between the Rolling Stones andAllen Klein and a burglary in Andrew Loog Oldham’s office, which saw all prints disappear. Shorter versions have circulated since then, however.
In 2012, a restored and extended version was finally released by Allen Klein’s ABKCO Records, which owns the rights to all older Stones material.
The 64 minutes documentary follows the group from their car trip out of London to Heathrow Airport, and from there to Dublin where they had two concerts at the Adelphi Theatre on 3 September. The next day they take a train up to Belfast for two concerts at the ABC Theatre, before returning to London by plane the following day.
Besides stage shots from the concerts (where the second Dublin concert ends in total chaos as fans storm the stage), the film contains scenes from a hotel room in Dublin (where Keith and Mick for fun do a few Beatles songs as well as a couple of their own), scenes from their train trip to Belfast, another impromptu song session by a piano (with both Keith and Andrew Oldham playing the piano while Mick impersonates Elvis Presley and sings Fats Domino’s version of “[[Blueberry Hill (song)| Blueberry Hill”), and finally their flight back to London. Intermixed with this are interviews with the band members where they talk about fame, fans and future.
The restored version premiered at the Walter Reade Theater in New York City on 29 September 2012, as part of the 2012 New York Film Festival, and was released on DVD and Blu-ray in November 2012. On 25 November 2012, it was shown by BBC Two as part of BBC’s “The Rolling Stones at 50” celebrations. According to BBC’s website, it was the first TV broadcast of the 47 year old documentary.
2. Shine a Light is a 2008 documentary film directed by Martin Scorsese documenting The Rolling Stones’ 2006 Beacon Theatre performance on their A Bigger Bang Tour.The Scorsese film also includes archive footage from the band’s career and marked the first utilisation by Scorsese of digital cinematography for his films with it being used for the backstage sequences. The film takes its title from the song of the same name, featured on the band’s 1972 album Exile on Main St. A soundtrack album was released in April 2008 on the Universal label.
Scorsese filmed the Rolling Stones at the Beacon Theatre on October 29 and November 1, 2006, but the performance footage used in the film is all from the second show. The music was recorded, mixed and co-produced by Bob Clearmountain. The concert footage is preceded by a brief semi-fictionalised introduction about the preparations for the shows, and is intercut with historical news clips and archival interviews with band members. (A “break” in a backstage game of billiards a few minutes into the film recalls the opening scene of another Scorsese rockumentary, The Last Waltz.) The shows, which were added to the tour schedule for the purposes of the film shoot, featured a different set list than was typical of other shows on the tour (see below), and were noted for their star-studded crowds, including former United States President Bill Clinton and wife, then United States Senator, currently Secretary of State; Hillary Clinton, who are shown in the film as attending a Rolling Stones soundcheck, and former President of Poland Aleksander Kwasniewski.
The Rolling Stones’ Beacon Theater performances benefitted the Clinton Foundation, a charity founded by Bill Clinton, who gave a short speech at the October 29 performance. The film also shows Jack White, Buddy Guy and Christina Aguilera performing with the Stones.