Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten 2007

A.O. Scott, New York Times: Leaves behind a surprising afterglow and allows you to appreciate Joe Strummer's warmth. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Temple has plenty of cinematic tricks and willing interview subjects. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The story illustrates how easily political art can be hijacked by the other side, and it illuminates the anguish of a man who spent the last 20 years of his life wrestling with his legacy. Read more

Tom Keogh, Seattle Times: Temple's film offers a rich, detailed portrait of a commanding but idealistic Strummer against the backdrop of the do-it-yourself punk ethos of the late '70s. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: The Future Is Unwritten is as overstuffed as Sandinista!, but it races ahead like 'White Riot.' Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Suffused with clear-eyed affection for its subject and times, this is not your little brother's punk documentary. Read more

Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times: A beautiful, evocative collage composed of concert footage, photographs, interviews and film clips, as well as interviews with people who knew him, the film is a rigorously thorough biography and an impassioned accolade. Read more

Greg Kot, Chicago Tribune: The singer's life is compressed into a two-hour montage of interviews, vintage video snippets and artsy filigree in Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Future is overlong and will best be enjoyed and understood by fans, but even newcomers will appreciate the essential drive of the man, who died of a sudden heart attack in 2002, and admire his ability to balance anger and ecstasy. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: The Future Is Unwritten captures the Joe Strummer who, in the late 1970s, just about firebombed the rock establishment with his fury. Read more

Amy Nicholson, I.E. Weekly: The big unanswerable question is: Do we wish Strummer would have listened to David Lee Roth's advice that "You don't have to take life so seriously, honey"? Read more

Charles Taylor, L.A. Weekly: Temple succeeds beautifully in evoking Strummer as a cross between a punk journeyman and one of the battered, upright gunmen who populate Sam Peckinpah's films. Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: [Director Temple's] documentary can be quite clear-eyed, especially when exploring Strummer's lesser-known years before and after The Clash. As Strummer attempts to define and redefine himself, he seems human but still heroic. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: The movie fascinates not so much because of Strummer, whose brooding temperament and flash-and-burn career arc seems pretty routine by rock standards, but because of the way Temple organized and edited the film. Read more

V.A. Musetto, New York Post: Compelling viewing, even for people who don't care a bit for the punk scene. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Julien Temple's film is an energizing work of art, a visually striking and inspiring look at a band that never 'sold out' and the leader who saw to it that they didn't. Read more

Dan DeLuca, Philadelphia Inquirer: Julian Temple has done cinematic justice to the punk humanist born John Graham Mellor. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Celebrates Strummer's fecundity and self-invention and honors his reticence and private despair, reminding us along the way what a contradictory and amazing affair a single human life is. Read more

Joel Selvin, San Francisco Chronicle: The Future Is Written is a loving testimonial to one of rock's true originals. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: Temple, who chronicled the Sex Pistols...offers the full, sometimes bloated, context of Strummer's life through the testimony of his many friends and collaborators. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: Miracle of miracles, a valuable portrait of Strummer manages to emerge from the chaos, helped by the film's one consistent thread: tapes of a BBC World Service radio show he hosted in his final years. Read more

Dave Calhoun, Time Out: Read more

Robert Koehler, Variety: The late punk rock legend Joe Strummer is rendered fully human in Julian Temple's engrossing and all-encompassing portrait. Read more

Jim Ridley, Village Voice: The Future Is Unwritten is less a eulogy than a wake, and one in which the subject is startlingly present. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten is one artist's moving tribute to another: director Julien Temple's poetic evocation of the life of punk's greatest troubadour. Read more